An analysis on conflicts faced by the main characters, Annie and Helen, in William Gibson’s the Miracle Worker

ABSTRACT

Conflict is a common thing in our daily life. We will involved in conflict with others is caused by any differences, for instance, different in the way of thinking, different in needs, desires, ideas. Otherwise, when we can not face the problems experienced on US because of the limited skills, un-satisfaction and un- fulfilled desires so that it will cause conflicts in our life. Conflicts appear when there is no balancing of mind affected the problems in life that come from our selves or our environment. Furthermore, conflict in literary work is unpleasant things that happened or experienced by the characters in the story. Conflict is an open struggle between two or more people, and conflict is an essential thing in drama, hence, any drama must have conflict.

The Miracle Worker is one of William Gibson’s plays. It tells about Helen Keller—who is blind, deaf, and mute young girl—with her teacher, Annie Sullivan. As main characters of the play, both of them often involved in conflicts and it was influenced other characters in that drama.

This study will analyze conflicts face by the main characters in drama text entitled The Miracle Worker using structural approach. The study will find out the conflicts faced by the main characters, the causes of the conflicts and the effects of the conflicts to other characters in the story.

The result of the study shows two kinds of conflicts faced by the main characters, Annie and Helen, namely, external conflict and internal conflict. External conflict is divided into physical conflict and social conflict, whereas, internal conflict is divided into psychological conflict and moral conflict. However, in this study the researcher didn’t find all kinds of conflicts. There are only social conflict and psychological conflict faced by the main characters in the drama where the causes of the conflicts were clearly explained by the author. Then, the effects of the conflicts not only experienced by other characters but also experienced by the main characters. Meanwhile, the causes of the conflicts sometimes are another conflict and the effects of the conflicts create new conflict to the characters.

Based on the finding above, it is recommended to next researchers who interested in analyzing the same data that is The Miracle Worker, to analyze other aspects of drama analysis such as, plot and theme, character, setting, etc. because this play has many interesting aspects to be analyzed.