As I Lay Dying Blog IV - 4.17.16

Addie finally speaks to us, this time from the afterlife, what insight do we get from her

narration? Focus on one revelation and connect it to another narrator’s.

     Throughout “section three” of William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying, we learn about the new troubles and struggles that await the Bundren family. Those struggles being how to get across the flooded/broken up bridge, having to get transportation to Jefferson after the wagon falls into the water along with the coffin and several other things, the coming out of how Addie had an affair with Brother Whitfield which caused Jewel to be born. Finally arriving at the town of Mottson, which obviously is not Jefferson, it’s simply just a pit stop on the way because “Dewey Dell had to deliver a package.” Anyways, that is just a summary from what I recall of section three. This section had its ups and downs, but the most interesting part of this section by far had to be Addie’s narration, and also Cora’s narration which led up to Addie’s as if trying to prepare us for what we are about to read. Through Addie’s narration we actually learn a lot… We learn about her unhappy marriage with Anse and how that all came to be. They met in Jefferson and he had lived out in the country, later on they had decided to get married. From that they had the children; they were one of the biggest issues for her as she felt she was “violated” by them and no longer had any privacy or free-time because of them, so she had resented Anse for fathering them both. After that, Addie had her third child, Jewel. From her writing she reveals that Jewel was the most loved child because he was the only one that was “truly hers” because he was fathered by another man, and that man was Whitfield. After that she had two more children, Dewey Dell, and Vardaman which she felt fixed the issue of her having Jewel and repaid the debt to Anse (even though he did not know she had an affair). To connect this to another narrator’s revelations it would most definitely have to be Cora’s narration, as her section is right before Addie’s. In her section she talks about sin and the different types of sin. One of these sins would be the fact that she had an affair with another man, and Addie did not seem to care that Cora knew or had been troubling her about it — Cora had always wanted Addie to get on her knees and pray. Addie did not want to repent because she felt that Jewel was not her punishment just as Cora did; she felt that Jewel would save her “from the water and from the fire.” (Faulkner 168) which is so far true because Jewel did actually save Addie and her coffin from the water which flooded the bridge and river. So, in conclusion, throughout Addie’s section of narration we learn several things about her — her unhappy marriage, and the affair that she had with Whitfield that caused Jewel to be born.