As I Lay Dying Literary Analysis

As I Lay Dying is a book set in the early nineteen-hundreds. Each chapter alternates perspective of one of approximately 14 characters throughout the book. William Faulkner uses each character to guide you through the death of a prideful mother, Addie Bundren, and the family willing to travel for days to bury her at her parents’ graves.The Bundren family consists of Addie her husband Anse, and their children, Cash, Darl, Jewel, Dewey Dell, Vardaman. Darl can be understood as the most systematic character throughout the book, mainly driven by reason rather than emotion. In contrast, his brother, Jewel, is fiercely loyal to their mother, and is willing to go to unspeakable lengths to protect her, even after her death. The Bundren family has had nothing but bad luck on their trek to Addie's’ gravesite, including the death of their mules, nearly drowning in a flooded river, and their brother, Cash, on his deathbed

William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying examines the connections and disconnections between speech, silence, and the meaning of words. However, having words is as good as having no words because the characters in this book, especially the members of the Bundren family, use words that obfuscate their true emotions. Faulkner uses his characters to portray speech as just another factor of nominalism and allows only silence to present the truth.

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.

Reading Addie’s section of the novel, the reader discovers several innermost thoughts and secrets the mother is

In the novel, Moseley highlights the cause of the Bundren family's dysfunction by providing positive contrast against their warped morality. Throughout their journey, almost all of the characters are depicted as simple-minded people from the country, lacking ethics and motivated only by selfish desires. While Jewel, Cash, and Dewey Dell are all focused on their own single object, task, or problem, and Anse with gaining possessions for himself, Moseley cares for others. He instructs Dewey Dell to "take that ten dollars and get married with it." (203) Later in the novel, after Dewey Dell had been tricked in her second attempt at an abortion, Anse steals the money to spend on himself. Dissimilar to Anse and McGowan, Moseley is honest, despite the fact he could have easily deceived Dewey Dell in the same ways. Faulkner uses these virtuous qualities of Moseley to distinguish the corrupt traits of the Bundrens.

William Faulker’s “As I Lay Dying,” tells the story of the Bundren family traveling to bury their dead mother. The Bundren’s embark on a quest through the north Mississippi countryside to take the corpse of Addie, wife and mother, back to her hometown, Jefferson, to bury her with family. Whatever dignity found in keeping a promise, to a dead wife and mother mocked by the selfish desires of each family member. Throughout the novel, every family member exhibits some degree of selfishness, but none more than Anse. Anse’s extreme selfishness and a poor example of a father are the underlying factors for the Burden family’s dysfunction.

In past years, as well as, in the twenty-first century, African Americans are being oppressed and judged based on the color of their skin. In, A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest J. Gaines, this is the primary conflict that plagues Jefferson’s as well as Grant’s everyday life. By pleading guilty to a murder that he did not commit, Jefferson has to choose to die just as he is, a hog in the white’s eyes, or die a man. On the other hand, Grant, who is his teacher, is faced with being looked down upon by his community all because of his race and status. He is graced with the challenge of turning Jefferson into a man before his execution date. It is only a matter of time before they both realize that they cannot change the past and they have

The novel I read is As I Lay Dying written by William Faulkner in 1920s Mississippi, US.

Death is recognized and handled differently by many cultures. William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying puts insight into how one family in the middle of the Great Depression deals with their mother’s death. Addie’s death characterizes Darl and Cash, illuminating Cash’s need for order and Darl’s hungry curiosity and deep thought. These two men show how grief can affect people differently.

Clear direction of the narrative is paralleled by the developing psychological drama of the tensions the characters are only half aware of. With every chapter, there is a manifestation of a fixed and distinctive emotional reaction (Vickery 50). In As I Lay Dying, William Faulkner uses different variations in style; dialect to imagery and poetic rhythms of the unconscious to create responses in his characters. Faulkner’s writing is more reflective of a pattern of individual existences rather than a pattern of events. (Handy 1).

Though the world keeps on turning, the death of a loved one always has lasting and sometimes surprising effects on those who loved the ones who died. It changes a person by making them deal with their own mortality, morality, and grief. However that is not the case in As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner. The effects of the death of Addie Bundren are very evident in the Bundren family through their actions and thoughts throughout the book. Though they love Addie, they use her dying wish to be buried in Jefferson as an excuse to head into town to fulfill their own agendas. This love and selfishness show the two sided nature of the family. On one hand they are genuinely grieving Addie’s death and on the other they are using her desire for their own gain. A majority of the family members grow out of their grief in their own ways through their individual suffering. Some of them choose to replace Addie in some regards with an animal or decide to deal with their grief in small segments, giving them more character depth, and uniqueness. Though the resolution of the family’s character development is not always ideal, the process to that outcome reveals that above everything else, that they are perfectly human.

Cash's birth was the dividing line in Addie's relationship with her husband. She now knew "that we had had to use one another by words like spiders dangling by their mouths from a beam."(AILD pg.172). But she is further embittered in the second birth: "Then I found that I had Darl... It was as though Anse had tricked me, hidden within a word like within a paper screen and struck me in the back through it".(AILD pg.172) Her bitterness over the trick is translated into hostility for Darl, who becomes the most vocal, the most strangely upset, and eventually destructive member of the family. His acts and his words are both desperate stratagems to assert himself as a member of the human race and of the family.

Faulkner is known to be one of the greatest authors in the world. His style of writing and creative use of diction has made him a favorite among many to read. Although his writing can be confusing and hard to understand, it still remains a tour de force. As I Lay Dying is one of Faulkner’s best novels to show off his unique writing style. His technique of using multiple perspectives in the novel contributes to the reader’s understanding of the ideas contained in the text.

There is a common belief that most people cannot advance themselves if they cannot be themselves, according to Marvin Gaye, “If you cannot find peace within yourself, you will never find it anywhere else.” The psychology of humans can be expressed in two groups, stable or not. These two groups can be applied to a psychoanalytical approach of William Faulkner’s, As I lay Dying. In this story, the Bundren family suffers the loss of Addie Bundren a loved wife and mother. Anse and the rest of the family, honoring her last wish, make the trip to Jefferson to bury her with her relatives. During the trip every thing that could go wrong does. This story is told from plentiful points of view and reveals the psychological state of the Bundren

As I lay dying is an American novel authored by William Faulkner. The novel is among the best-ranked novels in the 20th century literature. The Faulkner’s seventh novel derives the title from the book XI of the homers the odyssey. In the introduction, Agamemnon converse with Odysseus: ‘’as I lay dying, the woman with the dog’s eyes could not close my eyes as I descend into Hades’’. The book consists of fifteen characters with more than fifty-nine chapters. It narrates the narrative of the bereavement of Addie Bundren and the family expedition and motivations to honor her longing to be put to rest in the Jefferson town (Faulkner, William, & Michael 43)