iv The Roland Barthes Codes In Charlotte Lamb’s Love is A Frenzy 1Erna Pranata Putri 2Hawasi, S.S., S.Hum., M.A. Department of English Literature, Faculty of Letters, Gunadarma University [email protected] [email protected] ABSTRACT Sometimes it is difficult to obtain the full understanding of a text for a text contains codes. The codes contain mystery that has to be solved by the readers. Semiotic is an approach to analyze the codes in a text. This research aims at finding out Roland Barthes codes in the novel Love is A Frenzy and the meaning of the codes portrayed in the novel. The writer analyzed the example of the codes portrayed in the novel and found out the meaning of the codes in the novel. This is a qualitative descriptive research where the data are presented in the form of written words or verbal expressions. The writer localizes the novel into 278 lexias then applies the lexia regarding the codes. The result shows that this novel contains all the five codes of Roland Barthes. The codes are Proairetic codes; Hermeneutic codes; Semic codes; Symbolic codes and Cultural codes. The Hermeneutic codes tell us about money cannot buy everything and hate is the beginning of love, the Proairetic codes tell us about action speaks louder than words, the Semic codes teach us about an effort brings a result meanwhile the symbolic codes tell us about the hope does not always appear to be real, and cultural codes teach us that sometimes you have to live your life breaking the rule. Key words: semiotic approach, codes, Roland Barthes INTRODUCTION For readers, this literary work replaces summoned realities, which is fictional. Literary work such as novel is also fictional as what Junus (1989: 91) says that novel imitates “possibility world”. The possibility world is the fictional world. Everything in it is not the real world, but the possibilities which can be approximated v imaginatively to be real. Thus, literary works are fictional texts delivering ideas using such a beautiful and attractive language. Novel is one of literary works delivering messages from authors to readers. Novel, according to Sumardjo (1986: 29), is a story with the prose form in a long shape. This long shape means the story includes the complex plot, many characters and various settings. Authors deliver messages of the texts through the plot, the characters, and the setting. The message of the novel is one of the significant parts in the novel. Frequently, there is something lying in a novel which we call it “mystery” or the hidden messages of the novel. There are excessively possibilities that the “mystery” is an enigma what Barthes stated in his essay S/Z, an exhaustive analysis of Balzac's Sarrasine that the process of understanding the text involves in the reader’s interpretation. In order to catch the “mystery” hiding in the text, the text must be able to communicate the meaning of the text. Semiotics, a science of signs and signs systems analysis is used to solve the “mystery” and other signs in a text. It closely related to the field of linguistics which studies the structure and meaning of language mode specifically. Semiotics is used to analyze signs in many fields of study; one of them is in literature study. It is used to analyze literary works such as poems, poetry, drama play, and novel. In a novel, semiotics is used to analyze the meaning of the novel by analyzing the signs presented in the novel. Authors deliver the meaning of the novel using these signs. In a novel of Charlotte Lamb entitled Love is A Frenzy, the writer conveys the meaning of the novel through signs presented in the novel. In order to find the meaning conveyed by the writer in the novel Love is A Frenzy, the researcher would like to analyze it using semiotics approach. It would be too wide to analyze it using semiotics approach presented by all semioticians such as Ferdinand de Saussure, Charles Sanders Pierce, Roland Barthes and others. Thus, the researcher only uses Roland Barthes Five Codes in analyzing the novel entitled Love is A Frenzy. Barthes divides the story into lexias before analyzing the story. In analyzing a literary work, Roland Barthes has established a theory that uses five codes. The codes are hermeneutic code, Proairetic code, Semantic code, Symbolic code, and Cultural code. These codes are representatives to how we view a text rather than a set of rules of how a text should be interpreted (http :// www.arts. uwaterloo.ca/~raha /700_701_web /BarthesLO/codes.html). These codes will be used to investigate the five codes as portrayed in Charlotte Lamb’s Love is a Frenzy. REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE Lexia Barthes stated in his work S/Z below vi The lexia will include sometimes a few words, sometime several sentences; it will be a matter of convenience: it will suffice