The Analysis Of Personality Traits Of Dana Evans In Sidney Sheldon’s The Sky Is Falling

Mutaat,M.Pd

Abstract

This research aims to comprehend the type of the character of Dana Evans in the novel of Sky is Falling and in the correlation with the personality traits using the formalistic approach. To gain a deeper understanding of the results, the writer formulates the problem by making the following questions: (1) What is the character type of Dana Evans in the novel Sky is falling (2) Who is the personality traits of Dana Evans described in the novel “The Sky is Falling”?. In the process of study and analysis of the character type of Dana Evans , the writer uses a formalistic approach to analyze, examine and understand some of the character’s types in a novel. The approach studies the intrinsic elements of literary work and its effect. The writer also did a library research to finish the research. The writer also takes some theories of character to support the analysis. The theory used in analyzing the character until finally reveals that Dana used the kind of character protagonist the writer shows the character in action. Dana Evans develops the protagonist. From character type analyze Dana Evans is warm person, caring and hearted girl and writer give evidence of the character of Dana Evans from personality traits is warm person and vigilant. Personality traits of the main character that best describes the main character personality are such as: caring, warm person (warm is kind of person who can create the condition or situation become good and care (care the condition around them). In the story the main character Dana Evans give some attention to her son who she adopted and Dana Evans also caring to her son, patient, and care.

Introduction

The novel of The Sky is Falling contains many characters with different personality. Besides Dana Evans, there are about twelve other characters. Each of the character has their own personalities that will fascinate the reader. The writer only focuses on analyzing one character. The character that would be analyzed by the writer is Dana Evans. In this thesis the writer analyzes based on the problem formulation. Firstly the writer tries to analyze the character type of Dana Evans. By this analysis the writer will find the character type of Dana Evans. Secondly the writer would analyze the personality trait of Dana Evans. The objective of those analyses will make the writer understand about the personality trait. By this analysis also the writer will find the personality traits of Dana Evans in Sidney Sheldon’s The Sky is falling.

Thus, reason why the writer has chosen to analyze a character as main object of this research because the writer considers that the character of Dana Evans is unique and has personality traits characteristic.

Theoretical Review

Main character is classified important and kept on performing that it feels dominating the whole story. The narration of this character is considered as the most important in a novel concern. He is the most

narrated character, whether as the hero or the one who is affected in the action. Even in certain novels, a main character always presents in every event and can be found in every page of the novel concern. Though his superiority values are not always the same, main character in a novel can be more than one.  There are some characters that are presented only once or a couple of times in a story, and it may be in a relative short narration. These characters are called peripheral character. The appearance of peripheral in the whole story is less, not important, and he appears only if there is connection with the main character, directly or indirectly.

Reading a novel, readers often identified themselves with certain characters, giving sympathy and empathy, involving themselves emotionally on those characters. Those characters are called protagonist.

Therefore, a protagonist is a character that we adore which one of its kinds is popularly called hero a character that is norms manifestation, values that is ideal for us. A fiction must consist of conflict and tension, especially  conflict and tension experienced by protagonist character. Antagonist  character can possibly be stated to be the opposite of protagonist character, directly or indirectly, either physically or physiologically. In other words, the antagonist is the character, force, or collection of forces that stands directly opposed the protagonist and gives rise to the conflict of the story.

Simple character, in its origin form, is a character that only has certain individual quality, one certain character. As a human being character, any possibility of his life side is not revealed. He does not have any characteristic or behavior that can give any surprising effect to the readers. A simple character‘s behavior and characteristic is flat monotone, and reflects only one certain character. Different with simple character, complex character is a character who‘s every possibility of life side and personality is revealed. He could have had a certain characteristic that can be formulated, but he can also present various characteristic and behavior, even can be in contradiction and hard to be guessed.  Therefore, it is difficult his characterization precisely in general. Compared with simple character, complex character is more likely as a real human being, because besides having any possibility of behavior and action, he also gives surprise. Thus, complex character is more complicated to understand, less familiar because the character presented is not really known before.

Static character is a story character that essentially does not experience any challenging or developing characterization as the result of events happened. This character apparently less involved and not affected by any environment changing happened because of relationship among human being. He is similar to coral stone that is un shakable though is rammed by the waves every day. His behavior and characteristic are relative consonant, un developing, from the beginning to the end of the story. On the other side, developing character is a character that experienced changing and developing characterization in compliance with developing events and plot narrated. The changing that outside him, and the relationship among human being which are affected each other can possibly touch his soul and can cause the changing of his developing character and behavior. Thus, this character and behavior will change and develop from the beginning, middle, and the end of the story suitable with the whole coherence on the story.

Typical character is a character whose individually situation is less presented, but his nationality or works are more presented, or some other things that possibly more represent. It is a description and reflection of people, or a group as a part of one institute, which exist in real life. While neutral character is a character that only exists for the story itself. He is an imaginary character who lives and exists only in fiction. He presents or is presented only for the story; he could even be the storyteller, or the main character. His existence does not have any pretensions to represent or to describe something outside him, someone outside from real life. Or at least, readers experience difficulty to interpret it, due to the lack of evidences reflected from real life.

