Faulkner's Absalom, Absalom!

: An Innovative Narrative Technique

Shawn Montano

Guilt should be viewed through the eyes of more than one person,
southern or otherwise. William Faulkner filters the story, Absalom,
Absalom!,
through several minds providing the reader with a dilution of its
representation.
Miss Rosa, frustrated, lonely, mad, is unable to answer her own
questions
concerning Sutpen's motivation. Mr. Compson sees much of the evil and
the
illusion of romanticism of the evil that turned Southern ladies into
ghosts.
Charles Bon and Henry Sutpen are evaluated for their motives through
Quentin
Compson and Shreve McCannon. Quentin attempt to evade his awareness,
Shreve the
outsider (with Quentin's help) reconstructs the story and understands
the
meaning of Thomas Sutpen's life. In the novel Absalom, Absalom!, a
multiple
consciousness technique is used to reassess the process of historical
reconstruction by the narrators.
Chapter one is the scene in which Miss Rosa tells Quentin about the
early days in Sutpen's life. It's here that Rosa explains to Quentin
why she
wanted to visit old mansion on this day. She is the one narrator that
is unable
to view Sutpen objectively. The first chapter serves as merely an
introduction
to the history of Sutpen based on what Miss Rosa heard as a child and
her brief
personal experiences.
The narration of Absalom, Absalom!, can be considered a coded activity.
Faulkner creates the complex narration beginning at chapter 2. It
ironic that
one of Faulkner's greatest novels is one in which the author only
appears as the
teller of the story in one brief section; The details of the hero's
arrival,
Thomas Sutpen, into Jefferson in chapter 2. Although Faulkner sets the
scene up
in each section (The omniscient narrator), most of the novel is
delivered
through a continual flow of talk via the narrators.
Quentin appears to think the material for the first half of the chapter
2. The narrator, throughout the novel, works as a historian. The
narrators
seem to act like a model for readers. The narrator actually teaches the
reader
how to participate in the historical recollection of Absalom Absalom!
The

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narrator also introduces the reader to things to come. The complexity
of the
novel involves more than just reading the novel. The reader must become
an
objective learner as to the history of Mr. Sutpen.
Mr. Compson's section of chapter two (43-58) contains words like
perhaps and doubtless. For example: Compson speculates that Mr.
Coldfield's
motivation for a small wedding was perhaps parsimony or perhaps due
to the
community's attitude toward his prospective son-in-law (50). The aunt's

doubtless: did not forgive Sutpen for not having a past and looked at
the
public wedding probably as a way of securing her niece's future as a
wife (52).
Faulkner uses these qualifiers to heighten the speculative nature of the
narrative, so that Compson's engagement in the metahistorical process,
rather
that Sutpen's history, becomes the primary focus (Connelly 3).
As Mr. Compson continues his presentation of the Sutpen history, Compson
begins to explain Sutpen on two very different planes of significance.
Sutpen,
through the narration of Mr. Compson, becomes the tragic hero and a
pragmatist
(Duncan 96). After this, Compson switches his approach to one of more
personal
involvement. The beginning of chapter 4, Faulkner displays this with
the use
of phrases like I believe or I imagine Mr. Compson begins to use a
more
humane approach to the telling of the story. Mr. Compson demands Henry
must
have know what his father said was true and could not deny it (91).
Compson
make assumptions based on his own conclusions at this time. The words
believe
and imagine again reveal for the reader that he/she must make some of
their
own speculations in order to ascertain some of Sutpen's historical
facts.
Mr. Compson is creating his own reconstruction of Sutpen's history.
Again, Faulkner uses words like believes and doubtless to make us
understand
Compson's explanation of the past. The reader is now compelled to
believe the
narrator. Compson insists at the end of this passage that Henry must
have been
the one who seduced Judith (99). It appears that this passage is
extremely
important to Compson's account. Rather than just collecting the facts
and then
recording them, the reader now begins to realize the all history is
subject to
interpretation.
With the reader beginning to question the historical reconstruction of

