EXPLORING SYNONYMY AND ANTONYMY IN LITERARY DISCOURSE: A SEMANTIC STUDY OF THE LAST LEAF

Abstrak

Semantics is the study of meaning in language, one branch of which is the study of lexical relations—how words relate to one another in meaning. This article focuses on two types of lexical relations: synonymy and antonymy, as applied to O. Henry’s short story The Last Leaf, using Murphy’s (2010) semantic framework. The aim is to show how these relations function not only at the lexical level but also contribute to narrative meaning, emotional development, and character psychology. Using a descriptive qualitative method, ten data points were analyzed in relation to their semantic roles within the context of the story. The findings indicate that the author intentionally uses lexical contrasts such as hope vs despair and life vs death to build emotional depth and strengthen the story’s thematic structure. Ultimately, this study demonstrates that synonymy and antonymy are not only stylistic elements but also serve symbolic and expressive functions in literary texts. It further shows how semantic theory can be effectively applied in literary analysis.This research also encourages future semantic-based investigations of literary texts to explore how meaning operates beyond the sentence level.