Image Explosion - 4.12.16

Pages 80-81 of As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner:

I would like to write about sleep, because sleep is what I need. Right now I would consider myself "empty of sleep" just as Darl describes on page 80. Because quite honestly, what is a person without sleep? They are deprived of one of the most beautiful things in the world and without sleep we would all be tired human beings just wandering around not getting anything achieved. Sleep is honestly a beautiful thing, especially after sleeping in on a long weekend, or on summer vacation. But, the fact that Darl narrates about sleep and how it makes you what you are, and what you are not, it makes me think and wonder whether I am or not in Darl's point of view. But, who knows, I could have interpreted the sleep mumbo-jumbo completely wrong.

As I Lay Dying Blog II - 4.10.16

     The character in William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying that I would like to give a general response to today is the character of Vardaman Bundren. Just to give a brief background on Vardaman’s character, he is an eight year old child (approximately) and the son of Addie and Anse Bundren. Throughout the story and the different parts that he narrates, we learn that he is a person of symbolism. He brings out the idea of the fish to represent his mother in different ways. For instance, the fish is once alive, like his mother, and then the fish is dead, just like his mother. His character, in my opinion, is very hard to understand when trying to grasp what exactly he is saying (most of the time). I found it hard to understand the fish concept until I researched it and it was explained in a class discussion, however, that is not the only thing that I found confusing about his character. I felt that his character’s narration was also slightly unreliable because of his age and the trauma that he is going through — simply because he exaggerates things and has an anxious tone for most of all his narrations. One thing that I do like about his character though is how he does make the analogy of the fish and his mother, which after much explanation it starts to make sense and I am sure that the analogy/symbol will be used throughout the entire novel. However, of course, there are things that I do not like and just confuse me about him. I was confused about why Faulkner actually included him other than to make the fish analogy. By Faulkner including Vardaman we see the child’s life through his own eyes, and just how much anxiety he has at the time of his mother’s death. I am sure that as the story proceeds we will see more of his character and how he goes about different situations. In the future pages of this novel, I am anticipating that something happens on the family’s journey to the town of Jefferson where they will bury Addie Bundren. But, I am sure that when something does happen on this journey we as readers will see through Vardaman’s eyes and interpret his narrations with even more symbols and analogies to his mother and maybe even more family members, like possible Darl, Jewel, or even Anse. 

A Rose for Emily Blog - 4.8.16

• Who is the "we" in "A Rose for Emily"? Is the narration reliable? Why or why not? [use evidence from the text]

In William Faulkner's A Rose for Emily the narrator is a questionable subject where we really are not sure who exactly it is. As the reader, I interpret the "we" to be a narrator from the New South that is just interpreting the character of Miss Emily and the daily life that surrounds her and every one else in the town of Jefferson. I believe this for many reasons. One reason is because throughout the story, it seems that the narrator(s) (if there are multiple narrators, we are unsure) continue to talk badly about her, and very rarely even praise her character. For example the narrator says, "So the next day we all said, 'She will kill herself'; and we said it would be the best thing. When she had first begun to be seen with Homer Barron, we had said, 'She will marry him.'" (Faulkner 4) This narration makes me think that the narrator is a female, however, I could be wrong. It may be a group of people just interpreting her life, meaning it may be a mixed group of genders. Also, I do believe that the narration is reliable, because from what it seems, the character of Miss Emily was interpreted correctly. They show that she had gone crazy (murder & necrophilia), which in my personal opinion sounds like a correct description of her character because she becomes a recluse after a whole bunch of stuff happens. Like the New South "paving" its way into Jefferson and her being a "fallen monument" after she dies.  

A Rose for Emily - 4.7.16

Q: How do you feel about the ending of Faulkner’s short story? Did it surprise you, or was there evidence all along, building to the conclusion?

A: Honestly, I am not sure what I expected to be at the end of this short story. I actually expected her to die from the beginning, so I really was not surprised by the events in this story. We learn that she is growing old in her house, that her father dies, and she loses love. We also learn that she does not leave her home nor speak to anyone outside of her house... It is assumed that she does not even speak to her servant who runs her errands. The fact that she has gone through so much, like death and the loss of love, but also the fact that we are told at the beginning that the whole town had gone to her funeral, it was kind of hard to be surprised that she died from a "sickness". This sickness possibly being a metaphor for a broken heart; it being broken by Homer and her father who drove away men. So all in all, I was not surprised by the events of this story as I felt there was evidence throughout the story that led to the conclusion.


*Apparently I misinterpreted how the end happened and that it just wasn't about her death.