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Sutpen's life, Miss Rosa take over the narration in chapter 5. It's
important
to know that her narrative is in italics. The italics signal a break
from
normally motivated narrative. when the narrators shift to italics,
they show
almost a quantum leap to the perception of new relationships, giving new
facts
(Serole 2). There is now a desire for the reader and the narrator to
unravel
the truth. Miss Rosa's section seems to be a dream. The dreamlike
qualities in
her recollection of the stories may not be true. By the end of Miss
Rosa's
narrative section we are probing and yearning to reveal the character's
motives
and history. Through Miss Rosa, Faulkner presses the reader to believe
that
such a dreamlike quality contains truths. The reader just as often
finds
himself witness to a proairetic sequence that appears perfectly logical
but
lacks the coherence of meaning, as if he had not been given the
hermeneutic
clues requisite to grasping the intention of event and motive of its
narration
(Bloom 108).
Chapter 6 marks the start of Quentin taking over the narration of the
novel, with Shreve supplying information that eventually considers him a
narrator. The chapter deals with Shreve asking Quentin to tell him about
the
south. As Quentin delivers the narration, Shreve occasionally
interrupts and
summarizes information for the reader. Faulkner now makes us believe
Quentin's
accounts of the past. Quentin's interpretation of the past is now the
focus of
the reader.
As chapter 7 begins, Quentin turns to Sutpen's biography, which is
actually Sutpen's account of his own youth. The only firsthand telling
is
mediated by three generations of speakers and listeners. The
authoritative
presentation is again undermined. A strange lack of involvement,
contrasting
the foreground biases and distortions of Rosa's and Compson's earlier
versions,
characterizes this section. The creation by the generations of mediation
and
Sutpens's detachment from his own experience, which is described as not
telling
about himself, He was telling a story (Matthews 157).
In Sutpen's own biography, he is obsessed with the telling of the grand
design. The wealth, land, and family and which would avenge his
reputation.
The linking of the Sutpen's grand design, his dynasty, and his quest for
a

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historical presence can be found throughout his narration. Sutpen's
compensatory plot, what he repeatedly calls his 'design' will be
conceived to
assure his place on the proper side of the bar of difference (Bloom
117).
Thomas Sutpen was convinced that the self-justifications he offers for
his
actions do explain, and General Compson tries to elaborate on Sutpen's
bare
story, adding his analysis of Sutpen's flaw, his innocence (240,252).
The next pertinent section of the book begins when Shreve get his chance
to narrate. Shreve makes presumptions about Bon's innocence. It is
here that
Shreve reveals to the reader that Bon was an instrument of revenge for
his
mother. The lawyer is a character solely of Shreve's invention, which
allows him
to explain the maybe's surrounding Bon's discovery of his parentage:
maybe
he wrote the letters that were the catalyst for the event to follow
(Krause 156).
Quentin and Shreve both begin to think as one at this point. The
compelling
nature in part to the attention to details, such as the lawyer's ledger
in which
the value of Sutpen's children is computed.
Shreve sorts through all kinds of assumptions. His exploration of the
history of Thomas Sutpen leads the reader to believe his conjectures.
Shreve
discards details that do not explain and keep what seems most capable of
illuminating the destruction of Sutpen's dynasty. Shreve's tenacity is
what
generates an undeniably compelling story (Conelly 9). Shreve contends:
maybe
she didn't because the demon would believe she had, Shreve also states:
maybe
she just never thought there could be anyone as close to her as that
lone child.
It is here that Faulkner begins to have Shreve be a detective of sorts.
If
consistency is achieved, then the conclusions are valid because they
follow
logic (Leroy 28).
Shreve's explanation is significant, but is not the final step toward
explaining Bon's motives for murder. Shreve and Quentin's collection of
data
and cumulative response was probably true enough for them. What Bon
thought and
knew and did during his alleged courtship of Judith and his attempt to
gain his
father's acknowledgment acquire a new insistence when Shreve momentarily
ceases
speaking (333). The narrator slips Shreve and Quentin into the roles of
Henry
and Charles. Shreve and Quentin believe that they have constructed and
are
experience Bon and his father.

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Henry had just taken in stride because he did not yet
believe it even though he knew that it was true...knew but
still did not believe, who was going deliberately to look
upon and prove to himself that which, so Shreve and Quentin
believed, would be like death for him to learn. (334-335)

Shreve and Quentin virtually live in Charles and Henry's shoes. This is
when Quentin say that he and Shreve are both Mr. Compson, or on the
other hand
that Mr. Compson and he may both be Shreve and that indeed it may have
been
Thomas Sutpen who brought them all into existence. Even what we
normally call
reported speech'-direct quotation- is the product of an act of
ventriloquism, in
a duet of four voices in which Quentin and Shreve become compounded with
Henry
and Bon (Bloom 119).

