Representation of Intense Loneliness Through Speech Acts in White Nights by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Abstract

This study aims to explore illocutionary types in White Nights by Fyodor Dostoyevsky and to examine how the illocutionary acts represent intense loneliness experienced by the narrator in the novel using Searle’s Speech Act Theory. This study applies a qualitative descriptive method by analyzing the narrator’s utterances that contain illocutionary acts, which were collected through a close-reading technique. After collecting the data, the researcher categorized the utterances into different types of illocutionary acts. The study found that in White Nights, there are 61 utterances identified as illocutionary acts. They consist of 22 expressive, 19 assertive, 11 directive and 9 commissive, while declarative speech acts were not found within the literary work. In the study, the author categorized each type of these illocutionary acts to identify and examine how they represent the narrator’s intense loneliness. In addition, the narrator’s incapacity to form a relationship, his needs for emotional understanding, fears of being rejected are reflected through each type of illocutionary acts. These findings indicate that speech acts are not only used to identify and interpret the intended meaning behind the character’s utterances but also provides a deeper explanation of how intense loneliness is represented through language use in the literary works.