The
Individual and therefore the Community in Light in August: Light in August is perhaps Faulkner's most complex and
difficult novel. Here he combined numerous themes on an outsized canvas where
many aspects of life are vividly portrayed. The publication of this novel
marked the top of Faulkner's greatest creative period — in four years he had
published five substantial novels and various short stories. Light in August is
that the culmination of this creative period and is that the novel during which
Faulkner combines many of his previous themes with newer insights into
attribute . In Sartoris, The Sound and therefore the Fury, and As I Lay Dying,
Faulkner had examined the connection of the individual to his family. In his
next major novel, Absalom, Absalom!, Faulkner returned to the family because
the point of departure for his story. In Light in August, the family as a unit
is replaced by the community, which although not examined because the family is
in other novels, is the purpose of departure.
The novel could also be interpreted on many levels. It
suggests such themes as man's isolation within the times , man's responsibility
to the community, the sacrifice of Christ, the search-for-a-father, man's
inhumanity to man, and therefore the theme of denial and flight as against
passive acceptance and resignation.
The Individual and therefore the Community in Light in August Each of those are often adequately supported, but none seems
to present the entire intent of the novel. Perhaps this is often because the
complexity of the novel yields to no single interpretation but seems to need a
multiple approach.
The complex theme of man's got to live within himself while
he recognizes his responsibility both to himself and to his fellow man will
support such a multiple approach to Light in August. The reaction of the varied
characters to the community offers another basic approach to the novel. Phyllis
Hirshleifer emphasizes the isolation of man within the novel, while Cleanth
Brooks sees in it man's relationship within the community. These two views
don't exclude one another . The isolation of every character only reinforces
his struggle for status both with the community and with himself.
Light in August follows within the logical pattern set by
Faulkner's two earlier novels, The Sound and therefore the Fury and As I Lay
Dying. The preceding novels addressed man trying to seek out a meaningful
relationship with the immediate family, and this one deals with man in
relationship to the community and as an isolated being unable to speak together
with his fellow man.
Cleanth Brooks writes
Cleanth Brooks writes that the community is "the field
for man's actions and therefore the norm by which his action is judged and
controlled ." But the problem here is that we don't have a sufficient
picture of the norm. it might be accurate to take the community as a force
which man tries to assail or avoid. And as Miss Hirshleifer writes: "The
society through which Lena moves, the people that give her food, lodging, money
and transportation due to her patient understanding modesty are, after all, an
equivalent people that crucify the Christmases whose evil arouses their own."
It is, therefore, the responses of the community to the person who become
significant. While Lena evokes responses permanently , Joe Christmas seems to
arouse their evil instincts, and Hightower arouses their suspicion.
But these responses aren't seen, as Brooks suggests, from the
view of the community, but through the consequences they produce on the
individual character. Thus the community reacts in varying ways, but none of
those reactions could accurately be considered because the norm of behavior.
And albeit Lena is in a position to evoke responses permanently from various
people, she remains outside the community. Each character within the novel is
seen as a lonely individual pitted against some force either within or outside
himself. Lena, Byron Bunch, Hightower, Christmas, Joanna Burden, Joe Brown,
Uncle Doc Hines, and even people like Percy Grimm and McEachern stand outside
the community. this is often further emphasized by the very fact that both Lena
and yuletide are orphans who haven't any family whom they will return to. The
community is additionally used because the objective commentator on the action.
We get the long-range view usually from the point-of-view of the community, but
nowhere during any of the long views does the community make any definite moral
evaluations.
The
Structure of The Novel
The isolation theme is carried over into the structure of the
novel. The novel could also be weakened into many groups of seemingly isolated
vignettes. Each scene, however, is a component of 1 large thematic mosaic, and
none might be successfully removed without destroying the entire . Likewise,
each isolated character in each isolated scene is viewed within the end as a
neighborhood of the structure of a unified whole. Thus the isolation of every
character is supported by the structural device of presenting the action of the
novel in groups of vignettes.
