| Summary: | This study explores the phenomenon of Bildungsroman in three selected English written
novels: Goethe's Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship, Austen's Emma, and
Bronte's Jane Eyre. The Bildungsroman is a literary genre started in Germany in the
late eighteenth century and spread broadly over Europe and th rest of the world. The
characteristics of the genre have blurred over time that it became difficult to classify a
work under the category. Despite the critics' disagreement about the nature of
Bildungsroman, they agree that the genre depicts the psychosocial and m raj
developments of the protagonist, who finally integrates into his society and becomes an
active member in it. Although the selected novels are classified as Bildungsroman,
many studies debated about their belonging to the genre. Considering the critics'
agreement in terms of psychosocial and the moral developments, this study seeks to re
evaluate the selected novels in order to offer another aspect of reassessing their
authenticity as Bildungsroman. This study is driven by three main objectives which are:
to trace the protagonists' psychosocial development, their moral development, and to
in estigate how other characters affect the protagonists' development. The analysis of
the three novels is chronologically done, where Goethe's Wilhelm Meister's
Apprenticeship comes first, followed by Austen's Emma and closes with Bronte's Jane
Eyre. The chronological order i meant to illustrate how Austen's and Bronte's novels
diverge from Goethe's prototype, taking into consideration the historical context and
gender differences. The theoretical framework of this study is adopted from Erik
Erikson's Theory of Psychosocial Development and Lawrence Kohlberg's Theory of
Moral Development. The employment of the selected framework is meant to give a
definite meaning of the psychosocial and moral developments and thus, a correct
identification of the true Bildungsroman. The analysis of the three novels, within the
framework of Erikson's stages of psychosocial development and Kohlberg's levels of
moral development, reveals that Goethe's Wilhelm and Bronte's Jane gradually develop
their senses of psychosocial and moral development, and they finally become active
members in their societies, while Austen's Emma hardly matures psychologically or
morally and she is not active in her society. This study concludes that Goethe's Wilhelm
Meister's Apprenticeship and Bronte's Jane Eyre could be read as Bildungsroman,
unlike Austen's Emma. Theoretically, this study is distinguished from other studies by
offering a different aspect of assessing Bildungsroman novels. Practically, the study
clarifies to individuals that being active in society means obtaining a systematic
development that enables them to contribute positively to their society.
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