THE PARTY HEGEMONY IN GEORGE ORWELL’S NINETEEN EIGHTY-FOUR

Rudi Fitrianto
E-mail: vitrian87@gmail.com

Supervised by:
Rosyid Dodiyanto, S.S., M.Hum and M. Taufiqurrohman, S.S, M.Hum

English Language and Literature Study Program, Department of Humanities, Faculty of Social and
Political Science, Jendral Soedirman University
Jl. Dr. Soeparno, Karangwangkal, Purwokerto 53122

ABSTRACT

Rudi Fitrianto. 2013. The Party Hegemony In George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty Four. English
Language and Literature Program. Department of Humanities, Faculty of Social and Political Science,
Jenderal Soedirman University, Purwokerto. Academic Year 2012/2013. First Supervisor: Second
Supervisor: Examiner:

Keyword : Hegemony, persuasive, forceful, Rudi Fitrianto, socialist, dystopia.

This research is entitled The Party Hegemony In George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty Four, which
analyzes about hegemony of The Party depicted in the novel by The Party. This research studies about
in what form the party use the hegemony to dominate outer party and the paroles as the lower class.
The method of this research is descriptive qualitative that describes the phenomenon of
hegemony used by ruler class or in this case is the party. The primary data are taken from a George
Orwell novel, nineteen eighty four, whereas the secondary data is taken from external resources relates
to the theory of hegemony.
The result of this research shows that there are two kinds of hegemony form used by The party.
The first form is persuasive hegemony, it is hegemony in the form of consensus which is frequently
broadened from a very implicit movement, propaganda, and any tools with the purpose of developing
a coercive influence in an ideological understanding according to the ruling class of government in
this case the term of government is equal to the party. Persuasive hegemony becomes one of the
equipment in holding and maintaining the power of politics in Big Brother regime. Processions,
pamphlets, banners, songs and slogans are the various ways to implant intensely somebody’s mind
and consciousness as behavior patterns, thought and belief. The effectiveness of persuasive
hegemony that is ruled by Big Brother regime is clearly understood since it has an indirect influence
to the common society of Oceania. With this kind of strategy, persuasive hegemony becomes more
efficient rather than any revolutionary and direct force even though it is needed a gradual stage not
an instant outcome.
The second form of hegemony that is found in Nineteen Eighty Four is forceful hegemony. It
is hegemony that applying a strict punishment that inflicts of severe physical cruelty such as:
confining, imprisoning, kidnapping, forced labor, torture and killing. The purpose of forceful
hegemony is not the punishment itself but persuade somebody to confess or recant something had
1
been done before. The thing that has more important is to confess and regret than forgot it as
something never been thought and done before and finally replacing all those orthodox manners with
a new consciousness of ideology as a complete obedience to the Big Brother.

ABSTRAK

Rudi Fitrianto. 2013. The Party Hegemony In George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty Four. Program Studi
Bahasa dan Sastra Inggris.Jurusan Ilmu Budaya, Fakultas Ilmu Sosial dan Politik, Universitas Jenderal
Soedirman, Purwokerto. Academic Year 2012/2013.Pembimbing Pertama: PembimbingKedua:
Penguji:

Kata kunci : Hegemony, persuasif, pemaksaan, Rudi Fitrianto, sosialis, dystopia.

Penelitian ini berjudul The Party Hegemony In George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty Four, yang
menganalisis tentang hegemoni yang digambarkan dalam novel oleh The Party. Penelitian ini
membahas bentuk-bentuk hegemony yang digunakan oleh The Party untuk mendominasi outer party
dan masyarakat sebagai kelas bawah.
Penelitian ini menggunakan metode deskriptif kualitatif yang menganalisa fenomena hegemoni
yang digunakan oleh kelas penguasa atau dalam hal ini adalah The Party. Data primer diproleh dari
novel George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty Four. sedangkan data sekunder diambil dari sumber lain yang
berkaitan dengan teori hegemoni.
Hasil penelitian ini menunjukkan bahwa ada dua macam bentuk hegemoni yang digunakan oleh
Partai. Bentuk pertama adalah hegemoni persuasif, Hegemoni ini adalah hegemoni dalam bentuk
konsensus yang diperluas dengan menggunakan gerakan yang sangat implisit, propaganda, dan semua
alat dengan tujuan untuk mengembangkan pengaruh paksaan pemahaman ideologis sesuai dengan kelas
penguasa pemerintah dalam hal ini dilakukan oleh The Party. Hegemoni Persuasif menjadi salah satu
cara dalam menguasai dan mempertahankan kekuasaan politik dalam rezim Big Brother. Prosesi,
pamflet, spanduk, lagu dan slogan adalah beberapa contoh media yang dipakai untuk menanamkan
suatu ide dengan intens terhadap pikiran seseorang dan menjadi kesadaran yang berubah menjadi pola
perilaku, pikiran dan keyakinan. Efektivitas hegemoni persuasif yang diperintah oleh rezim Big Brother
dipahami dengan jelas karena memiliki pengaruh tidak langsung kepada masyarakat umum Oceania.
Dalam konteks strategi, hegemoni persuasif menjadi lebih efisien daripada bentuk kekuatan
revolusioner dan langsung mengena sasaran meskipun diperlukan tahapan untuk mewujudkannya dan
bukan merukan sesuatu yang langsung berhasil.
Bentuk kedua dari Hegemoni yang Peneliti ditemukan di Nineteen Eighty Four adalah
hegemoni dengan cara pemaksaan, cara ini adalah hegemoni dimana penerapan sanksi tegas yang
menimbulkan kekejaman fisik berat seperti: Membatasi, memenjarakan, penculikan, kerja paksa,
penyiksaan dan pembunuhan. Tujuan dari hegemoni dengan cara pemaksaan bukanlah hukuman itu
sendiri tetapi untuk membujuk seseorang mengaku atau mengakui kesalahan sesuatu telah dilakukan
sebelumnya. Hal yang lebih penting dari tujuan tersebut adalah untuk mengaku dan menyesal terhadap
segala sesuatu yang dipikirkan dan dilakukan sebelumnya kemudian untuk melupakan segala hal
tersebut dengan penuh penyesalan dan akhirnya mengganti semua perilaku ortodoks dengan kesadaran
ideology baru yang sesuai dengan The Party sebagai ketaatan lengkap untuk Big Brother.

