preview

Analysis Of Blood Ties In Barn Burning By William Faulkner

Decent Essays
Open Document
“Barn Burning”, a story written by William Faulkner that describes the way a boy decides to “betray” his dad by turn him in because of his crimes. Sartoris, who is just starting to see the difference between right and wrong, has been covering up his dad’s crimes and helping him to commit them. Mr. Snopes, Sartori’s dad, expresses deliberately his methods of making justices with his own hands, and not only that, but also forcing his son to keep his loyalty to him and his family. Eventually, Sartoris starts to analyze the severity of his dad’s actions and choose not to help him anymore in his attempt to burn the second barn belonging to his new boss, De Spain. Although, Faulkner tries to present a situation to think more about our actions, it doesn’t seem that way for many readers. For instance, Jane Hiles in her critical response, called “Blood Ties in Barn Burning”, to Faulkner’s work, states that his intention wasn’t to recognize Sartori’s decision, but to support his dad’s beliefs of the responsibility of being loyal to his family. As an evidence, she presents an Interview in Japan directed to Faulkner in which he talks about clannishness as a way for people to defend their “blood” from external injustices.
As it seems, this literary piece might be very complex to get a conclusion from. Personally, I think Faulkner wants his readers to debate about this. While I was reading “Barn Burning”, I noticed that the author does not give specific resolutions to the problems he
Get Access
Related
Get Access