Shreve ceased again. It was just as well, since he had no

listener. Perhaps he was aware of it. Then suddenly he
had no talker either, though possibly he was not aware of
this. Because now neither of them were there. they were
both in Carolina and the time was forty-six years ago, and
it was not even four now but compounded still further, since
now both of them were Henry Sutpen and both of them were
Bon compound each of both yet either, smelling the very
smoke which had blown and faded away forty-six years ago for
the bivouac fires burning in a pine grove, the gaunt and
ragged men sitting or lying about them talking. (351)

Faulkner has carried most of the novel thus far with sensations such as
sight and sound. Faulkner introduces and even more powerful sensory
trigger,
smell. When the reader goes through Miss Rosa's section of the novel,
the
reader is conditioned to see psychological truth; these unqualified
experiences
are the culmination of that search. The experience offered here does
not
supplant and invalidate the earlier narratives; rather, through the new
rhetorical mode of presentation in which was' has become is', Faulkner
achieves a sense of closure. The quest for explanations is complete
(Conelly
11). It now seems that the past in now being reenacted by Quentin and
Shreve.
The voices are Bon, Henry, and Sutpen are evident. We here these voices
and
experience these actions as taking place in the present and the real and
imaginary collide (Rollyson 361). The passage now seem to be the truth
of
history rather than just an interpretation.
The traditional narration is dropped from existence. The fact,
interpretations, speculations and conjectures are now woven together.
It

5
appears that Faulkner's question of historical recollection is not what
we right
down. It is instead a collection of human situation, complex personal
relationships, analytical skills used to reconstruct the facts and a
creative
look into the past. The reader doesn't merely look at the past, the
reader has
to reassess the past. The reader is compelled to believe when the
senses are
all used to construct and imagine the true history, and evaluate it
enough to
consider it valid. In Absalom, Absalom! the reader is compelled to
believe the
story that unravels before their very own eyes. The story is played out
in
front of us, and the reader is drawn in slowly to the process of
understanding
the history of Thomas Sutpen. Absalom Absalom! is not history, but a
novel.
about the quest for historical knowledge (Connelly 12).

Works Cited

Aswell, Duncan. The Puzzling Design of Absalom, Absalom! Muhlenfeld

93-108

Bloom, Harold, ed. Absalom, Absalom! Modern Critical Interpretations.

New
York: Chelsea. 1987.

Connelly, Don. The History and Truth in Absalom, Absalom!

Northwestern
University, 1991.

Faulkner, William. Absalom, Absalom! New York: Vintage, 1972

Levins, Lynn. The Four Narrative Perspectives in Absalom, Absalom!

Austin: U
of Texas, 1971.

Muhlenfeld, Elizabeth, ed. William Faulkner's Absalom, Absalom!: A

Critical
Casebook. New York: Garland, 1984.

Rollyson, Carl. The Re-creation of the Past in Absalom, Absalom!

Mississippi
Quarterly 29 (1976): 361-74
Searle Leroy. Opening the Door: Truth in Faulkner's Absalom, Absalom!
Unpublished essay. N.d.

Quotes

1. Out of quiet thunderclap he would abrupt (man-horse-demon) upon a scene

peaceful and decorous as a schoolprize water color, faint sulphur-reek still in

6
hair clothes and beard, with grouped behind him his band of wild niggers like
beasts half tamed to walk upright like men, in attitudes wild and reposed, and
manacled among them the French architect with his air grim, haggard, and
tatter-ran. Immobile, bearded, and hand palm-uplifted the horseman sat; behind
him the wild blacks and the captive architect huddled quietly, carrying in
bloodless paradox the shovels and picks and axes of peaceful conquest. Then
in the long unamaze Quentin seemed to watch them overrun suddenly the
hundred square miles of tranquil and astonished earth and drag house and
formal gardens violently out of the soundless Nothing and clap them down like
cards upon a table beneath the up-palm immobile and pontific, creating
Sutpen's Hundred, the Be Sutpen's Hundred like the oldentime Be Light. (p. 4)

Quentin recalling the legend of Thomas Sutpen's arrival in Yoknapatawpha

County.