2
1. BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
Emotion maybe defined as important role in human mental life. Human emotion is defined as a
mental state that arises spontaneously rather than through conscious efforts. Human emotion is often
accompanied by physiological changes; a feeling, such as the emotions of joy, sorrow, reverence,
dislike, and love (Goertzel, 2004). In other words, emotion is the spontaneous way of human beings to
express what they feel about something in one time.
Emotions as human expression cannot be separated from social activity. In some cases, human
emotions express their feeling in social experiences. There are numerous ways that human emotions
can occur because of social activities. Human emotion is essential to understand social experiences,
which are typically considered as responses to important events in human life, and social events are
among of the most important factor of human emotion. Individual emotion has also been
conceptualized as regulated by the social constrain and affordances provided by norms, morals, and
values. In other words, individual emotion is constrained by society (Leach, 2004).
Meanwhile, individual emotional experiences are dictated by our social surroundings in a way
that is so thorough, even people do not notice for the influences. Here, human emotion is the reactive
impact about what individual feels about social events and entities. Empathy, envy, hatred, pride,
anger, regret and guilt are not simply a product of human emotional reaction to social relationship. In
other words, those emotional feelings are created as the impact of social experiences (Leach, 2004).
Regret, as one emotional effect of guilty feeling, is common human experiences and a truth
expressively based on a condition. Regret is a negative conscious and human emotional reaction to
personal past acts and personal behaviors in social activity. It is often expressed by the term of sorry, a
feeling of sadness, shame, embarrassment, depression, annoyance, or guilt, after one act in a manner
and later wishes not to have done so. Moreover, regret is distinct from guilt, which is a deeply
emotional form of regret, which may be difficult to comprehend in an objective or conceptual way. In
this regard, the concept of personal regret is subordinate to guilt in terms of its emotional intensity
(Landman, J, 1987).
Here, mental anguish is one of the impacts of regret feeling, which is generally considered as
pain and suffering. It covers not only the pain associated with the hurt feeling, but also the mental
reaction to the suffered and the possible consequences of the emotional feeling. The major factor of this
mental suffering are thought to be caused by a complex combination factors, they are biological aspect,
genetic (hereditary) aspect, familial factor, and social influences (Burg, 2012).
The issue above is the interesting case in human life, which is also taken as the theme in literary
works. One of the authors that set this issue into his works is Ian McEwan, a British writer. Ian
McEwan’s Atonement is his masterpiece novel which put individual emotions in the social life. It
affects the psychological sides of the character, mainly the mental anguish as the psychological effect
of the emotional feelings.
Atonement by Ian McEwan is a novel which is actually fiction within fiction, which means that
this novel tells about the life story of the main character’s novel. The novel is structurally and
differently built, but thematically discusses issues that has much in common. In this way, it provides an
interesting analytical basis for dynamic and contrastive discussion. Obviously, other factors come into
play with regard to the captivating effect of the novels. The author of the book is a fictive character
giving account of events taking place throughout her life. Atonement is a book written from a third
person point of view focusing on different people in different chapters but it is actually the main
character, Briony Tallis.
Briony Tallis, the main character in Atonement, is the author of the book in her old days. She
has spent her entire life writing drafts of this book as atonement for the crime she committed when she
was young which changed the lives of people around her. Since Briony is both the author of the book
and one of its characters, this reflects upon the story and the characterizations (Klausnitzer, 2008).
3
 This study belongs to literary research, which concerns on psychological elements, especially
mental anguish in the character of Briony Tallis as the main character in Ian McEwan’s Atonement.
This research employs the plot analysis, which focuses on the character of Briony Tallis, then the
factors and impacts of her mental anguish to her. The psychological approach is applied in supporting
the discussion of this research.

2. LITERATURE REVIEW
a. Psychology of Literature
According to Dudek (2009), the tools of psychology provide a means for the reader to
understand the reality of human character that is captured in literature. The reader can gain knowledge
of reality not only through the psychological study of the implied author, but the authorial person also
created in the narrative voice. Just as other characters act and make choices, this implied that author
makes judgments of his own in his representation and interpretation of characters.
Dudek sees psychology as means for making the authentic experience of literature more
accessible and meaningful to readers. Psychological analysis should not simply make literature into
case histories of neurotic characters. Psychological analysis is the best tool for exploring these
characters as real people. By bringing psychology and literature together, one’s knowledge of
experiences is amplified. Psychology helps reader to talk about what the author knows and literary
works helps the readers to know what the psychologist is talking about (Dudek, 2009).
According to Endraswara (2004), psychology of literature is comprises by three approaches.
First, textual approach which studies the characters ‘psychological aspect in the literary work. Second,
receptive-pragmatic approach which studies the reader’s psychological aspect both the effect which is
accepted and receptive process in reading a literature. Third, expressive approach which learns the
author’s psychological aspect in creating the literature projected on his manifestation. This research
employed the first approach, which focus on psychological aspect of Briony Talis in the Atonement
novel.
Basically, psychology of literature focuses on humanity aspects which are summon through the
character’s dialogues and actions. The Atonement novel is within the assumption of the first one in
which the research is not analyzed the author’s thought and feeling. The characters in the novel are
considered as human being who have his own mind and feeling, not only a mere product of the authors’
imagination.
In conclusion, psychological analysis is the best tool for exploring these characters as real
people, especially textual approach which is used to study the characters psychological aspects in
literature. In the Atonement novel, the human character that is analyzed is the mental anguish as the
effect of human emotion in the life experience.

