A Reflection of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Conversation of Eiros and Charmion on Myth of COVID-19 in Indonesia

Abstract

The outbreak of COVID-19 has affected discourses in Indonesia. People are pushed not only to work, to study, and to pray at home, but also to face uncertainty of
everyday information. Both offline and online are coming in every second but its truth are questionable. In result, there are many myths stated about COVID-19, from heat of sunlight that could cure the symptoms to hospitals that exploit infected patients of the virus. Meanwhile, Edgar Allan Poe‘s The Conversation of Eiros and Charmion told us another view of myth. Poor information of visible comets at that time are imagined to be the incoming doomsday. Eiros and Charmion
are those who live in post-apocalyptic era of the judgment day. From those points, the paper through qualitative method would like to answer the question; how are myths of COVID-19 reflected on Edgar Allan Poe‘s The Conversation of Eiros and Charmion? By revealing what is under the rug of the myth, society may find better way to find certainty in this era of post-truth. Theory of myth and illusory truth will be asserted to show the reflection of as well as to compare Poe‘s story
in today‘s condition.