Lena wills her own isolation. Although she could have left
her brother's home unmolested and by the front entrance , she chose to go away
by the window which had played such a prominent part in her pregnancy. She
never complains of her lot and never asks for help from anyone. However, she
instinctively knows that folks will help her; so she involves accept their help
at face value. Her simple faith in life is echoed by her belief that she need
to be with the daddy of her child when it's born: "I reckon the Lord will
see thereto ." Her responses to life are the straightforward and basic
reactions founded on an easy philosophy of charity and hope. She is usually
anxious to assist those people that give her assistance, and she or he would
always "be obliged" if others would share her meager meals together
with her . She constantly feels the necessity to commune and share her
experience with others.
Even though she relies upon the kindness of strangers, her
strength lies within the incontrovertible fact that she has assumed complete
responsibility for her acts. She blames nobody for her predicament, and she or
he acknowledges no outside hostile force working against her. Lena, then, brings
together with her the potential salvation and redemption of Byron Bunch and
Hightower by evoking from them responses permanently and forcing them to get
entangled in responsibility.
Byron
Bunch
Byron Bunch, during his seven years in Jefferson before
Lena's arrival, had just one acquaintance, the Reverend Gail Hightower, who was
an outcast completely isolated from the community. The community had never
noticed Byron, except during a casual thanks to comment upon his
idiosyncrasies, until he became involved Lena. Merely by her passivity and her
simple questions, Lena forces Byron to get entangled . After revealing to her
the identity of Joe Brown, Byron then feels responsible to her. this sense of
responsibility draws Bryon out of his lethargic existence and forces him into
the stream of life. He successively tries to involve Hightower, who struggles
against Byron's interference. Hightower has lived too long in his isolated
world of self-abnegation and denial to ascertain that Byron must feel liable
for Lena. He cannot understand Byron's actions and interprets them as
possessing some ulterior motive.
But Byron's actions are the result of quite thirty years of
routine monotony and celibacy. Byron, like Lena, had willed his own isolation
in Jefferson; however, with the looks of Lena, he's forced to get entangled in
society. His potential redemption is that he's ready to live outside himself
and commune with another person; and albeit this involvement was forced upon
him, his strength and salvation dwell the very fact that he willingly accepts
the responsibility for his actions. Not only does he commit the required acts
of preparing for Lena's child and acting as her protector, but also, he exceeds
the stress made upon him when he follows after the fleeing Brown and confronts
him albeit he knows that he are going to be beaten. Thus Byron, after willing
his own isolation, has involvement forced upon him which he willingly accepts.
Hightower's isolation is likewise somewhat self-imposed.
Initially, the isolation derived from forces over which he had no control. His
grandfather's ghost haunted his Calvinistic conscience until it forced him to
marry a woman whom he didn't love and subject her to his own ghosts. he's
haunted by two conflicting views of his grandfather — that of the romantic
cavalry officer galloping down the streets with drawn saber which of the
grandfather shot while stealing chickens, and furthermore, shot probably by
some woman.
The seminary he attended acted not as a sanctuary from his
phantoms, as he hoped it might , but rather as a way of furthering his ends and
preparing him for a call to Jefferson. At the seminary, he met his future wife,
who wanted to flee from the tedium of her life there. At Jefferson, he confused
God together with his grandfather, galloping horses with salvation, and
therefore the cavalry with Calvary. His sermons then reflected his own
confusion and, as he later realizes, didn't bring back the congregation the
messages of hope and forgiveness.
When his wife commits suicide as a results of Hightower
failure as a husband, the congregation then turns against High-tower. He then
becomes the rejected and isolated minister. Therefore, a part of his isolation
is forced upon him, but partially it derives from his own inner failure to bring
the past and present into a workable unity.