b. Mental Anguish
Huffaker (2001) defines mental anguish or emotional distress' as an element of damages
including the mental suffering resulting from the excitation of the more distressing and painful
emotions, such as grief, severe disappointment, indignation, wounded pride, shame, guilty, despair, etc.
Pain and suffering is the ordinary term for the physical and emotional stress caused from an
injury. Some damages that might be under this category would be such aches, temporary and
permanent limitations on activity, potential shortening of life, depression or scarring. Pain and suffering
is part of the general damages. Otherwise, it is an element of emotional damages, which allows
recovery for the mental anguish and physical pain.
Meanwhile, pain and suffering are clearly not the same thing. Pain is fairly objective. There is a
shared notion of what constitutes pain and there are standardized measures for physicians to assess pain
4
and how much there is, and also there are well defined and codified interventions for the relief of pain.
Pain is one most agreed upon and publicly endorsed. When it comes to suffering, mental anguish, or
other symptoms, there are many more complicating factors. However, suffering-like mental anguish-is
a vague and controversial notion. There is no shared interpretation of what constitutes suffering
(Emanuel, 2008).
There are two types of suffering: suffering of the physical body and suffering of the mind.
Physical suffering may include a lack of basic necessities, or natural disasters, or injury to the body
from weapons, diseases, burns, abuse, or poisons. People experience this bodily pain, no matter what
our status is in life. However, suffering can be reduced by co-operation and improvement of our
physical situation, such as, for example, an improvement of medical technology. Although the cure
may not be ultimate, it provides a certain degree of relief (Sim, 2012).
Whereas, the mental suffering of our mind can be caused by many things, including
disappointment, hatred, frustration, fear, anger, and loneliness. Everybody experiences this suffering
differently. Some, for example, while watching the moon, feel wonderful and peaceful. At the same
time, others may feel terrible, lonely, or sorrowful. Another example is the mental anguish caused by
an illness. Some feel sad and terribly frightened. However, others do not feel this depression, and may
never feel mentally downcast, even though suffering from the same illness, and the same physical pain
(Sim, 2012).
Here, mental anguish can be connected with a physical and psychological injury; this term
includes both the resultant mental sensation of pain and also the accompanying feelings of distress,
fright, and anxiety. As an element of damages, it implies a relatively high degree of mental pain and
distress. It is more than mere disappointment, anger, worry, resentment, or embarrassment, although it
may include all of these, and it includes mental sensation of pain resulting from such painful emotions
as grief, severe disappointment, and guilty feeling (Scott, 2009).

3. RESEARCH METHOD
The method of this research uses the descriptive qualitative method. It means that this research
concerns on describing and analyzing the phenomenon that happened in the novel and paraphrasing it
into a descriptive form in order to be understood easily. This study belongs to literary study with
psychological approach, which uses library research in collecting the data.
The psychological approach is applied in supporting the analysis process in this research. The
approach stresses on the relationship of elements of literature to the psychological theme, which is
presented in the novel. In this case, this research discusses about the main character of the novel,
Briony Tallis, in the psychological sides, especially in her mental anguish. Meanwhile, the plot analysis
was employed to figure out the effect of events in the story line to the characterization of the main
character.
The plot analysis is the arranging events in a story, which are described in order to achieve a
certain effect to the characters in the story. Plot is a pattern of cause-effect relationships may be
created, which imposes form on experience, which is formless in the story. Thus, analyzing the plot of
a story means not simply repeating what happens, but explaining why it happens and what point this
proves (Ville, 2012). The plot analysis is employed in analyzing the data, which is done by making
some lists of all the conflicts in the story, group them according to type and think about which ones are
most important and why. Plot analysis is important in illustrating the expression and the meaning of a
work
Meanwhile, the analysis in this research is divided into three steps. The first step is
paraphrasing the primary data which are collected from the novel in order to make them easier to be
understood. The paraphrasing step is supported by the intrinsic elements of the novel itself, especially
5
the plot analysis in explaining the character of Briony Tallis by using psychological approach. The
second analysis step of this research is elaborating data and theory. The paraphrasing of the primary
data, which are taken from the dialogues, the sentences, and the discourses from the novel as the
evidences. They have been collected before being elaborated with the theory of mental anguish as the
primary point in literary review in order to answer the research questions. The last analysis step is
providing the result of the elaborating process between the evidence and theory into a descriptive form,
in order to conclude the result of this research.

