Assignment

Sociological Analysis of Novel The Fifth Horseman

By

Muhammad Ilham Nur

(F21116328)

ENGLISH DEPARTMENT

FACULTY OF CULTURAL SCIENCES

HASANUDDIN UNIVERSITY

2019

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 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

Alhamdulillahhi rabbil alamin; all praises be to Allah, the Almighty, the most
benefical, the All-loving, and the most merciful, without His blessing, love, and guard, the
writer would never have finished this assignment. All the power and help are only by the
permission of Allah.

Many thanks to all of the people who contribute to help the writer to finishing his
assignment, especially to all of the lecturer in English Department of Faculty of Cultural
Sciences of Hasanuddin University from whom writer gained their knowledge and guidance.
Many thanks to all of writer’s friend who always give their suggestion through discussion.
Without all of them, writer would never have finished this assignment

At last, writer realized that this assignment is far from being perfect as an assignment,
so the writer as a imperfect human being would be very glad to get some critics from the
reader. Writer hopes that the critics would make him a better person in the future that can
make some contribution to his beloved country.

Makassar, March 27th 2019

Writer

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 TABLE OF CONTENTS

TITLE .................................................................................................................... i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ...................................................................................... ii

TABLE OF CONTENTS ....................................................................................... iii

CHAPTER I : INTRODUCTION

A. Background ................................................................................................ 1
B. Identification of the Problems ..................................................................... 2
C. Statement of the Problems .......................................................................... 2
D. Objective of the Problems ........................................................................... 2
E. Theory ........................................................................................................ 3
F. Method ....................................................................................................... 3

BIBLIOGRAPHY .................................................................................................. 5

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 CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

A. Background

Literature is a form of creative and productive activity which produces a work that has
a sense of aesthetic values as well as reflecting social reality. According to Wellek and
Warren (1993:3) literature is a creative activity work art. Literature is 'creative' or
'imaginative' writing, does imply that history, philosophy and natural science are uncreative
and unimaginative (Eagleton, 1996:2).

Literature is the aspect of human activities composition that tells a story, dramatizes,
expresses and feels. Glickberg (1967:75) stated that “all literature, however fantastic or
mystical in content, is animated by a profound social concern, and this is true of even the
most flagrant nihilistic work.” Literature expresses thoughts, feelings, ideas or other special
aspects of human experiences. Literature is a representative of the real life of humans.
Sometimes it is used as publicly and criticism. Literature cannot be separated from human
life since it give many contributions to people. Perspective of sociology literature that have
to be consider is a statement from Levin (Elizabeth and Burns, 1973:31) who stated that
“literature is not only the effect of social causes but also the cause of social effect.” This
statement given us prove that sociology and literature are related to each other.

Based on the definition above we can conclude that a literary work is one of a
medium for an author or writer to express their feelings and thoughts about the society, and
makes the literary works as a reflection of the society. The form of literary work which was
the best form to show us a clear example of the human life is novel.

A novel creates with some aspects of structure like plot, theme, character, language
style, and point of view (Sugira, 2004:74). The all aspects connected from one aspect to
another to create a literary work. The connected aspects are the best media to describe what is
the story inside the novel, and often that the story contain moral values that helps the readers
to learn something from the novel and applying it in their life.

This study is concentrated on the social background of the novel “The Fifth
Horseman.” This novel is mainly narrates about the conflict between Libya and USA during

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the Cold War, as being showed by the two major character of President of USA and Colonel
Gaddafi from Libya, and other characters such as the Dajanis and the police officers.

The Cold War may seems to be not as massive as the World War I and World War II,
but in fact, there are still some friction happened between Uni Soviet with its satellite states
(the Eastern Bloc) and USA with its allies (the Western Bloc) in a form of geopolitical
tension. That is why this novel which was written on the Cold War period and also have a
story inspired by that period is really interesting to be analyzed.

