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By CategoryAs I Lay Dying
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As I Lay DyingFun with Faulkner
2005-12-20
Article Written by: Jillian Smith
If you have not yet read any of William Faulkner's novels, As I Lay Dying would be my suggestion for a great starter since Faulkner's unique narrative style can be both confusing and frustrating. You can read several chapters without having any idea what the story is actually about, but if you pay attention and read carefully you'll easily see why this novel has become a classic.
As with his other works, in As I Lay Dying , Faulkner strays from the average third person narrative, and leaves his readers to their own devices. Each chapter of this book is written from the point of view of one of the members of the Bundren clan. (You know who you're "hearing" by the name in the chapter heading.) The characters are not ever formally introduced, so you have to read for quite a while before you can deduce their relations, ages and mental competence. Each character is brought to life through their own disclosures, secrets and selfish motives, and with each passage, the true relationship between each of the characters is revealed. As you change form narrator to narrator, a new storyline may start, but as you continue reading, keeping track of characters and their stories becomes much easier.
The overall story that these smaller portions make up follows the trials and tribulations of Bundren family from a small rural section of Mississippi . Wife and mother Addie Bundren passes away in the first few chapters of the book, and the family—her husband Anse and their five children Darl, Jewel, Cash, Vardaman and Dewey Dell—is charged with transporting her body to the land of her birth for burial. After a bleak funeral service in the county, Addie is placed in a coffin made by her son Cash and loaded into the wagon. Here begins her journey home. This is where her journey home begins.
As the family travels, conditions worsen. For example, upon arrival at the river, they discover that the bridges are flooded. While trying to make their way across the swift waters, the wagon is tipped. The mules and coffin flow into the surging river, along with Cash. Jewel manages to rescue the coffin, but the mules drown in the chaos. Cash remarkably survives, but his leg is broken. That night the family takes shelter in a local barn, but they are forced to sleep outdoors due to the overwhelming stench of the body—keep in mind that this takes place before the invention of the vacuum seal. In attempt to save his family from any more distress, Darl sets fire to the barn, and yet again, Jewel saves the coffin. So the family's journey continues. As the family's journey continues, the reader can't help but wonder if they will ever make it to Jefferson to fulfill Addie's last wish.
The book follows a morbid storyline in which the exceedingly poor and mentally incompetent family pursues honorable goals with selfish intents. Though it is undeniably a tragedy, this story is unlike anything else that you may have read. It is gruesome and harsh with a humorous and strange macabre absurdity. For a better understanding you'll just have to read it yourself. The book is only 261 pages, but you'll find yourself flipping back through the different chapters to piece together the whole story.