4. DISCUSSION
This chapter presents the discussion of the research, which analyzed Briony character who get a
guilty feeling of her misinterpretation and her mental anguish as her atonement of her guilty feeling.
The discussion chapter of this research employs the plot analysis, in order to describe the events
happen in the story and explains the effects of those events to the character of Briony Tallis.
Analyzing the plot of a novel means not only simply retelling the events that happens in the
novel, but also explaining the cause and effect of the events that happen and what relation to the
characters. There are several points that become the focus of plot analysis, such as discovering the
play's situation, seeking the inciting incident, the main events, as well as the cause and effects patterns
among the events and the characters (Bruch, 2013).
Therefore, this research employs plot analysis to discuss about the correlation of cause effect
pattern between the events that happen in the novel and the character of Briony Tallis as the main
character that develop the plot of the novel. The discussion will focus on the factors and the impacts of
Briony’s mental anguish that is created as the cause effect of the several events in his life. Therefore,
the plot analysis in this research is divided into four parts, which the exposition and rising action
explain about the factors of Briony’s mental anguish and the climax and falling action explain about the
impacts of mental anguish.

a. Personal Factors of BrionyTallis’s Mental Anguis

1) Exposition
Atonement starts off by introducing the reader to the main character, young Briony Tallis who is
a 13 year old ambitious and imaginative writer with dreams and visions of becoming famous one day.
Briony has written and prepared a play for her older brother Leon, who is returning home from
London, where he lives and works, for a weekend with his family. Three cousins from the north arrive,
Lola, Jackson, and Pierrot, to spend the summer at the Tallis home while their parents are supposedly
attempting to work out their differences.
Briony is 13 year old girl of Tallis family who loves writing a literary works. Middle
adolescence, of 13 year old girl, is a time of blossoming development - the insecure, inwardly focused
13-year-old becomes a cheerful, charming 16-year-old looking toward the future. During this time
Briony starts thinking about her imagination of writing skills to take a decidedly adult turn become
increasingly important to her.
In this case, Briony tries to concern to her writing activity, while she starts to think that she can
think as an adult in the character she makes. At this age, Briony starts thinking about herself, others,
and the world shift to a much more adult level. She enters middle adolescence with a focus on things
she can experience here and now, and moves to being able to imagine the range of possibilities life
holds (Firchow, 2013).
On her play "The Trials of Arabella", Briony writes a metaphor for what is happened to
Briony’s life and her family life. Briony is the one who has a different characteristic from all of the
Tallis because of her great imagination as a writer. In this case, she has a great intention to be the most
6
important part in Tallis family by writing the play of "The Trials of Arabella" in reflection of Tallis
family.
As writers, one of the most crucial tools of Briony’s mindset is a well exercised imagination.
Not just the imagination to fashion a story out of thin air but the imagination to see things differently.
This condition supposes that a child has the sort of imagination before the world show her the truth in
the real life (White, 2012).
Briony’s play, ”Trials of Arabella”, indicates her high point of satisfaction when she quickly
accomplishes it and shows it to her mother. Her play tells about her perception of Tallis’ family, which
this is an obvious foreshadowing of Briony’s mood and theme of lost innocence as a child. In this
perception, Briony feels trapped in her younger body and she feels older enough for adult’s life and
comparing her older sister's enthusiasm to the play as more of condescension than sincerity.
As a child, Briony has a high standard of his writing satisfaction, consequently she isolates
herself because she needs her own time to write without any disturbance. Meanwhile, based on Griffis
(2013), the dominant stereotype of a writer is someone who is scattered and too creative for their own
good. It means that Briony is a type of a perfectionist writer, who totally pushes her imagination to her
works, in this case is the play of "The Trials of Arabella".
Daniels & Price (2000) define perfectionists as people who are focused on personal integrity
and can be wise, discerning and inspiring in their quest for the truth. In this case, Briony’s behavior
indicates her as a perfectionist person, who also tends to dissociate herself from her flaws or what she
believe are flaws, such as negative emotions and she can become hypocritical and hypercritical of
others, seeking the illusion of virtue to hide their own vices.
The next description is in-depth description of the older female Tallis’ sibling Cecilia. It is
stated that Cecilia has great desires to be needed at home, unfortunately her family do not care to her.
Despite her uselessness to the rest of the family, she does not want to go away.
Cecilia is quite different from her younger sibling, who studied at Cambridge where she learns
the unfortunate separations between gender and social class. Meanwhile, Cecilia feels impatient and
desperate for something exciting to happen to her. She also feels useless as a member of the Tallis
family. She is restless and wants to feel needed, but is not, as illustrated in the quotation above.
Based on Millon (2006), character of Cecilia depicts the worthless self-image tendency, which
means that she judges herself of no account, valueless to self or others, inadequate and unsuccessful in
all aspirations. This tendency is proven by her desperate feeling while her study can not improve her
family.
Cecilia has had a long-term relationship with Robbie including attending Cambridge University
together. Robbie Tuner is at the university at the same time Cecilia is, although they did not be friend
one another because of the clear social-class distinction between the two. While there, Cecilia and
Robbie run in different circle because of a distinct separation in class, while Robbie is the son of the
Tallis charlady. This separation in friendship may have built up some suppressed anger towards Cecilia
from Robbie because of her family wealth and his lack thereof, as well as a loss of in loyalty.
Robbie is the main male character of the novel, who is the son of the Tallis charlady Grace
Turner. During childhood, all the children were too young and innocent to recognize any difference
between themselves and Robbie was close friends with Leon and Cecilia, and acted as an older, caring
brother to the young Briony. He is now working on some landscaping in the Tallis park and debating
on going back to school for a degree in medicine. His entire schooling has been funded by the generous
Jack Tallis.
One time, deep in her self-absorption, Briony gazes out the window and observes from a far
distance, the fountain scene between Cecilia and Robbie. Too young to fully comprehend what she is
witnessing, having complete command over her, forcing her to disrobe and drown herself, and so he