that the lexia be the best possible space in which we can observe meanings; its dimension, empirically determined, estimated, will depend on the density of connotations, variable according to the moments of the text: all we require is that each lexia should have at most three or four meanings to be enumerated. (1990: 13-14) In his work S/Z Barthes divided Balzac’s Sarrasine into numerous lexias before apply it to the five codes; hermeneutic code, proairetic code, symbolic code, cultural code, Semic Code. Semiotic of Roland Barthes In his book S / Z (1970), Roland Barthes grouped the text into five codes; the codes are hermeunetik code, proairetic code, symbolic code, code of semes, cultural code. This is his attempt to capture something of how meaning is produced and dispersed in the text. The hermeneutic code (HER) and proairetic code (ACT) have to do with the manner in which the narrative produces itself – they have to do with narrative and chronological logic. The three remaining codes (symbolic code, cultural code, Semic code) take us outside of the text’s narrative sequences and logic (Allen, 2003: 86-87). a. The hermeneutic code (HER) concerns with the response to the question, events that formulate questions or delay its answer, and constitute an enigma and lead to its solution (Barthes, 1990: 17). Here the narrative raises questions, creates suspense and mystery, in it proceeds along its course the questions are solved (Hawkes, 2003: 94). b. The proairetic code (ACT) concerns with actions and their effects: ‘each effect’ having ‘a generic name giving a kind of title to the sequence’ (Barthes, 1990: 18). It determines the result of an action (Hawkes, 2003: 95) c. The symbolic code (SYM) concerns all the symbolic patterns, the patterns of antithesis and opposition, observable in the text in particular (Barthes, 1990: 18). This code is regularly repeated in various modes and by various means in the text (Hawkes, 2003: 95) d. The Semic code (SEM) concerns all the connotations which build up the qualities of characters or actions (Barthes, 1990: 18). It utilizes hints or “flickers of meaning” generated by certain signifiers (Hawkes, 2003: 95) e. The cultural code (REF) or reference code concerns the several codes of knowledge or wisdom to which the text continually refers. Since ‘all codes’ are in a sense ‘cultural’, cultural codes here means ‘afford the discourse a basis in scientific or moral authority’ (Barthes, 1990: 18). Quoting from vii Hawkes about the meaning of this codes “ this code manifests itself as a “gnomic”, collective, anonymous, and authoritative voice which speaks for and about what it aims to establish as “accepted” knowledge or wisdom” (2003: 96) RESEARCH METHOD Research Design In this research the researcher uses qualitative methodology as a research procedure. Qualitative methodology is used because the researcher conducting this research in textual analysis where the researcher observes data such as dialogues and narrative found in the Lamb’s Love is A Frenzy as the descriptive data. In conducting this research, the researcher employs semiotics approach particularly using semiotics Roland Barthes’ five codes; hermeneutic code, proairetic code, symbolic code, cultural code, semic code to achieve the objectives of this research. Source of the Data The primary data of this research is a novel entitled Love is A Frenzy written by Charlotte Lamb. It is published by Mills and Boon in 1979. Data Collection Procedure 1. The researcher read the novel Love is A Frenzy in order to understand the story before deciding the problems to be analyzed. First of all, the researcher read the text using heuristic reading to get the meaning of the words and terms used in the text. Secondly, the researcher read the text using hermeneutic reading to get the whole understanding of the text. 2. Marked the text that belongs into lexias. The researcher marked the lexias found in the text. 3. The researcher divides the story into lexias. As what Roland Barthes did when analyzing Balzac’s Sarrasine, the researcher divides the text into numerous lexias before apply it to the five codes; hermeneutic code, proairetic code, symbolic code, cultural code, and code of semes. Then the researcher puts the lexias in columns. Data Analysis Procedure 1. Classifying the text into lexias according to the Roland Barthes five codes. The researcher classifies the lexias according to hermeneutic code, proairetic code, symbolic code, cultural code, and semic code. viii 2. Finding the codes as portrayed in the novel Love is A Frenzy. The researcher analyzes the text then finds the codes as portrayed in Love is A Frenzy. 3. Analyzing the meaning of each code. The researcher analyzes the meaning of each code while comparing to the theories of definition of each code given by semioticians.