Faulkner's Form
Nobel Prize-winning author William Faulkner has made a name for himself with his own unique style of writing. With his constant use of metaphors and eloquently long sentences, Faulkner has as profound an impact on his readers with a twenty-page short story as other authors do using hundreds of pages. However, despite all of the great literary devices he uses, the greatest aspects of Faulkner's stories are the great characters that he skillfully fabricates. Some of Faulkner's greatest characters are Nancy from "That Evening Sun," Miss Emily from "A Rose for Emily," and Sartoris Snopes from "Barn Burning." Profound, deep characters like these are essential to his stories because most of the action occurs internally. In fact, Faulkner specializes in analyzing his characters in time of dire internal self-conflict. He believes that psychological issues are the most dismal problems one can encounter. Therefore, Faulkner tries to "scar" his readers by placing, beneath the cl!imax of his stories, the epiphany of a character's struggle within themselves. Beneath the climax of "Barn Burning" lies, more importantly, Sarty's conquering of his feelings of inferiority within himself. Sarty feels
This oppression that Nancy feels has clearly led to her conviction of inferiority and lack of maturation. She never takes responsibility for her actions, but instead conforms to what white society tells her, blaming everything on the belief that she "aint nothing but a nigger... It aint none my fault" (80). Society has clearly instilled in her morale strong, and unhealthy, insecurities. She cannot even defend herself; she seeks protection from her husband Jesus by enticing the Compson children to play in her house. Here Nancy feels so insecure about her color that she feels young children will protect her, simply due to the fact that they are white. At the climax, when the father neglects Nancy's pleas and takes the kids away, she does not even bother closing her front door. Nancy has given up all hope on life, simply because she sadly believes "I hellborn child... I won't be nothing soon. I going back where I come from soon" (86). She has accepted the influence of her opp! Faulkner uses the same method with Miss Emily from "A Rose for Emily." Miss Emily is an extremely troubled person whose inner conflict culminates in the climax of the story. Miss Emily lives a life void of any type of proper love and compassion. At her funeral people only attended "through a sort of respectful affection towards a fallen monument... mostly out of curiosity to see the inside of her house" (47). She was a relic that nobody really cared about, but simply felt an obligation to her because of her family's illustrious history in the town. Only one person actually could show Miss Emily authentic love, the "sweetheart... [the townspeople] believed would marry her," but he ends up abandoning her (50). Faulkner has clearly adopted the technique of showing self-conflict in order to leave a lasting impression on his readers. He writes about inner struggles because he knows that we have all been down that road before. It is an issue we can all relate to. It is an issue that Faulkner knows we will inevitably sympathize with. Self- conflict is clearly an issue that Faulkner successfully "scars" us with. "Who will do our washing now, father?" I said. Perhaps the greatest description of Faulkner's feelings about self-conflict can be found in the author's own words throughout his momen
Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1550
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)
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