7
can save her and have her hand in marriage. She bears this story in comparison to a story she had once
written. But, Briony mistakes the scene for Robbie proposing to Cecilia.
Seeing her sister stand in her underwear, soaking wet in front of Robbie, sets her mind loose
and one mystery breeds another. Briony discovers that the world, the social world, is unbearably
complicated. Briony accepts that what she sees, she does not understand but decides to write the story
anyway.
Briony’s active imagination begins to run wild on her. She wonders if Robbie is blackmailing
her older sister, threatening her, and if he has some sort of invisible power over her. She is aware she
does not understand completely, and must just watch in order to attach sense to what she sees. Briony
concludes in her mind that this is not a fairy tale world and that chance brought her to the window to
witness the extraordinary event, and that this is the stuff of real-life, adult world.
Once again, Briony is unable to separate her imagniation from the reality. Briony is caught in a
moment of oblivious daydreaming that leads to a coming back to reality. It is during the transient
moment between the daydreaming and the coming back where Briony loses her godly power of
creation. The narrator flat out tells the reader that part of the daydreaming enticement is the illusion that
she was helpless before its logic. Unable to differentiate between the two realms will cause Briony to
confuse what she sees and what she believes.
The exposition part explains about Briony’s character as a perfectionist person with great
imagination, which makes her always feels that she is the right one who is far from the sins and guilty
feeling. These feelings appear as the reflection of her life as the writer who can create every situation
she wants, including her perception of the relationship between Cecilia and Robbie.

2) Rising Action
The problem starts when Briony read Robbie’s apology letter to Cecilia. Robbie has made a
trouble to Cecilia and he intends to write his apology letter. Robbie always reaches into his deepest
desires of sexual wishes to Cecilia. Robbie gets a difficulty in writing his apology letter to Cecillia, and
it wastes many drafts until he is able to come on one letter that he feels is right. After the letter is ready
to send, he spots Briony who is still standing on the bridge over the lake on the road into the Tallis
property. Robbie asks Briony to run ahead and pass the note to Cecilia, thinking this would avoid him
giving it to her in front of others, and allow her some time to absorb its contents in private before
facing him.
Briony runs away from her sister and up to her room to get ready for dinner. While there, she
tries to write. We learn, without doubt, that Briony opened the letter and discovered the obscenity in its
closing sentences (Robbie writes: "In my dreams I kiss your cunt, your sweet wet cunt. In my thoughts I
make love to you all day long."). The “c” word was foreign to her, but she correctly assumes its
meaning. As she sits and wonders what to do next, Lola enters her room. Briony is aware that the letter
along with the fountain incident has been a loss of innocence for her, and she is now ready to become
the adult writer she has always wanted to be.
Briony’s innocence brings her imagination to her fairytales, who always feels free from guilt or
sin especially through lack of knowledge of bad things. In this case, Briony indicts Robbie as a bad
person who wants to give bad impact to her sister, Cecilia. It can also imply lesser experience in either
a relative view to social peers, or by an absolute comparison to a more common normative scale. It is
generally viewed as a negative term, connoting an pessimistic view of the world, in particular one
where the lack of knowledge stems from a lack of wrongdoing, whereas greater knowledge comes from
doing wrong (O’Brien, 1995).
Briony enters the library and discovers Robbie and Cecilia pinned up in the corner. Her
perception is about Robbie’s attack and that her sister is being held by Robbie there against her will.
Her sister’s dress is above her knees, Robbie has a hold of her hair and her forearm, and she is being
8
pressed into the corner. Briony calls her sister’s name, who gets out of the compromising position and
leaves the study without saying anything to Briony. Briony is left in there alone with Robbie who does
not acknowledge her and goes about straightening out his clothes.
Briony's interpretation of Cecilia and Robbie's love leads her to believe she must protect her
sister. This is an inversion to the way that Cecilia used to protect Briony after nightmares, and instead
of protecting her by imploring come back, the failed attempt causes her to go away. Briony’s crime
starts from her good intentions as a sister, however this good intention misguided her perception to
Cecillia and Robbie.
Again, the theme is about misunderstanding or misinterpreting a sensory experience but, what
Briony sees is not enough to overcome what she imagines to be true. This visual brings confusion to
Briony and it contributes to Briony's false accusation of Robbie because of her imagination. This case
proves that she trusts her imagination as a literary instincts more than visual data. Briony's crime is not
that she lies, but she feels confused for the fact a fiction through her talent for imagination creation.
Briony's childhood ended in the dark. What began as a scene in a nursery ends with a scene in a
darkened wilderness. Briony is now a participant in real life, in the wild, instead of a player in a
childhood fairytale in a nursery.
Briony becomes the one who commit a crime here. As well, when the authorities arrive and the
adults are involved, everyone relies on the testimony of one thirteen-year-old girl. The adults’
ignorance to the other witness makes the failure to pursue proper truth, and it much blames for Robbie's
false arrest.
The importance of being the only witness to the crime and the one feeds Briony’s confidence
and confirms her wrong perception in her own head. It is actual written text that confirms Briony’s
story and seals Robbie’s fate. Aware her accusations are not being taken seriously, Briony is able to
support them with the written word. The combination of her imagination and erotic letter-writing have
the power to turn imagination into reality, but this time, not only to Briony but to her entire audience as
well. By now, Briony changes her perspective from the imagination to the factual events. By the time,
she sees Robbie's innocence laid out in front of her, she is outraged, and a sign that she is fully
convinced of his guilt.
Briony is unable to identify the condition that she has take a wrong perception and this situation
makes her confused and desires for her mother’s protection. Witnessing Cecilia's forgiveness of Robbie
in front of the police car, Briony enters a new dimension of adulthood--guilt. Forgiveness is a word that
had never meant a thing before, and now she will spend the rest of her life in searching the forgiveness.
Several years later, Briony becomes a nurse in one of London’s hospital while it prepares for
the returning of wounded soldiers of world war II. It is as amendment of Briony to herself as her
acceptance of her own guilt. Briony wants to get as close to the war as she can, announce her sin to the
world, and get rid of her guilt, even if it means living in shame.
Briony has detached herself from her family almost entirely. After living with an aunt and uncle
in a part of London and trying it as a writer, she now limits her communications with her parents to
monthly letters in which very little is revealed. Her parents are still living in the country. They have
taken in some billets from East London as part of Britain’s safety procedure to evacuate the city
because of the bombings and things at the Tallis household are in complete disarray. Talis’ servant
dislikes all the mothers boarding there and the children. There is constant fighting amongst all
inhabitants at the Tallis estate and the park is being destroyed in preparation for war.
Briony’s decision to detach from her family and to be a nurse is the impact of her guilty feeling,
after she feels that she has separated her sister from her lover, and she has broken the relationship of
Tallis family. She feels that her innocence and her imagination have led her perception to the wrong
decision. Therefore, Briony chooses to be a nurse in a war time in order to find the way to make
apologize to Robbie and her sister, Cecilia.
9
 Briony does her best to handle the situation of the hundreds of wounded men who arrive at her
hospital; she is determined not to fail. Instead, she comes away humiliated. As soon as the war touches
her life, i.e. is not in control of the situation like a writer always is, she fails. Her failure as a nurse
during those first days represents her inability to cope with a world in which she is not the puppeteer.
The rising action part describes about the personal factors of Briony’s mental anguish, which
starts from her innocence and her great imagination about adult life. Briony’s perception is created as
the implication of her great imagination, which leads her point of view of Robbie’s character as the bad
person. These characteristics lead Briony’s wrong perception to all of the situations on her life,
especially between Cecilia’s relationships with Robbie. At last, Briony’s guilty feeling of her
accusation, and depressed feeling because of no chance to say forgiveness becomes the personal factors
that leads her to suffer Mental Anguish.