Carl Benson writes: "Hightower shapes his own destiny by
acts of will, and he is, therefore, morally in charge of his choice." It
seems, however, that Hightower's earlier life was shaped for him from forces of
the past over which he had no control. These are the forces which ultimately
cause him to be rejected by the Presbyterian congregation. it's only after his
dismissal that Hightower wills his own destiny, and thus becomes morally
responsible for it. His option to stay in Jefferson despite persecution,
disgrace, and physical violence leads to his complete isolation. His moral
responsibility derives from the sanctity of isolation faraway from the
community. He thinks that because he suffered the disgrace and shame, the
physical torment and pain, he has won the proper to peace and solitude and
therefore the privilege of remaining uninvolved in life. He refuses to simply
accept responsibility for his past faults because his suffering has atoned for
his previous errors.
But with the doorway of Lena into Jefferson, Hightower is
forcefully drawn into the stream of life again and realizes that the past has
not been bought and purchased . Hightower, therefore, cannot become the
effective moral reflector of the novel until he's ready to come to terms both
with himself and his fellow man, and until he assumes an area in society again
and recognizes his responsibility to himself and his fellow man. The Individual and therefore the Community in Light in August
.Lena, Byron, and Hightower all will their isolation. Joe
Christmas' isolation is forced upon him early in his life by outside forces and
attitudes. a part of his plight in life comes from the very fact that he can
never accept anything but partial responsibility for his acts and at an
equivalent time attempts to disclaim all responsibility for them. Just before
killing Joanna, he thinks that "Something goes to happen to me,"
which suggests that Christmas looks upon his violent actions as being compelled
by exterior forces which relieve him of any personal responsibility. on the
other hand this only increases his predicament, because he does feel a partial
responsibility for his actions. If, then, Christmas' life and attitudes are
shaped by exterior forces, it's necessary, so as to know his plight, to work
out what proportion Christmas feels he should be held liable for his acts.
Joe's earliest attitudes
were formulated
Joe's earliest attitudes were formulated within the
orphanage. it had been here that he first discovered that he possessed Negro blood
— a incontrovertible fact that in a method or another controlled or affected
his every act throughout life. His remaining life was spent trying to bring
these two irreconcilable opposites into a big relationship. His unknown father
bequeathed him his Negro blood, and this heritage, over which he had no
control, is that the strongest influence upon his life. At the orphanage he's
first called "nigger." The blood cages him in, and therefore the
vigilance of Euphues Hines sets him aside from the remainder of the orphans.
he's unable to determine a meaningful relationship with any of the opposite
children, and he senses his difference.
One experience at the orphanage, especially, has multiple
consequences for Christmas. When he's discovered stealing the dietitian's
toothpaste, he expects punishment and instead is bribed with extra money than
he knew existed. This experience becomes the determining think about his
attitude toward the order of existence, women, and sex throughout the remainder
of his life. Since he was kept edgy for several days desiring punishment which
never came, he was left confused on the meaning of his act.
McEachern
Therefore, during the remainder of his life when the pattern
or order of existence is broken, the result's usually disastrous. When he
transgresses McEachern's rules he expects and receives punishment, which
accords together with his idea of the order of things. this is often again why
he detests the interference of Mrs. McEachern. She, just like the dietitian,
represents a threat to the settled order of human existence. Or else, with each
prostitute during his years on the road, he would tell her that he was a Negro,
which always brought one reaction. When this pattern is broken by the
prostitute who didn't care whether he was Negro or not, his reactions are
violent and he beats her unmercifully.
Thus his violent outburst comes from the unconscious desire
to punish the dietitian who had first violated his pattern of order. an
equivalent reaction is seen in his relationship with Joanna Burden. For about
two years, their relationship conformed to an ordered (though unorthodox)
pattern; but when Joanna broke this pattern together with her demands that
Christmas take over her finances, attend a Negro school, and eventually that he
pray together with her so as to be saved, he again reacted violently to the
present violation of his concept of an ordered existence.
