COMPARATIVE LITERATURE

An introductory excerpt
Erbee Pram
UTY

Abraham Lincoln once said, in the ceremony marking the end of a long, exhausting, and bloody
civil war of the United States, that men were created equal. Though this part of his speech was in fact
aimed for the abolishment of slavery, yet this can bring some other meanings related to the values of
humanity. Human beings are basically the same despites their different backgrounds. If we are aware
of our life, these similarities appear in almost every field of life. “Human behavior goes beyond the
individual subject,” said Goldmann (41)
When I was reading Shakespeare’s MacBeth and even watching its film version, I remembered
a Hong Kong film series entitled Warriors of the Dragon Castle. Both present an intrigue within the
circle of the king’s palace running for the throne. In MacBeth, the main character, MacBeth was
supported by his lady in his effort of murdering the king, while in that Hong Kong series the prince
was supported by his four adopted children without their being aware of the prince’s bad ambition and
conducts. The elite intrigue within the palace along with the inner conflicts of the characters as the
results of the intrigue overwhelmed both stories. Ambition, envy, hatred, vengeance, and love are
blended and seasoned with cheating, lies, and tricks. Though there are of course many differences
between these two stories, but there is a similarity in which both offer the same topic, treachery
resulting agony. Two different works from two different backgrounds: countries, cultures, eras, etc.
One is a European work of 16th century, and the other is Asian work of 20th century using the setting of
old Chinese kingdom era.
The Zoo Story, a play written by Edward Albee, talks about a man losing his life as the effect of
the unjust economic growth in America. This absurd play offers its readers the inner conflict of the
ordinary people (reflected by Jerry), the people’s losing trust towards society along with its system,
and the big disparity between those who were poor and those who were rich in America in the mid of
20th century. The unbearable burdens lead the sufferer to death. This play reminds the writer of another
play composed by Putu Wijaya, Aduh. Just like the one of The Zoo Story, the absurdity of this play
may perhaps mislead ordinary readers to get into its essential message. Unlike the former, the latter
has no end since the beginning of the story is the end and vice-versa. This play also presents social
distrust, mental conflict, and selfishness. Both reflect social unrest along with its effects towards the
people experiencing it. Like in The Zoo Story, social distrust within Aduh leads people to death. The
crowd awkwardness and reluctance to give a favor to the sick man in Aduh present similar situation
and atmosphere as ones in The Zoo Story through a character named Peter. Social unrest as the fruit of
economic boom in one side and political uncertainty in another side is an event that might happen
everywhere in this world. Hence, this can be considered as a value trespassing any national borders, or

1
in other world, this value is universal. Again, similarities of two very different works of literature from
two different countries and cultures show up. One is American, while the other is Indonesian.
When I once enjoy Robert Burns’ Red Red Rose sometimes ago, suddenly this brought my
memory to Sapardi Joko Damono’s poem, Aku Ingin. The sweet love and romantic atmosphere of the
first propose the same nuance as the second does. The poems grasped the breath of limitedness of the
poets in uttering their love. Burns used similes and metaphors to compare his love to nature, and so did
Sapardi Joko Damono. Burns used both possibility and impossibility as the metaphors for his love. He
mentioned a red rose and a melody as the possibility metaphors, and proposed the seas going dry, the
rock melted by the sun, and a distance of thousand miles as the impossibility ones. Those things are to
show how deep his love is. It seems to me that Burns wanted to say that love is above all things both
possible and impossible, logic and illogic, simple and complex.
A Red, Red Rose
O my luve's like a red, red rose.
That's newly sprung in June;
O my luve's like a melodie
That's sweetly play'd in tune.
As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,
So deep in luve am I;
And I will love thee still, my Dear,
Till a'the seas gang dry.
Till a' the seas gang dry, my Dear,
And the rocks melt wi' the sun:
I will luve thee still, my Dear,
While the sands o'life shall run.
And fare thee weel my only Luve!
And fare thee weel a while!
And I will come again, my Luve,
Tho' it were ten thousand miles!
(Robert Burns)
On the other hand, Sapardi Joko Damono used simple yet philosophical metaphors by
comparing his love to unutterable words of wood to fire and of cloud to rain.
Aku Ingin
Aku ingin mencintaimu dengan sederhana
dengan kata yang tak sempat diucapkan
kayu kepada api yang menjadikannya abu
Aku ingin mencintaimu dengan sederhana
dengan isyarat yang tak sempat disampaikan
awan kepada hujan yang menjadikannya tiada
(Sapardi Joko Damono)
He wanted to state his simple yet deep love. Like Burns, Damono also plays with contradictory
binaries in his poem. He wants to love in a simple way, but that simple way is a complex, deep, and
philosophical one in that it refers to an ‘unutterable word’ of a wood to fire, as simple as an
‘undelivered sign’ of cloud to rain: a deeply complex love in a simple way. These contradictory