As I Lay Dying Gallery Crawl - 4.6.16

My reflection question: 

     " What could Faulkner's purpose of contrasting the townspeople & the poor white farmers on the base of class suggest about early Southern 20th century life?"

Personally, I believe that I can continue to support my reflection question as the question I asked was about the plot in general and how Faulkner continues to contrast the townspeople and white farmers on the basis of class, even though the contrasting is not obvious, but it is instead seen through how each narrator characterizes another one. Some people posted several questions that could be added onto my reflective question, and those questions did not even come to mind when I created my statement. For example, people asked, "Which class do you think Faulkner favors?" or "How does this shape the plot of the story and the character?" or even how race is not a present figure in the novel, even though taking place in the early 20th century south, prejudice is still present and looked at with the factor of class. I believe I can still investigate this question because now I can look for how class affects other characters and what it will come out to be in the end. As I move on through this reading I will scope out for details about how characters like Peabody, Anse, and other characters characterize one another. 

As I Lay Dying Blog I - 4.4.16

     In William Faulkner’s novel, As I Lay Dying, there are many different narrators throughout the entire book. Some narrating more than others, some being more reliable than others, and some there to just add value to the plot and what exactly is going on throughout the novel. As a reader, I sometimes like the way that Faulkner lays out his novel with different narrators. However, there is one narrator in particular that has been more prominent over the other narrators. That person would be Darl, who is one of the Bundren children and according to Cora is one of the most caring and loving to his mother, Addie, who dies in the first part of the reading. However, while discussing as a class he (most likely) was not the most caring of his mother, because, in fact, he called his mother by her first name and Jewel had been there for Addie more often and defended her with some sort of sanity. Although, that does not matter too much at the moment. What really does matter though is the fact that Darl’s narrations are sometimes a mix between third-person limited and third-person omniscient. It seems that Darl can communicate with other characters and see what they are seeing without actually being with them, around them, or even with literally communicating with them. I quite honestly believe he is one of the more reliable characters in this novel, even though I do not believe anyone can actually be reliable since they all have their own biases and views. Compared to other characters though, I feel like the incorporation of multiple narrators makes the novel more reliable as a whole as we are seeing it from everyone’s eyes instead of it being from a single person.

     Compared to other narrators like Nick in The Great Gatsby or Huck Finn in Huck Finn, I believe that Darl’s narrations compare differently. Even though in The Great Gatsby we grasp a glimpse about Jay Gatsby and his life, and also the lives of other wealthy people… I believe that these narrations differ because of how everything is laid out and portrayed. Nick had a longer amount of time to put everything into detail and describe events and stories, while Darl’s narrations were snippets of his everyday life and descriptions of what is going on around him. In the end though, I do believe Darl may possibly be more reliable than the other characters like Vardaman, Cora, or Peabody. That is because they all are different from one another. Vardaman is only an eight year old and he views things from a different perspective, he can tend to exaggerate what is going on around him. Cora could be less reliable because of her religious views, and Peabody less reliable because of how he is a townsman and a doctor. The townspeople and people from the country are different as seen when the Bundren family criticizes them, including Peabody who is a doctor who came out to see Addie Bundren on a short notice. So all in all, depending on how the reader views the different narrations and how Faulkner lays out his novel, the reliability may change from person to person. But one thing is for certain, I would trust Darl’s words over someone like Anse, Vardaman, or Cora. 

As I Lay Dying Free Write - 4.4.16

William Faulkner's novel, As I Lay Dying, was honestly kind of weird to me as a reader. I am not entirely sure of the purpose to this writing or who/what the intended audience is. The dialect and dialogue throughout the first part that we read could be confusing at times, but it could also be very easy to read. Sometimes while reading I'd have to go back and make sure I actually read something correctly because the sentence structure was really weird. I am also very confused on why Addie Bundren died at the beginning instead of the end, because usually an author will kill off a character towards the end or at the climax of a novel. So, maybe Faulkner is setting her death at the beginning in order to build something off of it, but I am not even sure what he would want to make off of the death. The narration throughout the novel was kind of nice, but also kind of weird because at times I would actually forget who was saying what and I'd have to turn back a few pages and see who was talking about the death, or what was going on. Since we didn't get last names and whatnot towards the beginning of the book for every character, I was confused on who was in what family. That being the Tulls or the Bundrens or even possibly another family that I don't even know about. The novel itself was weird to me, and it could be because I don't know what it is about in the first place, other than to show her death and possibly some outcomes that come from her death and the things leading up to it.