His basic hatred for ladies ultimately returns to the present
episode. The dietitian in violating his order of existence also attempted to
destroy his individuality. Thus the effeminizing efforts of Mrs. McEachern to
melt his relations together with his foster father are rejected because if he
yielded to them, he would face the likelihood of losing the firm and ordered
relation with McEachern. As long as he maintains this masculine relationship
with McEachern, he feels that he retains his individuality.
And, finally, the childhood episode with the dietitian is
reflected in his sex life. The toothpaste becomes the essential symbol. At an
equivalent time that it's a cleanser , it also is a phallic symbol. The results
of the scene is his utter sickness caused by the "pink woman smelling
obscurity behind the curtain" and therefore the "listening . . . with
astonished fatalism for what was close to happen to him." Each subsequent
sex relation, therefore, brings a guilt feeling to Christmas. He associated sex
with filth, sickness, violation of order, and therefore the potential loss of
individuality.
Likewise, it's significant that every of his subsequent
encounters with sex is amid strong sensory images. When he beats the young
Negro girl, it's amid the strong odors of the barn and he's also reminded of
the sickness caused by the toothpaste. Later, his first encounter with Bobbie
Allen is within the restaurant where he goes to order food, and eventually , he
meets Joanna in her kitchen when he's stealing food from her. Each of those
sensory occurrences recalls to him the scene with the dietitian and again
threatens the loss of individuality and therefore the breaking of an ordered
existence.
Christmas' need for order is violated successively by each of
the ladies with whom he comes into contact. The lesson he learned early in life
was that he could depend on men, but women were forever unpredictable. it had
been the lady who always broke the pattern of order. First the dietitian, then
Mrs. McEachern violated his concept of order, then Bobbie Allen turned
violently against him at the time when he most needed her. The last woman to
interrupt his order of existence was Joanna Burden, who purchased it together
with her life.
The women, then, function the destroyers of order. this is
often brought out mechanically by Faulkner by using the biblical concept of
woman as being unclean. Their menstrual period breaks the order of their life
then involves represent their unordered and unclean life. the primary time he
learned of their monthly occurrences, Christmas' reactions were violent and led
to a blood baptism — the blood being taken from a young sheep that he killed.
But even then he rejected this data in order that when Bobbie Allen tried to
elucidate an equivalent thing to him, again his reactions were violent, this
point ending together with his vomiting. When he next sees Bobbie, he takes her
with force and animal brutality. Again, he seems to be reacting against his
initial introduction to sex through the dietitian, again asserting his
masculinity by forcing order upon the lady .
Christmas' great need for order reverts basically to the 2
bloods in him which are in constant conflict. As stated previously, his blood
is his own battleground. He can neither accept nor reject his mixture of blood,
and neither can he bring these two elements into a workable solution.
Christmas' plight results from his inability to secure an appropriate position
in society and he searches for a society which will accept both elements of his
blood. Unable to seek out this, he isolates himself from all human society.
Christmas' youthful love
for Bobbie Allen
Christmas' youthful love for Bobbie Allen existed on an
idealistic plane because he was ready to confess his Negro blood to her and be
accepted by her as a private . However, her betrayal of his love amid her
taunts of "nigger bastard" and "clod-hopper" implants the
thought in his mind that thanks to his blood he must remain the isolated being.
His look for peace, then, may be a look for someone who could
accept Joe Christmas as a private despite his conflicting blood. When Joanna
Burden asks Christmas how he knows he has Negro blood, he tells her that if he has
no Negro blood, then he has "wasted tons of your time ." He has spent
his whole life and energy trying to reconcile these two bloods, and if he has
no Negro blood then all the efforts of his life are to no avail."
Joanna
Burden
Joanna Burden should are the one that could have accepted Joe
for what he was. By the time of their involvement, Christmas not seems to
revolt against being called a Negro. But Joanna fails him. In being corrupted
by him, she seems to enjoy the corruption even more by screaming "Negro!
Negro!" as he makes like to her. At thirty-three, Joe has learned to
simply accept this name-calling without the accompanying violent reactions;
he's living in partial peace with himself, albeit this peace has been found
only in complete isolation.
