As I Lay Dying Book Analysis

Faulkner’s Description of Dewey Dell in As I Lay Dying William Faulkner’s phrasing, point of view, and grammar in his polyphonic novel, As I Lay Dying, strategically employs the miserably pessimistic yet juvenile voice of Dewey Dell to characterize her as the novel’s naïve victim. The only surviving female in the Bundren family, Faulkner presents the hardships that Dewey Dell must endure. In addition, as an uneducated girl with no guidance, Dewey Dell experiences an uncertainty in many issues that arise in her life.

Most works of literature often use events and objects to display a deeper meaning to the current situation. In As I Lay Dying, by William Faulkner, there are many references that connect the Bundren family to mythological, Biblical, and classical allusions. Faulkner’s use of various types of allusions emphasizes the characters’ behavior and relationship to each other.

Edwidge Danticat uses her memoir to show how powerful a voice is to have, how it makes a difference in not only your life, but the ones without a voice, the ones who cannot speak for themselves. In the book, Brother, I’m Dying, written by Edwidge Danticat, which tells us how her younger life growing up in Haiti with her uncle, affects her after she moves to the US to be with her parents at the age of 10 years old, this drastically changes the relationships she has with her uncle and father, creating a new family dynamic. The suggestion of voice is shown in many ways, while her reasoning is constant, Danticat faced many situations in her life that have shaped her beliefs and formed her opinions on individual standings. Danticat’s memoir

“The eye is the lamp of the body. If your vision is clear, your whole body will be full of light” (). Ever since the creation of mankind, the eyes exist as the window to the soul. Taking one look into a person's eyes can leave you with more knowledge than ever thought imagined. Love, anger, lust, hatred, sympathy and guilt can all express themselves in just one glance. William Faulkner knew of this interesting trait and applied it to his 19___’s novel “As I Lay Dying”. Each character possesses their own unique traits and personalities which drive them to fulfill their end mission: burying their mother in Jefferson. To express their personalities, Faulkner incorporates a variety of similes and metaphors all relating to the eyes. This technique sheds light of their selfish ways. These selfish qualities, not the love for their mother, cause the Bundren children to succeed in their mother's dying wish.

William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying presents a broken family whose members are not all sound of mind. They all present different ways in which their sense of self can be viewed as broken. Even though there is no forefront hero depicted within the novel there is definitely evidence that suggests that some of the heroes are capable of heroic characteristics. Though there is rampant selfishness and immorality some redeeming qualities of the Bundren family shine through.

When a mentor gives you lemons, you make the lemonade. In the book The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman, the person most important in Bod Owens’s life is his mentor, Silas. Bod Owens did not have the average teenage life; he was raised by two dead parents who live in a graveyard, and was not allowed to leave the graveyard unless his parents gave him permission. The lady on the Grey is the symbol of death that mentors Silas, which gives her and Silas a similar “job” in their afterlife.

1. Which are the most intelligent and sympathetic voices in the novel? With whom do you most and least identify? Is Faulkner controlling your closeness to some characters and not others? How is this done, given the seemingly equal mode of presentation for all voices?

The Bundren family from William Faulkner's As I lay Dying are a unique family, in that they don’t fit the mold of what most would think a family should be: a unit. They disconnect as a group, often saying one thing while thinking another. While Addie’s burial is the central reason for their journey to Jefferson, some family members have motives of their own. Evident in that half of them with the exception of Darl, Cash and Jewel have other reasons than to bury Addie in Jefferson.

In the novel, As I Lay Dying, by William Faulkner, two characters ,Darl and Jewel Bundren, each cope with their mother’s death and deal with their isolation from their family by expressing their feelings in deeply emotional behavior. Darl, the second eldest sibling out of five, questions his existence because of his isolation and the lack of love he received from his mother growing up. Jewel, on the other hand, was his mother’s favorite of all five of her children. Jewel was the bastard son of Addie Bundren and the minister she had an affair with, Whitfeld. Due to the violent situation by which he was conceived, Jewel expresses all of his actions, including love, through violence and hatred. Both Darl and Jewel Bundren, convey their

William Faulkner uses language in a unique way in his novel As I Lay Dying. Language is a form of expression to show thoughts and emotions. Faulkner uses it to convey the individual characters’ thoughts and feelings. He also uses it to draw a line between language and true expression. He shows the limitations of language and the difference between language and words.

The author of As I Lay Dying, William Faulkner, really contributes to the aspects of literature through his ability to tell a seemingly incredible story through only the “stream-of-consciousness” technique. Faulkner takes his insight beyond the piece, through other’s views and thoughts. Although the characters might be acting differently upon each subject or handling each action in opposite ways, the tone and theme that he uses really brings the whole piece to a perfect balance. In As I Lay Dying, Faulkner displays contradicting elements through the reactions of the family members towards the mother’s death with the use of dialogue, tone, imagery, and internal conflict.

The conversation to redefine gender roles is often dominated by polarized extremes. In As I Lay Dying, William Faulkner explores the social and psychological effects of the traditional southern female gender role with the character Addie Bundren. Through Addie’s narrative, Faulkner presents the struggles of a woman as she lives the oppressive consequences of expressing her sexuality: childbearing and motherhood. The same consequences are reflected in the destruction of the life of Addie’s unwed daughter, Dewey Dell. Through these women’s stories ,Faulkner reveals the damaging effect of institutional patriarchy in women’s lives as storyteller rather than feminist.

In As I Lay Dying, an important question the reader grapples with is simply why? Why all of these unnecessary hardships just to get to Jefferson? Is the Bundrens’ journey to Jefferson driven by familial duty, or familial love? It’s really driven by neither. Familial duty is the guise in this novel for each family member to get to town—namely, Anse—for some sort of ulterior motive. Anse is the driving force for the other members of the family to find a reason to go to Jefferson. The only person in the Bundren family to convey actual familial love is Darl, who tries to burn his mother’s body—which, we are reminded—makes him insane. Yes, they get to Jefferson and bury Addie’s body, but was she even really a person anymore, or

The novel As I Lay Dying by William Faulker is filled with many aspects that display a deeper meaning to enhance the text. In the criticism “Exploring the Nature of Individual Identity in Faulkner's As I Lay Dying and Ware's Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Kid on Earth” Elizabeth Spavento notes on Addie Bundren’s, who is the maternal figure of the family, sexuality. Spavento deeply analyzes Addie’s affairs with Minister Whitfield and her special love for Jewel as her escape from Anse’s lack of care. Throughout her criticism, Spavento displays the theme that “a life of action is far better than a life based on words given the potential for deception that is inherent in language,” (Spavento 66) by using examples mostly from Jewel, Addie, Darl, and Ans Bundren. She describes the relationships and separation between the members of the Bundren family by those who are loved by Addie and those who are not.

As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner is famous for its use of modernism as one story is told from a multitude of individual perspectives in a stream-of-consciousness format. Faulkner’s modernistic writing allows the reader to delve deep into the true emotions of characters and gain a profound understanding of events and intentions. The individual perspectives show the reader the true beliefs of people and the communities that they fit into, which reveals fundamental differences in opinion without saying who is “truly” good or bad. The community of the family believes what they are doing is good because it is the best that they can and should do, while the community of all outsiders expresses that the family’s actions are actually wrong. Additionally, the community of women in the novel generally express that there is no excuse for the family’s actions, while the community of men in the novel generally see