MAIN CHARACTER’S DEFENCE MECHANISM IN WILDBY CHERYL STRAYED:PSYCHOANALYSIS APPROACH

In this research, the writer analyzes a main character in Wild by Cheryl Strayed. The novel captures Cheryl Strayed who decided to go in Pacific Crest Trail to find her happiness. The analysis has two goals, which are describing about anxiety and defence mechanism that experience by main character. The anxieties that writer find are realistic and neurotic anxiety. Defence mechanism that writer find are humor, displacement, denial, acting out and rationalization. The writer uses Psychoanalysis by Sigmund Freud as the theory. The method that writer applied is close reading method for searching the details by observe and collect the data to prove the analysis. The result show the main character in the novel has anxieties and overcome with defence mechanism. The novel describes the main character has two kinds of anxieties, which are realistic anxiety and neurotic anxiety. In realistic anxiety, the main character experienced it when fear of wild animals and circumstances in wilderness of Pacific Crest Trail. In neurotic anxiety, the main character experienced it when agony because her mom gets lung cancer then die and when meet a stranger in the trail of PCT. The main character uses defence mechanism to defends several problems that she gets from the anxieties. She uses humor when encounter the wild animal and unexpectedly circumstances of wilderness, displacement when her mom get lung cancer and she runs out water in PCT, denial when her mom got verdict of lung cancer, acting out to handle her agony when her mother die and the last rationalization when meet the strangers. Keywords: Psychoanalysis, Anxiety, Defence Mechanism