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Stream of Consciousness
April Seventh, 1928
Explanation and Analysis:
Faulkner's style varies drastically between the sections of his book. This variation is key to readers’s ability to take multiple perspective on the narrative, and also allows Faulkner to closely match his writing to each character.
The style of Benjy’s section is simple, rapid, highly sensory, and stream-of-consciousness. It centers often on dialogue, is full of repeated phrases and patterns, and is interspersed with flashbacks, both italicized and non-italicized. A good example occurs when Benjy finds Caddy on the swing outside:
It was two now, and then one in the swing. Caddy came fast, white in the darkness.
"Benjy." she said. "How did you slip out. Where's Versh."
She put her arms around me and I hushed and held to her dress and tried to pull her away.
"Why, Benjy." Caddy said. "What is it. T.P." she called.
The one in the swing got up and came, and I cried and pulled Caddy's dress.
Here, Faulkner’s writing matches Benjy’s senses and emotions. He aligns with Benjy’s characteristic disregard for the boundary between the present and the past, and between himself and the surrounding world.
Quentin’s narration is markedly different. It's propulsive, elevated, tortured, and obsessive—full of run-on and fragmentary sentences, complicated diction, and elaborate figurative language. It’s also interspersed with italicized flashbacks. A good example occurs when Quentin tries to escape the girl following him in the country:
The lane went back to a barred gate, became defunctive in grass, a mere path scarred quietly into new grass. I climbed the gate into a woodlot and crossed it and came to another wall and followed that one, my shadow behind me now. There were vines and creepers where at home would be honeysuckle. Coming and coming especially in the dusk when it rained, getting honeysuckle all mixed up in it as though it were not enough without that, not unbearable enough.
Faulkner’s writing is articulate and distinctly modernist in this segment. It’s where his stylistic virtuosity is most on display.
Jason’s segment marks another dramatic shift in style. Here, Faulkner’s writing is cruel, intense, direct, uneducated, and bitterly resentful. This segment is driven by dialogue and full of Jason’s mocking thoughts. For example:
I went on back to the garage. There was the tire, leaning against the wall, but be damned if I was going to put it on. I backed out and turned around. She was standing by the drive. I says,
"I know you haven't got any books: I just want to ask you what you did with them…"
Here, Jason is rude and crass as he narrates the small inconveniences of his life. His sentences are also shorter and more to the point than Quentin’s or Benjy’s.
In Dilsey’s section, yet another stylistic change occurs. Faulkner writes in the third-person for the first time. This section is full of elaborate imagery and long sentences. It’s articulate and free-flowing, taking artistic liberties:
The day dawned bleak and chill, a moving wall of gray light out of the northeast which, instead of dissolving into moisture, seemed to disintegrate into minute and venomous particles, like dust that, when Dilsey opened the door of the cabin and emerged, needled laterally into her flesh, precipitating not so much a moisture as a substance partaking of the quality of thin, not quite congealed oil.
Faulkner is highly skilled at following images beyond what readers expect: he gives extra figurative description to enhance his characters and their themes. Faulkner’s style varies over the course of the novel, but in many ways this variation is the point. Readers can access multiple consciousnesses and can understand that each one demands a specific style of writing.
Related Themes:
June Second, 1910
Explanation and Analysis:
Faulkner's style varies drastically between the sections of his book. This variation is key to readers’s ability to take multiple perspective on the narrative, and also allows Faulkner to closely match his writing to each character.
The style of Benjy’s section is simple, rapid, highly sensory, and stream-of-consciousness. It centers often on dialogue, is full of repeated phrases and patterns, and is interspersed with flashbacks, both italicized and non-italicized. A good example occurs when Benjy finds Caddy on the swing outside:
It was two now, and then one in the swing. Caddy came fast, white in the darkness.
"Benjy." she said. "How did you slip out. Where's Versh."
She put her arms around me and I hushed and held to her dress and tried to pull her away.
"Why, Benjy." Caddy said. "What is it. T.P." she called.
The one in the swing got up and came, and I cried and pulled Caddy's dress.
Here, Faulkner’s writing matches Benjy’s senses and emotions. He aligns with Benjy’s characteristic disregard for the boundary between the present and the past, and between himself and the surrounding world.
