Tag Archives: Compson

Women in Faulkner

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Absalom Absalom! begins differently, compared to his other three novels, The Sound and the Fury, As I Lay Dying, and Light in August, as the readers are quickly given a narration as to how the downfall of a family came to be.  Coldfield’s story of Sutpen, can easily be Ms. Burden, from LIA, or Hightower’s story, a story related to the Civil War that involves slavery and isolation. I found it quite interesting that Faulkner would situate a story prior to Quentin’s travel to Harvard and death. As told in The Sound in the Fury, the interpretation that Quentin’s death was primarily due to Caddy’s actions may be false. Absalom Absalom! Travels before the birth of Quentin, to a period that may explain why the once Aristocratic Compson family lost their wealth and reputation. The usage of “ghosts”, involvement of Mr. Compson, the non-present father figure in TSAF, and a female’s voice, may explain why Quentin was so heavily affected by Caddy’s actions and with his conversations with his father. Though Coldfield tells Quentin her stories due to his Ivy League education, “So maybe you will enter the literary profession as so many Southern gentlemen and gentlewomen too are doing now and maybe some day you will remember this and write about it…” My interpretation of Miss Rosa Coldfield’s reasoning as to why she chose Quentin to tell her story is similar to Ms. Burden’s forcefulness and want to control Christmas’s life and future in LIA. Miss Rosa Coldfield expects Quentin to join the literary profession, get married, own a house, and publish stories in magazines, yet she knows nothing about Quentin. Mr. Compson states, “Do you want to know the reason why she chose you… It’s because she will need someone to go with her- a man, a gentleman, yet one still young enough to do what she wants, do it the way she wants it done…” It seems Faulkner expresses each female in his novels as a demanding, emasculatory, and dominant figure in comparison to males that are easily manipulated and insecure with their own identity and inability to grasp control of their desires and futures.  Also, the analogy of ghosts to ladies “Years ago we in the South made our women into ladies. Then the war came and made the ladies into ghosts.”(AA!) , may implicitly tune into the ability of  women playing drastic roles in males without their presence being significant such as the lack of Addie’s presence in AILD, yet memories of her still allowed her to play a significant role in her son’s life through animal magnetism, a fish and a horse. However, due to Quentin’s naïveness, “Quentin thought, long ago when she was a girl—of young and indomitable unregret, of indictment of blind circumstance and savage event; but not now; only the lonely thwarted old female flesh embattled for forty-three years in the old insult; the old unforgiving outraged and betrayed by the final and complete affront which was sutpen’s death…”, in comparison to Mr. Compson’s belief of Miss Coldfield’s intentions, this leaves a question as to why did Faulkner decide Quentin be told this story instead of Quentin’s father or perhaps to another person who is more aware of Sutpen’s identity. By reading TSAF, LIA, and AILD, we are able to have a better grasp on how women, men, and the setting /town play a role into each person’s life through manipulation and interpretations.

A family Led on Seperate Roads

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Quentin and Jason Compson both have very different ideologies towards their past and present lifestyles. Quentin obsesses with time and indulges in past failures as his narration is hindered by retrospective memories of his father and sister, Caddy. In contrast, Jason Compson reflects on his past experiences as a method to bring reassurance and to motivate him for future success. Both narrators approach their past in very contrasting ways, Quentin in a crippling manner while Jason in an empowering manner, but ultimately they are unable to escape their past.

Raised closely by different parents, Quentin by his father and Jason by his mother, Quentin’s obsession with time represents his desires to escape his father’s ideals of time and sexuality but gain his acceptance. But as his mind constantly fluctuates between the past and the present it becomes obvious, he obsesses with his father’s ideals while Caddy is used as a scapegoat to deviate from his father’s principles and for Quentin to gain his own identity. From the start of the chapter, Quentin’s father warns him to separate himself from time but contradicts himself and hands Quentin a watch.

Quentin’s father tells him, “to forget time… try not to conquer it because no battle is ever won. The field only reveals to man his own folly and despair” (76).  As Quentin tries to separate himself from the past, the constant ticking of clocks and watches haunts Quentin indicating its not Quentin’s sense of time that is crippled but it’s the memory of his father that Quentin can’t forego and separate from. Many memories that arise, are often focused in on Caddy but they are all reflected off of conversations between Quentin and his father. “I have committed incest I said Father it was I it was not Dalton Ames” (TSAF 79). Quentin calls upon incest relations with Caddy as a way to propose the idea, Caddy’s child does have a known father and Caddy is not ruining the reputation of the Compson name through her promiscuous actions. However, on page 78, the conversation between Quentin and his father states, “In the South you are ashamed of being a virgin. Boys. Men. They lie about it. Because it means less to a women, Father said. He said it was men invented virginity not women….Why couldn’t it have been me and not her who is unvirgin and he said that what that’s sad too.” In this passage, the idea of losing virginity as a male serves as a passage from becoming “a boy to a man.” Quentin who is still a virgin, is looked down upon, and grasps at the concept of, if he mentions to his father he had sexual relations with his sister, he will gain his father’s approval as well as save the rest of the reputation that is left of the Compson name, that has not been destroyed by Caddy’s pregnancy out of wedlock.

Another moment that brings Quentin to arrest at the thought of his father’s memory is when Quentin is accused of spying on Caddy, “The street lamps would go down the hill then rise toward town I walked upon the belly of the shadow. I could extend my hand beyond it. feeling father behind me beyond the rasping darkness of summer and August the street lamps Father and I protect women from one another from themselves our women Women are like that they don’t acquire knowledge of people we are for that they are just born with a practical fertility of suspicion that makes a crop every so often and usually right they have an affinity for evil…”(TSAF 96-97). Faulkner incorporates this passage to implicate several things. Mr. Compson, Quentin’s father is the primitive source that haunts Quentin. While his sense of time and Caddy represents the disorder that builds within Quentin as he tries to gain his father’s acceptance but gain his own identity.

Lastly, the Italian immigrant girl depicts Quentin’s last attempt to separate himself from his father. He calls her his sister and does not try to take advantage of her as he is able to lose his virginity to her making his father proud he is no longer a virgin. Instead, he tries to lead her to her home. The Italian girl may be representative of purity and as Caddy untouched. He views her as his last attempt to separate himself from his father; allowing himself to bring her home without memories of his father clouding his judgment. Though memories of Caddy and Natalie arise during this moment, this represents a struggle he has with his morals versus expectations he has as a man (134).

Jason obsesses with money and social status like his mother and unlike Benjy and Quentin he does not respect women. He views himself superior over all others, authoritative, sees himself as a person who should command respect and attention, and is extremely cynical of everyone’s actions. In contrast to the views Benjy and Quentin had for their mother, Jason’s narration views Mrs. Compson as a very emotional and caring mother whose actions are controlled him Jason. Mrs. Compson constantly repeats the words “flesh and blood” as she pleads Jason to allow Caddy to return for Quentin, “I’d gladly take her back, sins and all, because she is my flesh and blood. It’s for Quentin’s sake.” Jason’s relation to time is blended with jealousy of Quentin’s Harvard education but also biased as each memory he has is propelled through blame and misery while he is a spectator. Jason is constantly comparing himself to Quentin’s Harvard education by stating the education is completely unnecessary as he is doing fine without it (196,197, 206, 235,). However, he also mentions Quentin is the reason for the downfall of the family due to selling property to pay for his education (206) and him having to be a father figure for the family. In this narration, Jason does not have flashbacks of Caddy instead his memories are targeted at Quentin and moments of his superiority. He views black people as inferior to him and him having to install a method to control and put fear into them so they know their role in society (207).  Jason’s relations to economics are very derogatory as he is fueled with hatred towards Jews and black people (234). He constantly remarks on their laziness and incompetency but on the contrary he is dependent on them (186), dependent on Dilsey to make him his meals, and the Jewish people who run the market.  Jason is not only racist but he is also sexist. On page 247, he states he does not need any more women in his life as she may “turn out to be a hophead”- a drug addict. Basically, women are virtually of no use to society.  His authoritative persona brings about his insecurity. He does not allow Caddy to return home probably because he’s afraid she will be favored, (on page 220 he forces his mother to burn the check) as well as the constant reminder of Quentin’s Harvard education he carefully attempts to show was a pointless education (235).