He must reject all of mankind so as to seek out peace. this
is often seen when Byron offers Christmas food and therefore the offer is
rejected. Therefore, when Joanna offers him jobs, wants him to travel to high
school , or tries to urge him to wish , he feels that she is trying to destroy
his isolation and peace. he's then forced to kill her or allow his own
individuality, order, and peace to be destroyed by her. Faulkner conveys this
on the story level just by the very fact that Joanna planned to kill Christmas
and would have succeeded if the pistol had not failed her. Christmas is then
forced to kill her in self-protection.
His life, his individuality, his peace, and his order would
are destroyed by Joanna had he yielded to her. And her death is amid Christmas'
refrain: "all I wanted was peace." But even at Joanna Burden's house,
Joe couldn't attain his desired peace with himself because the warring elements
of his blood compelled him to inform others that he was a Negro. At least, he
confessed to Joanna and Brown. If, then, he could achieve peace only by
isolating himself from people and by rejecting all responsibility toward
society, he could never attain inner peace until he could accept himself and
his own blood, both Negro and white.
Since Joanna was an overwhelming threat to Joe's sense of
peace and order, he realized that he must murder her or be destroyed by her.
But the murder wasn't one in cold blood. the flowery and symbolic rituals
preceding the particular performance suggest that Joe is involved during a deep
struggle with himself. The murder, rather than resolving his minor conflicts,
severs him forever from any hope of becoming a meaningful a part of society.
It is significant that he doesn't plan to escape. He never
leaves the vicinity of the crime. On the Tuesday after the Friday of the crime,
he enters the Negro church and curses God. this is often the peak of his
conflict. The white blood can not remain pacified and must express itself in
violence. It remains now for Joe to return to terms with the conflicting
elements within himself, and this will be done only within the circle of his
own self; consequently, there's no need for Joe to go away the immediate
neighborhood of his crime.
When Joe exchanges his shoes for the Negro's brogans, he
seems to simply accept his heritage for the primary time in his life. And
together with his acceptance of his black blood, Joe Christmas finds peace for
the primary time in his life. Like Lena Grove, who always accepted her
responsibility, Joe realizes now that so as to seek out peace, he must accept
full responsibility for his heritage and actions. And again like Lena, when he
accepts this responsibility, he finds peace and contentment, and he becomes
unified with nature.
It is when Joe accepts his Negro heritage and recognizes that
he can never shake himself that he breathes quietly for the primary time in his
life and is suddenly hungry not . This recognition that he's not hungry becomes
significant against the background of Joe's earlier life, which was crammed with
a continuing struggle against hunger. That is, when he accepts himself, he
symbolically becomes asleep together with his tormenting hunger and also he
sleeps peacefully for the primary time.
With his acceptance of his responsibility and his recognition
of his heritage, Joe can another time approach others. this is often revealed
by the scenes which immediately precede and follow Joe's self-realization.
within the first scene, Joe approaches a Negro so as to ask him the day of the
week, and his mere appearance creates astonishment and terror within the
Negro's mind. He flees from Christmas in utter horror. But immediately after
Joe has come to peace with himself, he approaches another Negro who quite
naturally and nonchalantly offers him a ride to Mottstown.
Joe's plight in life, however, isn't resolved. He could gain
a partial truce with society by isolating himself from society; alternatively ,
he could attain a full acceptance of himself, but note that this was achieved
while outside the community in complete isolation. Once he has recognized his
responsibility, he must then return to the community. And once more within the
community, he involves the belief that he can never be accepted by society. the
belief of his complete rejection is formed more terrible by the wild rantings
of his own grandfather, who demands his death." Thus, if old Doc Hines
must persecute his own grandson, Joe realizes that there are often peace for
him only in death. His escape finally, however, seems to be not such a lot due
to the fanaticism of old Doc Hines, but rather due to the quiet persuasion of
Mrs. Hines. Her appearance at the jail was probably Joe's final proof of the
woman's got to destroy his individuality.