Quentin’s narration is markedly different. It's propulsive, elevated, tortured, and obsessive—full of run-on and fragmentary sentences, complicated diction, and elaborate figurative language. It’s also interspersed with italicized flashbacks. A good example occurs when Quentin tries to escape the girl following him in the country:
The lane went back to a barred gate, became defunctive in grass, a mere path scarred quietly into new grass. I climbed the gate into a woodlot and crossed it and came to another wall and followed that one, my shadow behind me now. There were vines and creepers where at home would be honeysuckle. Coming and coming especially in the dusk when it rained, getting honeysuckle all mixed up in it as though it were not enough without that, not unbearable enough.
Faulkner’s writing is articulate and distinctly modernist in this segment. It’s where his stylistic virtuosity is most on display.
Jason’s segment marks another dramatic shift in style. Here, Faulkner’s writing is cruel, intense, direct, uneducated, and bitterly resentful. This segment is driven by dialogue and full of Jason’s mocking thoughts. For example:
I went on back to the garage. There was the tire, leaning against the wall, but be damned if I was going to put it on. I backed out and turned around. She was standing by the drive. I says,
"I know you haven't got any books: I just want to ask you what you did with them…"
Here, Jason is rude and crass as he narrates the small inconveniences of his life. His sentences are also shorter and more to the point than Quentin’s or Benjy’s.
In Dilsey’s section, yet another stylistic change occurs. Faulkner writes in the third-person for the first time. This section is full of elaborate imagery and long sentences. It’s articulate and free-flowing, taking artistic liberties:
The day dawned bleak and chill, a moving wall of gray light out of the northeast which, instead of dissolving into moisture, seemed to disintegrate into minute and venomous particles, like dust that, when Dilsey opened the door of the cabin and emerged, needled laterally into her flesh, precipitating not so much a moisture as a substance partaking of the quality of thin, not quite congealed oil.
Faulkner is highly skilled at following images beyond what readers expect: he gives extra figurative description to enhance his characters and their themes. Faulkner’s style varies over the course of the novel, but in many ways this variation is the point. Readers can access multiple consciousnesses and can understand that each one demands a specific style of writing.
Related Themes:
April Sixth, 1928
Explanation and Analysis:
Faulkner's style varies drastically between the sections of his book. This variation is key to readers’s ability to take multiple perspective on the narrative, and also allows Faulkner to closely match his writing to each character.
The style of Benjy’s section is simple, rapid, highly sensory, and stream-of-consciousness. It centers often on dialogue, is full of repeated phrases and patterns, and is interspersed with flashbacks, both italicized and non-italicized. A good example occurs when Benjy finds Caddy on the swing outside:
It was two now, and then one in the swing. Caddy came fast, white in the darkness.
"Benjy." she said. "How did you slip out. Where's Versh."
She put her arms around me and I hushed and held to her dress and tried to pull her away.
"Why, Benjy." Caddy said. "What is it. T.P." she called.
The one in the swing got up and came, and I cried and pulled Caddy's dress.
Here, Faulkner’s writing matches Benjy’s senses and emotions. He aligns with Benjy’s characteristic disregard for the boundary between the present and the past, and between himself and the surrounding world.
Quentin’s narration is markedly different. It's propulsive, elevated, tortured, and obsessive—full of run-on and fragmentary sentences, complicated diction, and elaborate figurative language. It’s also interspersed with italicized flashbacks. A good example occurs when Quentin tries to escape the girl following him in the country:
The lane went back to a barred gate, became defunctive in grass, a mere path scarred quietly into new grass. I climbed the gate into a woodlot and crossed it and came to another wall and followed that one, my shadow behind me now. There were vines and creepers where at home would be honeysuckle. Coming and coming especially in the dusk when it rained, getting honeysuckle all mixed up in it as though it were not enough without that, not unbearable enough.
Faulkner’s writing is articulate and distinctly modernist in this segment. It’s where his stylistic virtuosity is most on display.
Jason’s segment marks another dramatic shift in style. Here, Faulkner’s writing is cruel, intense, direct, uneducated, and bitterly resentful. This segment is driven by dialogue and full of Jason’s mocking thoughts. For example:
I went on back to the garage. There was the tire, leaning against the wall, but be damned if I was going to put it on. I backed out and turned around. She was standing by the drive. I says,
"I know you haven't got any books: I just want to ask you what you did with them…"
Here, Jason is rude and crass as he narrates the small inconveniences of his life. His sentences are also shorter and more to the point than Quentin’s or Benjy’s.
