Anne Sullivan’s will to be meaningful in William Gibson’s The Miracle Worker: Viewed from Victor Frankl’s Logotherapy theory

ABSTRACT

Logotherapy theory is a theory brought by Victor Frankl, studying about the meaning of life. The function of Logotherapy is to find the meaning in life, which means helping the people aware of the logo in their selves as the process of their own analysis, by looking for various potential meanings of life must be fulfill by every human as well as their desire to find the meaning of life.

Anne Sullivan, the main character analyzed by the researcher is a woman who plays her role in teaching Helen Keller as a special need child who is dumb, blind, and deaf. Anne Sullivan began to effort and makes Helen Keller understand the world, it then becomes her purpose of life to find her meaningful life. The reason of taking this title is deeply because the researcher interested in analyzing this novel based on logotherapy theory.

The research questions are (1) What are the concepts of logotherapy theory reflected in Anne Sullivan’s will to be meaningful in William Gibson’s The Miracle Worker? (2) What are the problems of existential vacuum of Anne Sullivan’s will to be meaningful in William Gibson’s The Miracle Worker? (3) How does Anne Sullivan implement her will to be meaningful in William Gibson’s The Miracle Worker?

The objectives of this research are to find the concepts of logotherapy theory reflected in Anne Sullivan’s will to be meaningful in William Gibson’s The Miracle Worker, also her existential vacuum and her ways to implement her will to be meaningful in William Gibson’s The Miracle Worker.

The research design used by the researcher is a literary criticism. The researcher uses the psychological criticism taking up the theory of Victor Frankl namely logotherapy theory as an approach instead of others. This approach is used due to revealing anything about human’s search for meaning and meaningful life, especially in the main character of The Miracle Worker relating to her struggle guiding the child with special need.

The result of this study show that there are three significances stated as the answer of the problems. Firstly, Anne Sullivan as the teacher of Helen Keller had her existential vacuum in the first time before she came to Helen’s life when she lost her brother and cannot forgive herself. The second, based on the concept of logotherapy, Anne Sullivan had already passed these three concepts those are the freedom of will, the will to meaning, and the meaning of life in her role as the teacher of special needs child. The last, there are three ways explained how Anne Sullivan finally reach her meaningful life through the creative values, the experimental values, and the attitudinal values.