b. Personal Impact of Briony’s Mental Anguish

1) Climax
The climax part happens when Briony as an author decides to change the story of her life time
in her novel. In this case, she tries to reduce her guilty feeling by rearranging the situation into a good
condition, where Robbie and Cecilia meet each other and live together.
Briony efforts to decrease her guilty feeling because she has realized that she would not meet
Robbie and Cecilia to make apologize. In this case, she makes a story about her life time whether she
can meet Robbie and Cecilia.
Briony starts to feel depressed of her guilty feeling. Feelings of guilt are often intertwined with
depression. Guilt comes from thinking that Briony has done something which she should not have and
therefore she assumes herself as a bad person. When a person feels depressed, they may find
themselves reviewing their life and dwelling on regrets and losses. They reflect about lost opportunities
and they feel worthless or guilty. Sometimes they magnify things out of proportion. They may have
impossible expectations for themselves. If they made a mistake or failed in some way, they may label
themselves a terrible person (Rego, 2009).
The description above explains about two factors of Briony’s mental anguish, they are guilty
feeling and depressed feeling. According to Strickland (2007), guilt is a cognitive or an emotional
experience that occurs when a person realizes or believes that he or she has compromised his or her
own standards of conduct or has violated a moral standard, and bears significant responsibility for that
violation. Whereas, Payne (2010) states that depression brings down a person's mood and energy and it
can affect how people think about themselves and their situation.
Therefore, Briony makes up the story when she visits a one-bedroom apartment near the church.
It is where her sister, Cecilia, is living. Cecilia is not expecting Briony and is shocked to see her. They
originally talk of nursing and the war, and Cecilia is very cold towards her younger sister. As they talk,
Robbie appears in the kitchen, unaware of Briony’s presence. When he sees her, he too is shocked and
angry. He goes at her both verbally and physically, and once again, Cecilia steps in between and saves
her little sister from Robbie’s wrath. Briony is happy to see that Robbie is alive.
Briony tries to apologize but she realize that she won’t the forgiveness from either Robbie or
Cecilia. She claims that she has grown up but Robbie does not accept it, and the guilty feeling still
threatens her. Robbie then instructs Briony on exactly what she needs to do if she is serious and sincere
about her search for atonement. Robbie tells Briony to go to her parents and let them know that she
knowingly falsely accused Robbie of raping Lola. Then she will write Robbie a letter in great detail
about everything that led up to what she saw at the lake and why she blamed Robbie. Finally, she will
go to the magistrate with the same, true version of events that night as she remembers them.

10
 Robbie and Cecilia escort Briony to the subway station. She apologizes again for all that she
has done, and then turns to leave. The apology is received blankly. Robbie just beseeches her to do as
he has instructed. This is the last time Briony sees either of them.
Briony’s mental anguish depresses her feeling because even she manipulates the story; her mind
cannot accept that she is forgiven. In her novel, Robbie and Cecilia still do not want to forgive what she
has done before. As a conclusion, Briony feels more depressed and she is drown in her mental anguish
of her guilty feeling.
In the climax part, Briony’s decision to make up the story is based on her perfectionism
characteristic. As a perfectionist person, she feels that she has to ask for the forgiveness from Cecilia
and Robbie for her false accusation. In fact, the situation does not give her a chance to meet Robbie and
Cecilia. Even though she has decided to amendment the story of her life in her novel, where she can
meet Robbie and Cecilia to say her forgiveness, it cannot heal the depression of her guilty feeling. This
situation indicates Briony’s dejected feeling as the physical personal impact of her mental anguish
when she has dispirited to deliver her apologize her wrong perception to Robbie and Cecilia.