The theory of personality is needed to assess how the character behaves and in this writing case, it turns to a result of revealing the personality type of the main character in a novel. The variation of personality theories had been developed by psychologist since psychological science discovered. Bustami Subhan says that Levin (1998) describes personality as consistent

“Personality has been defined as a consistent pattern of behavior based on an individual‘s thoughts, feelings, and perceptions and it has been viewed in terms of adjustment and the general manner in which an individual meets the demands of his or her environment.‖(Levin, 1998).

From the explanation and quotation above, it is clear that personality is individual‘s reflection, reaction and perception that are reflected by outer appearance and reliable behavior. It also describes how a person adapts with general manner in his or her environment. Yet, sometimes human‘s behavior, though, and feeling are consistent in a variety of situation and stable over the time.

It is clear that personality trait is the consistent pattern of someone‘s behavior, though and feeling in various situation and stable over the time that differentiate one person from another. For instance, when someone has personality as a nice and smart person, but the others may have arrogant personality. Those differences make each individual is unique and special.

Gordon Allport described three types of personality traits. They are cardinal trait, central trait and secondary trait. Alloport‘s theory was developed further by Raymond B Cattell (1905–1998). Raymond B Cattel proposed hierarchical structure of personality: (1) primary trait factors, (2) second-order or global factors. They are used to determine the structure of personality. In this analysis the writer will use the primary trait factors that well-known as six-teen personality factors to analyzing the personality trait of the character. These personality factors are listed as a pair of opposites and it describes each of the primary factors. It is described into high range and low range, the trait that has high range represents the primary factor that has determined by Cattel. The precise primary factors reveal the details of the person uniqueness and are more powerful in predicting actual behavior

Objectives

As indicated in the background, this study attempts to do the following:

1. What is the character type of Dana Evans in the novel Sky is falling?
2. Who is the personality traits of Dana Evans described in the novel “The Sky is Falling?

Method

The writer analyzed the novel, The Sky Is Falling, where the main character seems to have character types and personality traits. The character or personality of Dana Evans , as the main character in this novel will be analyzed using the formalistic approach. The author is using this approach because the answer for the first and second research question needs to be proven with some quotations from the novel. This approach will also give convincing supporting evidence for making a conclusion about the finding in the research Some character types and personality traits of the main character will be revealed and expected to the result what character type he has.

The author figures out the data from the novel, books and internet. Data classified into two parts primary and secondary data. The primary data found in a novel “Sky is Falling. The secondary dates are about theories, which support analysis. The writer uses some steps to find theories, which the support data.

Findings and Discussion

In this chapter, the writer analyzed the type of main character, and how a main character fulfills her basic needs. Based on the personality traits in this research, the writer found one type character. That character was Protagonist.

1. Character Type

“I was no longer alone in the world, someone cared about me, and I love Dana with all heart and soul” Kemal said. And he was grateful now that no one had chosen him before  (page 38)

The situation stated that Dana was tries to convince others that Kemal good fellow. She insisted that she would not trust other people’s judgment. Stating that Kemal was did not good boy. She really believed that Kemal was a good fellow. Dana hopes that this way could support Kemal that he did not alone to face this problem. Dana also wants make Kemal cheerful sad and depressed that prove obviously described that Dana was a caring girl who support others in facing the problem.

“When Dana opened the door to the study, Kemal was in bed, with his eyes tightly closed and his pale face stained with tears” (Page 120)

The quotation clearly showed Dana looked worried with the problem’s life Kemal. She hopes there would be something to do with Kemal because she worried something happen with Kemal. These feelings worried reflect the caring characteristic to Dana. It means Dana did not tell directly her cared on Kemal but it was reflected when Dana feeling worried on him. From the above explanation it could be concluded that people can express their caring to others in different ways.

Besides being a caring girl Dana was described as helpful girl. She likes assisting someone to complete the job. The first evidence proving that she helpful person is when she helped Winthrop’s family for big problem solving. Danaseems feeling pity on them because there were five violent deaths in one family in less than a year were too much of a coincidence. Dana knows she was a betting with her life.

“if you’re right, we’re looking for someone who cold bloodedly murdered six people, I don’t want you to be number seven. “ Elliot said. (Page 80)

And Elliot is worried about Dana; he thinks she was getting in too deep.

“If you intend to tear down his memory, you’re going to find yourself with a lot of enemies, let me give you some advice. don’t go looking for trouble, or you’re going to find it. That’s a promise. I’m warning you to stay the hell away” said General Booster. (Page 163)

This quotation clearly shows that Dana makes sudden decision of helping Winthrop’s family. Although Dana knows she was a deal to getting investigated but she was not care about it. This sudden decision of helped Winthrop’s family proved that Dana kind-hearted girl that she would help others without see who the person and ignore her life. It also could said that the action of helping has already been part of her characteristic because she does not care about the perspective of herself.

