As I Lay Dying by American Novelist William Faulkner

An American novelist William Faulkner has written As I Lay Dying in modernism, a significant movement appeared in the nineteenth century. Modernism was a change in the form and style of literature and especially novels.

Faulkner has used a specific technique “stream of consciousness” to discover the inner feelings of the characters. He used multiple narrators that each individual character expressed his view and feeling differently about the events that occurred to the family, to present the notion of alienation in the novel. Although psychological problems and financial problems were a major reason behind appearing alienation in the novel.

Section one in this study presents Faulkner’s biography and style regarding to the “Faulkner’s Alienated Family in As I Lay Dying ”. Section two introduces the background of the novel with its historical background as well as the title of the novel with the plot. While Section three is about the movement which had a significant influence on the novel. And the last section discusses the alienated family in the novel As I Lay Dying.

William Faulkner’s Biography and Style

An American Author who was born in New Albany, Mississippi in 1897. He had received the Nobel Prize 1950, a national book Award, and a Pulitzer Prize. Faulkner wrote short stories and many important novels such as As I Lay Dying, The Hamlet, Light in August, Absalom, and Go Down, Moses. Many critics regarded Faulkner as a great and influential American writer of the twentieth century.

He once said “It opened up a gold mine of people, as I created a cosmos of my own” because the fictional cosmos that Faulkner created was a Yoknapatawpha Country which it has its own reality. He indicted what happened there with a sign that only literature can impart. With the appearance of each novel that he wrote, he filled in the history of the country. So this was the history of the society, the decisions it faced, the directions in which it was drowned, and with its effort to maintain its traditions and principle of integrity. However, his focus was not only on the south but, involving all humanity. The violent and insane consequences of race and money in Faulkner’s south become in his fiction a history of the whole United States, which in turn was a history of the fallen human race. Faulkner’s writing seemed Shakespearean in its great expressiveness and in its remarkable range of characters, situations, and tones. Faulkner’s greatness is obvious through his novels and situations that he used, extending from earthy comedy to deep tragedy and in huge power of expression. He died in 1962. (Hodgins,1996).

The Background of As I Lay Dying

Faulkner was one of the American’s special modernist authors. The novel “As I Lay Dying” has been written in modernism so Faulkner as a modernist interested in those new forms and styles that produced by modernism, a movement which is broadly used to identify new and distinctive features in the topics, forms, concepts, and styles of literature in the nineteenth century(Abrams,2005). It was also a reaction against Victorian and Romanticism. Modernism in literature was like breaking rules of tradition and conventions (Cuddon,2013). The most noticeable modernist principles that were used by Faulkner were stream of consciousness, multiple narrators, realistic southern characters, and focusing on the lower-social class families.

It can take to consideration that this novel has been written after World War I that is why the effects of the War were evident in the novel. The subjects were about the destructions that appeared in a result of the War and the setting was in the south. Faulkner’s novel “As I Lay dying” contains all of these principles that appeared in a result of the War. In addition, Faulkner’s characters had a strong impact not only on the region but on the world generally because of their surviving with the difficult problems that they faced. Faulkner himself called As I Lay Dying “A deliberate book “ and a planned “ tour de force” proposing the kind of highly self-conscious creative process so often attributed to modernists (Meriwether,2004;297). The title of this novel comes from Agamemnon’s speech to Odysseus in the Odyssey:” As I lay dying the woman with the dog’s eyes would not close my eyes for me as I descended into Hades.” Fredrick Karl, one of Faulkner’s biographers, contends that “I” related to one character in the novel who is “Darl” but, Most of the others thought that Addie is “I”. This novel has a simple subject matter. It took nearly not more than a nine-day long burial process that participated by a poor family. It begins with Addie lying in her bed and ends with her final ceremony. No extraordinary happening has been seen. This Novel can be regarded as a journey book, like The Canterbury Tales, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Odyssey, On the Road. Although the story of the journey was important, Faulkner did not emphasis on details that were not as important as the people on the journey and the meaning of the journey (Goss,2015).