Doc and Mrs. Hines then contribute to Joe's death, since they
set peaceful elements into contention again. Consequently, his escape is an
shake woman and also an enquiry for peace and order through death. It is,
therefore, logical that after his escape he runs first to a Negro cabin then to
Hightower's house. Through Mrs. Hines, Hightower has become the symbol of hope
and peace to Christmas, and in his look for peace through death, he chooses
Hightower's house as his sanctuary during which he passively accepts his
crucifixion. His failure to fireside the pistol is symbolic of his acceptance
of his crucifixion and death and of his recognition that he can find peace only
in death.
The killing and
castration of Christmas at the hands of Percy Grimm implant in our memories the
atrocities that man is capable of committing against his fellow man. Grimm
becomes the acute potential of all the community when society refuses to simply
accept its responsibility to mankind. Or as Hightower uttered when he first
heard about Christmas: "Poor man. Poor mankind." That is, Joe's death
isn't the maximum amount a tragedy for Joe because it may be a tragedy for the
society which might allow such a criminal offense as
Grimm's to be perpetrated. In Grimm's act, therefore, we see
the failure of man to achieve recognition, sympathy, or communion among other
men and society's failure to simply accept man within the abstract.
But Joe's death wasn't vainly . Through his death and thru
the birth of Lena's child, Hightower has attained salvation in life by arriving
at an entire realization of his own responsibility. Earlier in life, Hightower
thought that through suffering he had won for himself the privilege of
remaining uninvolved in life. But with the looks of Lena, he becomes another
time drawn into the active stream of life. This participation wasn't voluntary
but forced upon him within the first instance (delivering Lena's child), but
after rejecting Mrs. Hines's pleas, his second act (attempting to save lots of
Joe's life) is entirely voluntary.
Originally the attraction of Hightower and Byron to every
other depended upon both being isolated from the community; but as Byron
becomes involved, he draws Hightower in also. Until after Lena gives birth,
Hightower struggles to retain his isolation and advises Byron to try to to an
equivalent . But Byron's involvement is just too deep. Hightower's struggle for
isolation becomes more intense as he sees himself threatened with involvement,
especially when he's asked by Byron and Mrs. Hines to lie for Joe Christmas'
(and in Hightower's words, mankind's) benefit. His refusal is his last futile
but passionate effort to retain his isolation.
But Hightower goes to the cabin and successfully delivers
Lena's child. This act of giving life to Lena's child becomes symbolic of
Hightower's restoration to life. Immediately after the act, he walks back to
town thinking that he won't be ready to sleep, but he does sleep as peacefully
as Lena's newborn child. He notices for the primary time the peaceful serenity
of the August morning, he becomes immersed within the miracle of life, and he
realizes that "life involves the old man yet." He views the birth as
a symbol of excellent fortune and an omen of goodwill. Therefore, this act of
involvement and responsibility has restored Hightower to the humanity .
This was Monday morning. Monday afternoon, Hightower is faced
together with his second act of involvement when Christmas flees to his house
for sanctuary. This violence which Hightower must face is his payment for
recognizing his responsibility in life. But having assisted within the birth of
Lena's child and having recognized his involvement in life, he can not retract.
Therefore, having acknowledged a partial responsibility, he must now perform
his act of complete involvement in life by attempting to assume responsibility
for Joe Christmas.
And albeit Hightower fails Christmas, he has achieved
salvation for himself. He doesn't realize this until afterward within the
evening when the entire meaning of his life evolves ahead of him "with the
slow implacability of a mediaeval torture instrument." and thru this wheel
image, he sees that man cannot isolate himself from the faces surrounding the
wheel. Man must become a neighborhood of the community and must assume
responsibility not just for his own actions but also for the actions of his
fellow man.
Oliver Twist Summary
Sister Carrie Summary
0 comments:
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.