2. Personality Traits Description

The first personality of Dana is that she is a warm person. She is described as the outgoing person that has strong interest in people and seeks interaction, so she can create the closes with them. The first evidence proving that Dana is warm person is when she meets with Rachel for the first time. she is very welcome and tries to have good interaction with her. she is also has big interest with Rachel because she knows from Jeff Connors that Rachel is a top model, Dana had seen her picture in television ads and on magazine covers. it was hard to believe how beautiful she was.

“What is udang goreng ? Dana asked “That shrimp in coconut milk it’s very good here” Rachel answered (page 28).

The above citation shows that Dana is seeking interaction between her and Rachel when they are lunch together. Dana believes that if she and Rachel were lunch together. There will be good interaction between them. She can ask anything about foods to Rachel. So it could created the closeness between them. It can be seen that Rachel responses the asking of Dana with very pleased. This fact proving that is a warm person because she can creates the closeness with the other people although it the first time they meet each other.

“Yes, a great deal has been written about you, Mr. Hudson, your father had owned a small steel company, Hudson industries and Roger Hudson had built it into a worldwide conglomerate. And I so know you and your wife were prominent in Washington society and influential in politics” page 122 .

This quotation shows that Dana is said Mr. Hudson o tell his job as a politic. It can be seen that Dana really has strong interest to Mr. Hudson.and his wife. She wants to know anything about Mr. Hudson’s job. The other purpose of what Dana doing is to create the closeness between them. based on the explanation above, the author can conclude that Dana was a warm person who has strong interest to another person and she always seeks interaction with him so it create the closeness between them.

The other personality that is often appearing in Dana was vigilant. She tends to be suspicious or distrustful to some people. She becomes distrustful to people when she gets the bad experiences with the other people or she hears bad story these people before. The first occasion showing that Dana is the suspicious person when she has awfulness about

Winthrop’s family was murdered, because she knows he was the friendliness and warmth of the attractive philanthropist

“So Taylor Wintrop had no enemies. Maybe i’m going about this from the wrong angle. What if it wasn’t Taylor Wintrop who made a deadly enemy? What if it was one of his children, his wife? Or General Victor Booster”  (page 65) 

The quotation shows that Dana is very suspicious with General Victor Booster. She really unbelievers that deathly about Winthrop’s family so she is very vigilant to face this situation because she is afraid that incident would come back and it would be dangerous for her. From the quotation and explanation above. It obviously shows that Dana has feeling high suspicious to others. She becomes suspicious to General Victor Booster because she gets threats and bad story about General Victor Booster before who like making a trick to make people afraid. it can be said, the act of Dana’s vigilance as the effort that can prevent Dana from something bad.

The vigilant personality of Dana can also be seen when she feels high suspicious with Joan Sinisi. She suspects Joan Sinisi as a former secretary to Taylor Winthrop; she filed a lawsuit and later dropped it.the last evidence proving that she is a vigilant person could be seen when she to looking commissar Sasha Shdanoff in Bureau for international economic development and wanted to ask about Taylor Winthrop because Dana know he is worked with him and that he is saw him socially on occasion. But when Boris Shadanof interrupted and Sasha Shdanoff scowled at his brother. Dana suspected them who have any hidden something.

“I wanted to get your personal opinion about Taylor Winthrop? Said Dana “commissar, can you think of any reason why someone would murder Taylor Winthrop?

This above citation describes obviously that Dana was very suspicious to Sasha and his brother because Dana believes that they have hidden something about Taylor Winthrop. hers suspicious appears because Sasha was angry when Dana asked about Taylor Winthrop and when his brother talked about the embassies in Moscow have many parties an

occasion that makes Sasha was angry to his brother Sasha Shdanof also known as the unfriendly person who does like with t to people because she ever gets the bad experiences their presence. It could be conclude that Dana become suspicious and distrust with them before. Based on the above evidence, the writer concludes that Dana was a vigilant person who tends to e suspicious or distrustful to some people

Conclusion

Based on the result of the research that has been concluded by the write Dana was described as the kind hearted girl who has many good characteristics and behavior. It was found that Dana’s character was caring girl, wise and patient girl. The first evidence of her caring girl characteristics was when she tries to support to Kemal because at the time feels very sad for has only arm. Besides being a caring girl Dana was described as helpful girl. She likes assisting someone to complete the job. The first evidence proving that she helpful person was when she helped Winthrop’s family for big problem solved. The second evidence proving that she was wise girl it can be seen that Dana tries to make Jeff and Rachel feel comfort withtheir situation. It was the last evidence proving that Dana was a patient girl was she feels the difficulties that when Dana should be changed house keeper for Kemal.

The writer then could get a conclusion on personality traits based on Dana’s character. Dana was the warm person it could be seen in Dana’s personality. She could create closeness with people and the evidence proving that was warm person was that can create good interaction. And Dana’s personality was vigilant person the evidence of her vigilant personality that her was very suspicious with people.

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