The reason of the writer chosen this novel because beside of the history matters is to
know how big is the impact of the novel affecting the society at that time of the novel was
written. Also, the writer wants to know what is the conflict happened in the novel and how
the characters solved it. The most important thing, the writers want to know what kind of
social or moral value that we can get from the story of the novel.

B. Identification of the Problems

Based on the background above, the writer formulated the problems as follows:

1. What is the story?

2. How the social life of the authors affected the story of their novel?
3. How the novel affected the society?

C. Statement of the Problems

This novel contain a lot of characters, and that characters have their own story which
happened in different time and place. The characters also have their own charateristics, and
different point of view. All of the thing which have mentioned before is just intrinsic aspect,
but the main focus of the writers is the extrinsic aspect, which are the biography of the
authors and the social condition when the novel was written.

D. Objective of the Problems

The writer hopes that this objective will solve the problems above, such as:

1. To explain the story.

2. To find out how the social life of the authors affected the story.
3. To find out how the novel affected the society.

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E. Theory

In this exploratory research study, writer uses a sociology literature approach from
Rene Wellek, Austin Warren, Swingewood and Diana Laurenson. The terms of Sociology
comes from Latin and Greek, the word is “socius and logos”, socius in Greek which means
friend, friendship or community. While the logos incomes science or also talk about anything.

Swingwood (1972) stated that sociology is a scientific and objective study of man in
society, the study of institutions and social processes. Sociology trying to answer questions
about how society, it is possible how does this work, and why the community survived
(Swingwood & Laurenson, 1972). As an approach to understand, analyze and assessing the
literary works by paying particular attention to the social aspects, then from the perspective
of sociology of literature, literature is no longer regarded as something an autonomous. The
existence of literary works, thus always to be understood in relation to aspects of society.
Literature was considered as one of the socio-cultural phenomenon, a product of society. The
authors of the literary works are community members. In creating the literary works,
certainly can not be dissociated from the community in which they live, so that what is
portrayed.

F. Method

1. Method of Collecting Data

Data are important elements in this research. In collecting data, writer uses library
research method. Library research method allows the writer to collect some data from various
sources by reading textbooks, articles, and critical writings which are considered relevant to
this research. In collecting data, the writer does not only do the library research but also do
note taking and finds data through internet.

This study uses library data, which are classified into two categories; primary and
secondary data. The primary data include the novel The Fifth Horseman by Larry Collins and
Dominique Lapierre, biography of the authors, and social background of the novel. The
secondary data include material about sociology literature approach, and other materials
which relevant to the analysis.

1) Primary Data

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 The primary data in this research are novel The Fifth Horseman by Larry Collins
and Dominique Lapierre biography of the authors, and social background of the
novel. There are several steps in collecting data from this primary data, such as:
1. Reading the novel several times to understand the plot, setting, characters,
and theme of the novel.
2. Reading the biography of the two authors of the novel, finding out the
relation between their biography and their work.
3. Reading some references of the social condition when the novel was
written, see if there is any connection between the social condition and the
story of the novel.
2) Secondary Data
The secondary data are data derived from some references that related to research
object. These data are used to support the analysis of the primary data. Secondary
data include other books, articels, writings, bibliography, thesis, and some other
printed and online resources relating to the objective of writing.

2. Method of Analyzing Data

The technique of data analysis used in this research is descriptive analysis. The writer
showed a synopsis of the novel as a preview then relate the story to the extrinsic aspect such
as biography of the authors and the social background of the novel. After that, the writers
analyzed it using sociology literature approach to figured out the relation between the novel
and the authors life’s condition at the time they wrote the novel.

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 BIBLIOGRAPHY

Collins, Larry dan Dominique Lapierre. 1981. The Fifth Horseman. Second Edition. New
York: Granada Publishing Ltd.

Endraswara, Suwardi. 2013. Metodologi Penelitian Sastra. Cetakan Pertama. Yogyakarta:

CAPS (Center for Academic Publishing Service)