In Dilsey’s section, yet another stylistic change occurs. Faulkner writes in the third-person for the first time. This section is full of elaborate imagery and long sentences. It’s articulate and free-flowing, taking artistic liberties:
The day dawned bleak and chill, a moving wall of gray light out of the northeast which, instead of dissolving into moisture, seemed to disintegrate into minute and venomous particles, like dust that, when Dilsey opened the door of the cabin and emerged, needled laterally into her flesh, precipitating not so much a moisture as a substance partaking of the quality of thin, not quite congealed oil.
Faulkner is highly skilled at following images beyond what readers expect: he gives extra figurative description to enhance his characters and their themes. Faulkner’s style varies over the course of the novel, but in many ways this variation is the point. Readers can access multiple consciousnesses and can understand that each one demands a specific style of writing.
Related Themes:
April Eighth, 1928
Explanation and Analysis:
Faulkner's style varies drastically between the sections of his book. This variation is key to readers’s ability to take multiple perspective on the narrative, and also allows Faulkner to closely match his writing to each character.
The style of Benjy’s section is simple, rapid, highly sensory, and stream-of-consciousness. It centers often on dialogue, is full of repeated phrases and patterns, and is interspersed with flashbacks, both italicized and non-italicized. A good example occurs when Benjy finds Caddy on the swing outside:
It was two now, and then one in the swing. Caddy came fast, white in the darkness.
"Benjy." she said. "How did you slip out. Where's Versh."
She put her arms around me and I hushed and held to her dress and tried to pull her away.
"Why, Benjy." Caddy said. "What is it. T.P." she called.
The one in the swing got up and came, and I cried and pulled Caddy's dress.
Here, Faulkner’s writing matches Benjy’s senses and emotions. He aligns with Benjy’s characteristic disregard for the boundary between the present and the past, and between himself and the surrounding world.
Quentin’s narration is markedly different. It's propulsive, elevated, tortured, and obsessive—full of run-on and fragmentary sentences, complicated diction, and elaborate figurative language. It’s also interspersed with italicized flashbacks. A good example occurs when Quentin tries to escape the girl following him in the country:
The lane went back to a barred gate, became defunctive in grass, a mere path scarred quietly into new grass. I climbed the gate into a woodlot and crossed it and came to another wall and followed that one, my shadow behind me now. There were vines and creepers where at home would be honeysuckle. Coming and coming especially in the dusk when it rained, getting honeysuckle all mixed up in it as though it were not enough without that, not unbearable enough.
Faulkner’s writing is articulate and distinctly modernist in this segment. It’s where his stylistic virtuosity is most on display.
Jason’s segment marks another dramatic shift in style. Here, Faulkner’s writing is cruel, intense, direct, uneducated, and bitterly resentful. This segment is driven by dialogue and full of Jason’s mocking thoughts. For example:
I went on back to the garage. There was the tire, leaning against the wall, but be damned if I was going to put it on. I backed out and turned around. She was standing by the drive. I says,
"I know you haven't got any books: I just want to ask you what you did with them…"
Here, Jason is rude and crass as he narrates the small inconveniences of his life. His sentences are also shorter and more to the point than Quentin’s or Benjy’s.
In Dilsey’s section, yet another stylistic change occurs. Faulkner writes in the third-person for the first time. This section is full of elaborate imagery and long sentences. It’s articulate and free-flowing, taking artistic liberties:
The day dawned bleak and chill, a moving wall of gray light out of the northeast which, instead of dissolving into moisture, seemed to disintegrate into minute and venomous particles, like dust that, when Dilsey opened the door of the cabin and emerged, needled laterally into her flesh, precipitating not so much a moisture as a substance partaking of the quality of thin, not quite congealed oil.
Faulkner is highly skilled at following images beyond what readers expect: he gives extra figurative description to enhance his characters and their themes. Faulkner’s style varies over the course of the novel, but in many ways this variation is the point. Readers can access multiple consciousnesses and can understand that each one demands a specific style of writing.
Related Themes:
