William Faulkner's "Absalom, Absalom!"
William Faulkner’s novel entitled Absalom, Absalom! is a book which systematically utilizes the concept of discovering the past in the present. Faulkner’s use of the past in the present is pertinent in both the construction of the plot of Absalom, Absalom! as well as the extension of its interpreted meanings. Furthermore, Faulkner’s writing of Absalom, Absalom! appears to have been motivated by the great ills and conflicts of the American South, which was most poignant during the American Civil War, while the title, as well as its implications, was simultaneously conceived in Faulkner’s mind. The fact that the story of Absalom in the Old Testament and the plot of Absalom, Absalom! are so strikingly similar suggests that, in Faulkner’s mind, there is no separation between the past and the present. For Faulkner, time is a continuum in which there is no past, so the only time in which people and things exist is either in the present or in the projected future. In fact, Faulkner’s Absalom, Absalom! demonstrates how the tribulations of the past are often the ills of the present, and, when people, including readers, are able to understand and depart from the failures of human nature, the future holds the possibility of truth and insight.
Considering that, for Faulkner, the past is never just the past, there are recognizable parallels betwixt the caricatures of Faulkner in Absalom, Absalom! and the story of Absalom in the Old Testament. For instance, Faulkner’s character Thomas Sutpen absorbs certain traits of both Absalom and his father King David from the Old Testament. Because Thomas Sutpen has the characteristics of both, he is powerful and rules a dynasty like King...
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...alid insight into the affairs of the prejudicial and slave stained South. In fact, as Wallace Steven’s suggests in his poem “Thirteen Ways to of Looking at a Blackbird,” it is the fourteenth view which is the truthful and insightful interpretation, causing a cathartic experience in the individual who perceives it (class notes). However, for those related to and descended from Sutpen, they have similar views of the world, which is embittered by the South’s intolerance for blacks, and they, including Henry, Judith, and Clytemnestra, have grown to abhor the South’s past and, therefore, themselves. As Faulkner’s Absalom, Absalom! proves, the inhibitions of the past are often inherited into the present.
Works Cited
Faulkner, William. Absalom, Absalom! New York: Vintage, 1986.
Spoto, Dr. Mary T. Class Notes. ENG 433. 28 March 2006.
Though slightly frivolous to mention merely because of its obviousness but still notably, all the slaves came from the Southern states including and not limited to Georgia, Texas, Alabama, Virginia, South Carolina, and Arkansas. Economically, the United States’ main cash crops—tobacco, rice, sugarcane, and cotton—were cultivated by the slaves who the rich Southerners heavily depended upon. From this perspective establishes a degree of understanding about the unwillingness to abolish slavery and contributes to the reality of the clear division between the agriculturally based South and industrially based North. Having watched the film, I wished the Northern people were more aware of the abuses and dehumanization of the slaves though the saddening reality is that the truth of the slaves’ conditions couldn’t be revealed till much later on because the fear of retaliation and prosecution of the slave owners and white people was very much present. That the slaves’ mistreatment would be considered repulsive and repugnant to the Quakers and abolitionists is made evident the narratives of the slaves read by the different former slaves who elucidated the countless
The poem, “My Great-Grandfather’s Slaves” by Wendell Berry, illustrates the guilt felt for the sins of a man’s ancestors. The poem details the horror for the speaker’s ancestors involvement in slavery and transitions from sympathy for the slaves to feeling enslaved by his guilt. Berry uses anaphora, motif, and irony, to express the speaker’s guilt and provide a powerful atmosphere to the poem.
DeLombard, Jeannie. “Eye-Witness to the Cruelty.” Southern Violence and Northern Testimony in Frederick Douglass’s 1845. Scholarly Journal. eLibrary. Web. 27 February 2014.
16. James Hinkle and Robert McCoy, Reading Faulkner: The Unvanquished. (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1995), 141.
Faulkner, William. The Sound and The Fury: The Corrected Text with Faulkner's Appendix. Norton, 1994.
Edenfield, Olivia Carr. "'Endure and then endure': Rosa Coldfield's Search for a Role in William Faulkner's Absalom, Absalom!" Southern Literary Journal 32 (Fall 1999): 57-68.
Porter, Carolyn. "William Faulkner: Innocence Historicized." Seeing and Being: The Plight of the Participant Observer in Emerson, James, Adams, and Faulkner. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1981. Cited as rpt. in Bloom.
In the passage of the Narrative of Fredrick Douglass, the author masterfully conveys two complimentary tones of liberation and fear. The tones transition by the use of diction and detail. The passage is written entirely in first person, since we are witnessing the struggles of Fredrick Douglass through his eyes. Through his diction, we are able to feel the triumph that comes with freedom along with the hardships. Similarly, detail brings a picturesque view of his adversities. Since the point of view is first person, the reader is able to be a part of the Douglass’ struggles with his new freedom. With diction, detail, and point of view, the reader is able to get a rare glimpse into the past of Fredrick Douglass.Fredrick Douglass’ diction is powerful as he describes his life as a slave and with his new freedom. Fredrick Douglass calls being enslaved an act of “wretchedness,” yet he was able to remain “firm” and eventually left the “chains” of slavery. Fredrick Douglass expresses that being enslaved is a wretched act and that no man should ever deserve such treatment. Despite being a slave, he kept strong and eventually broke the chain of society. However, Fredrick Douglass experienced great “insecurity” and “loneliness” with his new freedom, and was upon a new “hunting-ground.” His new freedom brought other devastating factors, being a new state without any friends, which caused his loneliness. In this new state, he grew insecure for he was in a new danger zone where at any time his freedom could be rejected. With new freedom come new obstacles, which are described in the diction of Fredrick Douglass.
“If all of this seems long ago and far away, it is worth remembering that the past is never past.” (Faulkner cited in Ellison, P.274)
The issue of Slavery in the South was an unresolved issue in the United States during the seventeenth and eighteenth century. During these years, the south kept having slavery, even though most states had slavery abolished. Due to the fact that slaves were treated as inferior, they did not have the same rights and their chances of becoming an educated person were almost impossible. However, some information about slavery, from the slaves’ point of view, has been saved. In this essay, we are comparing two different books that show us what being a slave actually was. This will be seen with the help of two different characters: Linda Brent in Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl and Frederick Douglass in The Narrative of the life of Frederick
Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, brings to light many of the social injustices that colored men, women, and children all were forced to endure throughout the nineteenth century under Southern slavery laws. Douglass's life-story is presented in a way that creates a compelling argument against the justification of slavery. His argument is reinforced though a variety of anecdotes, many of which detailed strikingly bloody, horrific scenes and inhumane cruelty on the part of the slaveholders. Yet, while Douglas’s narrative describes in vivid detail his experiences of life as a slave, what Douglass intends for his readers to grasp after reading his narrative is something much more profound. Aside from all the physical burdens of slavery that he faced on a daily basis, it was the psychological effects that caused him the greatest amount of detriment during his twenty-year enslavement. In the same regard, Douglass is able to profess that it was not only the slaves who incurred the damaging effects of slavery, but also the slaveholders. Slavery, in essence, is a destructive force that collectively corrupts the minds of slaveholders and weakens slaves’ intellects.
To explore the problem of not only revisionist history but of slavery itself we turn to 19th century American writer Fredrick Douglas. Douglas was an escaped slave, and also one of the few that were able to write down and get published his account of his treatment from plantation owners and overseers. His account is very detailed and at sometimes rather graphic, and compares his treatment from many different masters thro...
By reading closely and paying attention to details, I was able to get so much more out of this story than I did from the first reading. In short, this assignment has greatly deepened my understanding and appreciation of the more complex and subtle techniques Faulkner used to communicated his ideas in the story.
As a child, Faulkner was well aware of his family background, especially the notoriety of his great-grandfather who had moved to the Mississippi Delta from Tennessee in 1841 (Zane). William Clark Faulkner was a Civil War Colonel, a lawyer, a planter, a politician, a railroad entrepreneur, and a best-selling novelist best known for The White Rose of Memphis. He died in the streets of Ripley, Mississippi, where a former business partner he had forced out of his railroad gunned him down (Padgett). While Faulkner had never met his great-grandfather, he was a powerful influence. When his third grade teacher asked what he wanted to be when he grew up, the young William replied “I want to be a writer like my great-granddaddy”(Padgett).
"William Faulkner (1897-1962)." Short Story Criticism. Ed. Jelena Krstovic. Vol. 97. Detroit: Thomson Gale, 2007. 1-3. Literature Criticism Online. Gale. Hempfield High School. 31 March 2010.