2) Falling Action
Briony clearly establishes herself as the author. Briony informs the reader of a recent diagnosis
of her illness, vascular dementia. In short, she is losing her mind and acknowledges that soon she will
not recognize, nor remember any parts of her life. She is strangely comfortable with this news. As her
driver takes her from her apartment to the library, Briony runs through a shopping list of what most of
the characters in her life have done and gone on to become.
Briony explains how her last novel should have been her first, the one that has gone through
many versions. Her complete intention after the second draft was to set out to describe the only one real
crime of wartime Britain. Briony informs the reader of her intention to wait until all the characters are
dead before publication so she can avoid the risk of being sued for libel for not changing names,
something she refuses to do as part of her atonement.
The presence of vascular dementia is largely unrecognized and untreated in the elderly. The
patient has become depressed and apathetic, exhibits personality changes, experiences social inhibition,
and has slowing mental capacity and sluggish motor activities with the inability to solve simple daily
problems (Román, 2007).
Based on Huffaker (2001), Briony’s mental anguish is defined as an emotional distress, as an
element of damage including the mental suffering of her guilty feeling. Briony’s pain and suffering
contemplate an injury that is derived from physical injury or condition, which the injury is dealing with
her emotional distress that is manifested in her physical symptom. In his case, it means that her
vascular dementia is a result of her mental anguish because of her effort to live in her imagination to
ease her depressed feeling by changing his life story in a novel.
In her final address to the reader, Briony lets go of the last twist of her tale. The last part of her
book where she is in London, and meets Robbie and Cecilia in their flat, was completely made up. The
narrator explains how Robbie never made it off the beach in Dunkirk and that Cecilia died shortly
thereafter in a London bombing. Briony explains how after the wedding, the real story is that she was
too coward to confront a bereaved sister, which led to never seeing her again before her death shortly
thereafter. The letters between Robbie and Cecilia, the two lovers, are now in the archives of the war
museum and not her possession. Her explanation is that she did not think the reader would want to
believe that they never met again, lived together again, and loved again. Briony finally explains that as
long as her book is read, her version will be the one that will survive to love rather than the sadness of
what really happened.
Briony makes a final plea to the reader: How can a novelist achieve atonement when, with her
absolute power of deciding outcomes, she is also God? There is no one, no entity or higher form that
11
she can appeal to, or be reconciled with, or that can forgive her. There is nothing outside her. In her
imagination she has set the limits and the terms. No atonement for God, or novelists, even if they are
atheists. It was always an impossible task, and that was precisely the point. The attempt was all.
Briony's final act of atonement was to fictionally give her lovers happiness but never let them forgive
her. She then debates if she should have gone further and brought Robbie and Cecilia, alive, happy and
old in one another’s arms, to her 77th Birthday party, and states, it is not impossible.
The artificial ending reverts Briony back to her thirteen-year-old self, a writer who is attracted
to fairy-tales and order. Briony suffers from her an inflated sense of creative genius, going even as far
as to refer to herself as God. Even Briony herself, who is dying, can enjoy a happy ending in the form
of a loving family reunion and successful performance of her very first play. The villains, the
Marshalls, appear to be suffering shallow isolation and impotence regardless of their wealth.
In the falling action part, the discussion focuses on Briony’s mental anguish, especially the
physical personal impact of mental anguish to his personal life, which represents in the suffering of her
physical sickness, vascular dementia.

5. CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION

a. Conclusion
The conclusion of this study describes that Briony suffers from mental anguish which is
identified by the factor and impact of her mental anguish. The analysis of this research is divided into
four parts belonging into the plot analysis of literary work; they are exposition, rising action, climax,
and falling action. The first part of analysis is exposition, which describes about the introduction of
Briony Tallis’ life as a young writer with her characteristic as a perfectionist child with great
imagination in writing. Besides, this part also describes about Cecilia Turner and Robbie Turner, who
gives great role in Briony’s life.
The rising action becomes the next part of the analysis, which describes about Briony’s problem
while she entering adult’s life. As a children with full of imagination, Briony has given different
perception in adult’s life, especially after Briony reads Robbie’s letter to Cecilia that contains adult
term. Hence, it makes the different perception of Robbie as a bad person, who has a bad intention to
Cecilia. Furthermore, Briony perception grows worse when she witnesses the incident between Cecilia
and Robbie while they are making love in library room. It develops Briony’s perception of Robbie as a
rapper of her sister. Based on the accusation, Briony call the police for Robbie’s crime. At last, Briony
realizes that her perception of Robbie is wrong, and she starts feeling guilty and decides to isolates her
life from the family by becoming a nurse.
The next part is climax, which describes about Briony’s depressed of her feeling guilty. As a
perfectionist person, Briony feels that she has to make an apologize to Robbie and Cecilia, but she has
not get the moment to do it. Therefore, Briony decides to rearrange the story of her life in her novel
while she can deliver her apologize to Robbie and Cecilia, whether it is not reduce her guilty feeling.
Both, those personal factors of guilty feeling and depressed feeling lead her to suffer mental anguish.
In the next part, falling action describes about old Briony as a writer with her mental anguish.
Briony’s mental anguish gives a physiological and physical impact to her personal life. Briony starts to
feel dejected as the psychological impact of her mental anguish. She becomes dispirited of her chance
to make an apologize to Robbie and Cecilia. Besides, Briony suffers vascular dementia, experience loss
of memory, mood changes, and problems with language, reasoning and decision making, which
happens because of her effort as a writer to reduce her guilty feeling by changing the story of her life in
a novel.

b. Recommendation
12
 In accordance with the analysis of this research which only concerns on the Briony Tallis’
character and her depressed feeling of her life, there are some recommendations which may be useful
for other researchers who analyze Ian McEwan’s Atonement.
The limitation of this research is highlight of the psychological phenomenon, which means that
there are other aspects left for discussion. There are many things that are challenging to be explored in
this novel. many issues are opened for discussion from other perspectives. Since the characterization
and plot have become the object of major discussion, the researcher then recommends the others to
discuss the other elements of the literary works for example the psychological analysis of the author or
sociological analysis among the characters might be used to analyze this novel further.

