13
A Comparison article between Indonesian Folktale “Timun Emas” and Japanese Folktale “Momotaro” by Catteleya A folktale is a traditional short story which is spread orally and still exists until today. Folktale has a moral value which is representation of the good and bad attitudes or experience that can give value. Folktales are developed in each society in the past. Every country has their different folktales. It makes them have their uniqueness characteristic culture. Some folktale around the world has similarity with other folktales from the different country. East Asian especially Chinese, Korea, and Japan have similarity in their cultural background with South-east Asian country such as Indonesia (Wardarita, R & Negoro, G, 2017). The folktale is one of oral folklore genre. Folklore is tradition believe or culture (Zaidan, 2007:74). Folklore is a part of collective culture including art, etiquette, behavior and ancestor culture that passed from generation to generation (Danandjaja, 2002:2). Indonesian folklore divided into three groups: myth, legends, and folktale. The myth is a story that happens in another world with a fictional setting with Gods and mythical creatures that believed as a historical story that happens in the past. Legend is a story that happens in the past and believed as the origin of some event or place. The folktale is a fictional story that not really happen and has a purpose to entertain. Japanese folktale called minwa/mukashi banashi or fairy tale. Japanese folklore also divided into three groups: myth, legends, and folktale but they have a different name, they are called shinwa, densetzu, and mukashi banashi (Danandjaja: 1997:70). Indonesian folktale from Central Java, “Timun Emas” or “The Golden Cucumber” has similarity with Japanese folktale “Momotaro” or “Peach Boy”. They have the same plot and other similarities. Timun Emas born from cucumber and Momotaro born from Peach, then they fought Ogre or Troll or Buto or Monster. This paper will discuss comparative of cross-culture in “Timun Emas” and “Momotaro”. The cross-culture that will be discussed in this paper including characters verbal behavior, characters myth, symbol and belief, the main character in their social organization system, and character achievement at the end of the story.