Alienated Family in As I Lay Dying

Alienation is one of the major features of the modern novel, which ranks at the top especially in As I Lay Dying. There are some significant reasons behind appearing alienation in Burden family; psychological problems, financial problems and selfishness of the family members, loss of the love and responsibility. The members of the Bundren family were living with each other and they were together in the journey but essentially alienated from each other. No effective conversations happened between the members of Burden family so Faulkner showed this Alienation through using multiple narrators (fifteen different narrators) in telling the story. Each character had their own interpretation to what occurred. The family members did not reveal their wishes to each other while the Bundrens contain of only seven characters. Not only the individuals alienated from others, but they were also alienated from God, or from the sense of religion. (Gale ,2016)

The major reason behind appearing alienation was a psychological problem. There was no kind or warm relations between the members of the family. No one was precious to anyone else, no one felt happiness either. Meaninglessness and uncertainty make the whole view of the novel totally gloomy. Most important alienated character in As I Lay Dying was Darl, Addie’s second child .The particular alienated character in the novel was Darl because of his psychological problem. Part of Darl’s alienation came from his sensitive personality and the other part is referred to painful situations (the death of his mother and the burial journey) which strongly affected his psychology (Peek, Hamblin,2004). Faulkner in this novel used a stream of consciousness is a technique that seeks to depict the multitudinous thoughts and feelings which pass through the mind. This term first used by William James in the Principle of Psychology (1890) to indicate the flow of inner emotions (Cuddon,2013). Stream of consciousness used by the narrators of the story, who each one interpreted the events through his or her view and emotions. Certainly, the stream of consciousness has been clearly seen by Darl, who was one of the main narrators of the story. He expressed his inner thoughts and feelings through his strange actions and quotations as nervously said:

'Yes yes yes yes yes yes yes.' (Faulkner,1957 :244)

“In a strange room you must empty yourself for sleep. And before you are emptied for sleep, what are you….I don’t know what I am. I don’t know if I am or am not. Jewel knows he is, because he does not know that he does not know whether he is or not.” (Faulkner,1957)

Darl was a character that lived in the world but he was somehow not of the world. He had some significant ability that was rare for other peoples such as, Darl’s realization of his sister’s pregnancy. It was an abnormal sense or ability when he talked with his sister telepathically about her secret. In this quotation, Darl indirectly told her sister “Dewy Dell” about recognizing her wish for going to the town to do the abortion: “I said to Dewey Dell: 'You want her to die so you can get to town: is that it?” (Faulkner,1957) Above all, Darl’s intellectual sensibility made him alienated from the community. Besides acknowledging his sister’s pregnancy, He was also aware of things that will happen in the future. Assess suddenly he felt his mother’s death by uttering these words when he was in the town with his brother Jewel:

“Jewel’s hat droops limp about his neck…Jewel, I say, she is dead, Jewel. Addie Bundren is dead.” (Faulkner,1957)

Even though Darl alienated himself from neighbors and also from his family (Atkinson). For example, “Tull” The Bundren’s neighbor declared Darl’s alienation through his speech when he said:

“I have said and I say again, that’s ever-living thing the matter with Darl: he just thinks by himself too much” (Faulkner,1957;71)

Darl’s alienation reached a peak when he burned Gillespie’s barn during an overnight repose. That is why Darl’s expression involved destruction rather that construction in a result of his psychological problem. Although this burning was a response to the pain that he enabled to express it over loss of his mother and also the burial journey In the end of the novel, Darl has been taken to an insane asylum in Jackson after trying to incinerate his mother's coffin by burning down Gillespie's barn. (Atkinson). Another major reason behind appearing alienation in this novel As I Lay Dying was a financial problem (Materialism or Marxism). The theory of Marxism is always linked with materialism. Marxism is a materialist philosophy: attempt to explain things without supposing the existence of a world, or of forces, beyond the natural world and the society (Barry,2009). Carl Marx, a German philosopher who founded the notion of Marxism. Carl Marx was the main theorist of modern socialism, believed that life is materialistic, starting with the need for food and shelter; the physical facts of life may be said to shape human consciousness rather than the other way around. The material economic world he called the base; a superstructure is built upon that base, and it is economics is the driving material force of society and of the class differences between the bourgeoisie, the capitalist upper class, and the proletariat, the working class that supplies the capitalists, or owner of the wealth, with their labor. Marx saw life as having a materialist base, spiritual expressions he saw as a culture’s ideology, and that ideology would support the needs of the dominant class (Guerin .etal,2011). Marxism observes development as coming about through the struggle for power between different social classes (Barry,2009).