6. References
Burg, Michael S. 2012.MENTAL ANGUISH: Defining It – Explaining It – Demonstrating It – Proving
It – Arguing It. Burg Simpson EldredgeHersh&Jardine P.C. www.pdf-online.com

Bruch, Debra. 2013. Plot Analysis. (http://www.fa.mtu.edu/ ~dlbruch/ scriptanalysis/ plot.html)

Dudek, Louis. 2009. The Psychology of Literature (Paper delivered before the Canadian Council of
Teachers of English. Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.

Eagleton, Terry. 2007. Literary Theory: An Introduction. (http://www.gyford.com/ phil/ writing/ 2007/
05/ 07/ literary_theory.php)

Emanuel, Ezekiel J. 2008. What is the Great Benefit of Legalizing Euthanasia of Physican-Assisted
Suicide?The University of Chicago Press.

Endraswara,  Suwardi . 2004. Metodologi Penelitian Sastra: Epistemologi, Model, Teori dan Aplikasi.
Pustaka Widyatama : Jakarta

Firchow, Nancy . 2013. Child Development: 13- to 16-Year-Olds.

(www.greatschools.org/parenting/health-nutrition/870-middle-adolescence.gs)

Goertzel, Ben. 2004. A General Theory of Emotion in Humans and Other Intelligences. www.pdf-
online.com

Griffis, Nancy M. 2013. The Writer as a Perfectionist. (www.nancygriffis.wordpress.com/

2013/01/27/the-writer-as-a-perfectionist/)

Heinrich, Larry. 1992. The Mental Anguish and Humiliation Suffered by Victims of Housing
Discrimination. The John Marshall Law School.www.pdf-online.com

Huffaker, M. Lee. 2001. RECOVERY FOR INFLICTION OF EMOTIONAL STRESS: Comment On The
Mental Anguish Accompanying Such A Claim In Alabama. www.pdf-online.com

Jensen, Morten Høi. 2005. The Effects of Conflict in the Novels of Ian McEwan. www.pdf-online.com
Malcolm, David. 2000. Understanding Ian McEwan. Univ of South Carolina Press : South
Carolina.

13
Klausnitzer, HelleVigh. 2008. Storyworlds and Narrative Ethics An analysis and interpretation of Ian
McEwan’s ‘Atonement’ and Saturday. Department of 'language and culture Aalborg
University.www.pdf-online.com

Landman, J. 1987. Regret: A Theoretical and Conceptual Analysis. www.pdf-online.com.

Leach, Colin W. & Larissa Z. Tiedens. 2004. The Social Life of Emotion. Cambridge University Press:
Cambridge.

Millon, Theodore. 2006. Pessimistic/Melancholic Personality. (www.millon.net/

taxonomy/melancholic.htm)Morrell, Jessica Page (2006). Between the Lines: Master the Subtle
Elements of Fiction Writing. Cincinnati, OH: Writer's Digest Books.

Morton, Adam. 2010. Anguish, Despair, Acceptance. Annual Public Lecture in Philosophy.University
of Alberta.

O’Brien, Paul. 1995. Imagination and Innocence: A Child's Perspective on Life .The Christian Science
Monitor. (http://www.csmonitor.com/ 1995/ 1106/ 06173.html)

Payne, January W. 2010. Feeling Depressed or Anxious? (http://health.usnews.com/ health-news/

family-health/ brain-and-behavior/ articles/ 2010/ 03/ 09/ feeling-depressed-or-anxious-screen-
yourself-online)

Pinnuck, James. 2011. Atonement - Study Notes. Ticking Mind.www.pdf-online.com.

Rego, Simon A. 2009. Regrets, guilt and depression:

Learn to change your negative thinking and forgive yourself.
(http://www.moodletter.com/GuiltandDepression.html)

Rennison, Nick. 2005. “Ian McEwan.” Contemporary British Novelists.Routledge : London.

Rivera, Joseph de. 2002. The Role of Suffering in Theories of Emotion. Frances L. Hiatt School of
Psychology : Clark University

Roberts, Ryan. 2008. Conversations with Ian McEwan. University Press of Mississippi.

Román, Gustavo C. 2007. Clinical Forms of Vascular Dementia. Humana Press Inc., Totowa, NJ

Scott, John P., Jr. & Joshua H. Threadcraft. 2009. A Practitioner’s Guide to Recovery of Mental
Anguish/Emotional Distress Damages in Alabama. Threadcraft Article Final.www.pdf-
online.com

Sernham, Cathrin. 2009. Briony Through Her Own Eyes; a discussion of the three Brionys in Ian
McEwan’s ‘Atonement’. Centre for Languages and Literature Lund University. www.pdf-
online.com

Sim, LohWai. 2012. From Relieving the Suffering of the Mind to Relieving the Suffering of the Body.
Budha Dharma Association.www.buddhanet.net

14
Ville, Marry. 2012. Literary Analysis Guide. http://www.ci.maryville.tn.us/ mhs/ studyskills/
compguide/ LitAnaPlot.htm

White, Martin. 2012. Write First Novel: The Writer’s Imagination.

(http://writeafirstnovel.wordpress.com/2012/12/01/the-writers-imagination/)

15