2
binaries or paradox are utilized to even show the greatness of a love he has, that his love is greatly
true.
Whatever words are used, whether they are simple or complex, long or short, many or few,
philosophical or plain, possible or impossible, both poems want to say that someone does deeply love
another one. “Love is a many splendor things”, sang Andy William; “Let me drown in your laughter /
Let me die in your arms,” sang John Denver. Words are then meaningless for the main point is the
great feeling of love. Although Red Red Rose is much longer than Aku Ingin, both present the same
idea in that love is too abstract, too absurd, and too great to express through words. This, again,
reminds me of what John Lennon sang through his song, Michelle, “… I love you, I love I love you
…”. He uttered many times for he felt that one time expression was inadequate to represent all his
feeling. Love is in fact wordless. Therefore, there is a similar basic idea within those works from
Scotland, Indonesia, America, Australia, and England.
Similarity also appears when I was reading a poem of Archibald Mc Leish, The Young Dead
Soldier and that of Chairil Anwar, Karawang Bekasi. Both bring the idea of heroism and patriotism as
the impact of war in each country in which the poems belong to. Some critics accused that Chairil
Anwar was making plagiarism when creating this poem for the fact shows that mostly these two
poems are the same despite their being different from each other in their special localities. The soldiers
in both America and Indonesia scream for not only remembrance but more than that, they need the
livings to continue struggling for the betterment of the countries.
...We leave you our deaths.
Give them their meaning.
We were young... We have died.
Remember us."
(Archibald McLeish)

Kami sekarang mayat

Berikan kami arti
Berjagalah terus di garis batas pernyataan dan impian
Kenang, kenanglah kami
yang tinggal tulang-tulang diliputi debu
(Chairil Anwar)
There is a possibility that Chairil Anwar got influence from McLeish considering that his
dictions sound a language transfer from English to Bahasa Indonesia. Nevertheless, there is a unique
locality value in Chairil Anwar’s poem that does not exist in McLeish’s. Chairil Anwar mentions the
famous names Soekarno, Hatta, and Sjahrir in his poem. Those figures are very significant in both the
poem and the setting of the poem. This might reveal the local world view so that this proves the
locality of the poem, and that the latter is then, by some other critics, regarded not a plagiarized
version of the former.
Many students of English department must know Oedipus Rex and Antigonê written thousand
years ago by Sophocles. They serve a story of agony suffered by the protagonists, King Oedipus, who,
without his knowing his own identity, killed his father and married his mother, and his daughter