According to the theory of Marxism money and materials are so important and it can the life. This novel As I Lay Dying also affected by the theory of Marxism because of the proletarian social class family which is Bundren family. The author Faulkner used this working social class to show the life and the situation of southern people. The idea of Marxism alienated Ans from his family. Ans was the father of the Bundren family and he was Addie’s husband. He was not a good father for his children and also he was not a responsible man. Ans was in a working social class, who was thinking to steal money from his children in order to get a new set of teeth. One part of Ans’s alienation came from his eagerness to steal money from his children and the other part came from his selfishness. He was clearly careless about his family, children and especially his wife “Addie”. Even he did not really love his wife and he did not felt sorry for her death, in a reason that he was too busy with his wish to go to the town, collect the money and got the teeth, as it is evident in his speech when he said:

'God’s will be done,' he says. 'Now I can get them teeth.' (Faulkner, 1957) 'But now I can get them teeth. That will be a comfort. It will.' (Faulkner, 1957;111) The Bundren’s neighbors and most members of the family thought that Anse wanted to took Addie's body for burial to Jefferson because Ans promised his wife Addie in her death-bed, but it was not true. The right reason behind going to Jefferson was the selfishness of Anse, to get a new set of teeth as he declared himself. 'I give my promise, She is counting on it.' (Faulkner, 1957) In addition, Ans sent his two eldest sons, Darl and Jewel, to take the wagon to the town for trading, for three dollars although he was aware of his wife’s situation. At that time when the novel has been written, three dollars was more a lot than nowadays. That is why when Addie died her two sons were not at home because of Ans’s wish for collecting money. So it is clear that even the smallest amount of money is a matter of life and death for the Bundren’s. Ans was responsible to what was happened to Addie’s coffin (nearly to be burned and destroyed by the storm) because he sent Darl and Jewel to the town that is why they must wait for the wagon to return back. When the wagon returned back,the storm started. This is evident that Ans has alienated himself from his family and he was not aware of his children’s wish. His selfishness derived him to alienation. At the end of the novel, Ans took Dewy Dell's abortion money and eventually used it to buy a new set of teeth. The selfishness of Ans is strongly obvious when he get married to another woman in his dead wife’s teepee

The noticeable point is that the Bundrens’ need for/// of money was so restrictive and affected all their decisions (Peek, Hamblin,2004). Another alienated character in As I Lay Dying was Dewy Dell, The only girl in the Bundren family. Her alienation came from her problem which was her pregnancy. With the death of her mother “Addie” she didn’t feel any pain because of her busy minded with her enormous problem which actually alienated her from her family and especially her mother. This was Dewy Dell’s expression about her mother’s death:

“I heard that my mother is dead. I wish I had time to let her die. I wish I had time to wish I had.” (Faulkner, 1957) Dewy Dell in this quote explained that her secret has been discovered by her brother “Darl”. However, no discussions and conversations occurred between the members of the family especially between Dewy Dell and her brother “Darl” but, Darl’s intuition awakens him to acknowledge his sister’s pregnancy(Peek, Hamblin,2004): “And so it was because I could not help it. It was then, and then I saw Darl and he knew. He said he knew without the words like he told me that ma is going to die without words…And that’s why I can talk to him with knowing with hating because he knows.” (Faulkner,1957) Eventually, any individual lived in her or his world. Especially Dewy Dell was the only girl of the Burden family although physically she was living with her family but, spiritually she was alienated from her family. The Bundren family in As I Lay Dying faced most significant problems such as, psychological problems and financial problems which made them alienated.

Conclusion

Alienation is one of the main and effective themes in As I Lay Dying which is written by William Faulkner in the nineteenth century. Faulkner used particular factors to illustrate the alienated family in As I lay Dying. By multiple narrators, he explains different views from each character about the event that occurred to the family.

Psychological problem and financial problem heavily affects the members of the Bundren family to be alienated in As I lay Dying. Darl’s psychological problem made him alienated from society and also from his family. In the hand, the financial problem made Ans to be alienated from his family because of his interest in/////greedy to the material world.

In my view, it is only loved that can control or save the family from alienation. When love is existed or felt by the members, all troubles can be solved. I think if there was love between the members of the family they will never alienated if there were a million reasons to be alienated.