3
Antigonê, who defied the king’s edict, faced her death in agony. This play, Oedipus Rex, is also a
story of a shame, incest.
When King Oedipus knew who he really was, he got shocked and horrified. To compensate his
deep and great remorse he blinded himself, a sign that eventhough he could see, he could not see. This
inner pain did not end where he took the action, but continue to his descendants since he had already
had children from his wife and mother as well. In addition, his wife and at the same time his mother,
Jocasta, committed suicide to get rid of the shame and agony she could not bear. The calamity upon
his family was the curse of his wrong conducts. His two sons, Eteoclês and Polyneicês, fought against
each other to death in a battle. Due to Creon’s edict of prohibiting people of Thebes to make proper
funeral for Polyneicês, hence nobody took care of the deserted body, but Antigonê did. As the
consequence of violating the king’s edict, Antigonê was sentenced to death. Haemon, her fiancé and
also Creon’s son, killed himself because of losing Antigonê, and his mother committed suicide
because of his death. It is a story of tragedy, a tragedy of humanity driven by ignorance and triggered
by incest.
What Sophocles wrote thousand years ago has resemblance with Javanese story called
Sangkuriang, a name of a young man who killed his father and intended to marry his own mother.
People of West Java, Indonesia are very familiar with this story and they relate the story with the
existence of Mount Tangkuban Parahu. According to the legend, the father of Sangkuriang was a dog.
He could not believe and accept this reality, hence he killed the dog. Furthermore, he also did not
believe that Dayang Sumbi was his mother due to her beauty that made her look much younger than
her real age. Sangkuriang insisted to marry Dayang Sumbi, his mother, to be his wife. The lady tried
very hard to reject the proposal and give understanding to the young man of their statuses. At the end,
Dayang Sumbi had to sacrifice her life to avoid the incest.
Based on the main idea or the message of a story, Antigonê can be paralleled to religious stories
from church’s teachings, for instance is the story of Jesus Christ in the Bible. The collision between
the values of heaven, when Antigonê took care of the body of Polyneicês, with the ones of earth, the
edict of Creon upon the death of Polyneicês, in Antigonê resembles the story of Jesus Christ in which
the heaven collides with the earth. Antigonê had to sacrifice her life to keep her faith on heavenly
belief against the earthy orders, and so did Jesus Christ for the quite similar matters.
The localities of both stories can be different as they are from different background of cultures,
but the values of supranationality appear in both. The idea of incest combined with murder toward the
father is quite rare, however this shows the universality crossing the borders of place and time.
Another similarity crossing the borders of place, time, and culture emerges from an English love
story of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet compared to a Chinese love story San Pek Eng Tay. Both
stories lift up a tragedy of love in which two couples loving each other were clashed with the different
wills of their parents. The former presents the situation of two families hating each other while their
son and daughter fell in love with each other. Moreover, the girl, Juliet, was also prepared to be

4
engaged to another man. The obstacles blocking this couple’s love drove them, Romeo and Juliet, to
take actions that even led them to their death. The latter presents a love story between San Pek and
Eng Tay in which they also faced some hindrances from especially the parents of Eng Tay, the girl.
She was also engaged to another man whom she did not love. The will to resist the parents’ oppression
brought this couple to their death. The similarity again appears in the situation of those two couples’
death. Both couples died side by side with their lovers.
It is obvious that both works of literature bring the same idea i.e., the power of love against
suppression. Death is not a symbol of weakness or being lost, instead it is a symbol of a victory. They
sacrificed whatever they had, including lives, for the sake of their loves. The power of love, the will of
heart, and the voice of conscience are above anything else in this world. When the searching goes
broader, the idea of these two works, in fact, resembles the one in a Javanese legend, Roro Mendut and
Pronocitro. With different locality of the story, this legend also puts forward the same idea i.e. the
power of love against another authority that tries to break it up. The consequence is also the same,
both Roro Mendut and Pronocitro died because of their keeping their faith in their love, and they also
died side by side.
Is it a coincidence that many literary works of different places, eras, cultures, and countries
contain similarities among them? Or is it because of one’s influences towards another one, as referred
by French School method in comparative analysis in which it searches the originality and influences?
Or is there any inner and spiritual relationship among great authors of different worlds? The answer is
obviously “No”.
Human beings are basically the same, in the case of psychological likeness. Hence, what an
author feels about certain thing at certain place might be similar to what another author feels about the
same thing at another place in a far away distance. Everybody is psychologically the same. Fear,
courage, love, hate, envy, passion, frustration, dream, happiness, sadness, and pain are the basic
feelings of human beings in this world. All stories of life cannot be separated from those feelings.
Thus, these create what is called universality. Furthermore, an author of literature, in producing a
literary work, tries to state out his/her contemplative thoughts and feeling in conscious efforts to apply
the universal values within the work.
Seperti juga Chairil Anwar pun Ajip Rosidi dalam hidup yang intens mencoba
mencapai nilai-nilai yang paling inti untuk sampai pada kesemestaan.(Pradopo, Kritik
Sastra 129)
Even both Chairil Anwar and Ajip Rosidi, in their life, intensely tried to reach the
core values to become universal.