2. Then hearing would reconcile and he would seem to listen to two separate
Quentin's now - the Quentin Compson preparing for Harvard in the South, the
deep South dead since 1865 and peopled with garrulous outraged baffled
ghosts, listening, having to listen, to one of the ghosts which had refused to lie
still even longer than most had, telling him about old ghost-times; and the
Quentin Compson who was still too young to deserve yet to be a ghost but
nevertheless having to be one for all that, since he was born and bred in the \
deep South the same as she was. . . (pp. 4-5)

Quentin thinking about the effects of the Civil War on early 20th century
Southern culture.

3. Oh he was brave. I have never gainsaid that. But that our cause, our very life
and future hopes and past pride, should have been thrown into the balance with
men like that to buttress it - men with valor and strength but without pity or
honor. Is it any wonder that Heaven saw fit to let us lose? (p. 13)

Rosa talking about Sutpen's character and why his flaws might be related to
larger Southern cultural flaws.

4. He lived out there, eight miles from any neighbor, in masculine solitude in
what might be called the halfacre gunroom of a baronial splendor. He lived in
the spartan shell of the largest edifice in the county, not excepting the
courthouse itself, whose threshold no woman had so much as seen, without any
feminised softness of window pane or door or mattress. . .(p. 30)

Mr. Compson talking about Sutpen's arrival in Yoknapatawpha and the facts that
spawned the legend that Quentin mentioned early in the book.

5. Tell about the South. What's it like there. What do they do there. Why do they
live there. Why do they live at all. . .(p. 142)

Quentin generalizing about frequent questions he gets about the South at

Harvard.

6. . and how on the eighth night the water gave out and something had to be
done so he put the musket down and went out and subdued them. That was

7
how he told it: he went out and subdued them, and when he returned he and
the girl became engaged to marry and Grandfather saying 'Wait wait' sure
enough now, saying, 'But you didn't even know her; you told me that when the
siege began you didn't even know her name' and he looked at Grandfather and
said, 'Yes. But you see, it took me some time to recover.' Not how he did it. He
didn't tell that either, that of no moment to the story either; he just put the
musket down and had someone unbar the door and then bar it behind him, and
walked out into the darkness and subdued them. . .(p. 204)

General Compson listening to Thomas Sutpen talk about his experience in

Haiti, and the way that he single-handedly halted a slave rebellion.

7. You see, I had a design in my mind. Whether it was a good or a bad design is
beside the point; the question is, Where did I make the mistake in it, what did I
do or misdo in it, whom or what injure by it to the extent which this would
indicate. I had a design. To accomplish it I should require money, a house, a
plantation, slaves, a family - incidentally of course, a wife. I set out to acquire
these, asking no favor of any man. (p. 212)

Sutpen explaining his simple, innocent design to General Compson.

8. "What is it? something you live and breathe in like air? a kind of vacuum filled
with wraithlike and indomitable anger and pride and glory at and in happenings
that occurred and ceased fifty years ago? a kind of entailed birthright father and
son and father and son of never forgiving General Sherman, so that forever
more as long as your children produce children you wont be anything but a
descendant of a long line of colonels killed in Pickett's charge at Manassas?"
"Gettysburg," Quentin said. "You cant understand it. You would have to be born
there."
"Would I then?" Quentin did not answer. "Do you understand it?"
"I dont know," Quentin said. "Yes, of course I understand it." They breathed in
the darkness. After a moment Quentin said: "I dont know." (p. 289)

Late in the book, Shreve and Quentin talking about the strange cultural
differences in the South that partly result from the burden of history and losing
the Civil War.

9. "The South," Shreve said. "The South. Jesus. No wonder you folks all outlive
yourselves by years and years and years." It was becoming quite distinct; he
would be able to decipher the words soon, in a moment; even almost now, now,
now.
"I am older at twenty than a lot of people who have died," Quentin said.
"And more people have died than have been twenty-one," Shreve said.(p. 301)

Quentin and Shreve talking about the South again, and Shreve acknowledging
some of the burdens of history that Southerners seem to carry, while reminding
Quentin of other historical burdens.

10. "Now I want you to tell me just one thing more. Why do you hate the
South?"
"I dont hate it," Quentin said, quickly, at once, immediately; "I dont hate it," he
said. I dont hate it he thought, panting in the cold air, the iron New England

8
dark: I dont. I dont! I dont hate it! I dont hate it! (p. 303)

Quentin and Shreve talking at the end of the book about Quentin's complex
relationship with the South, and Quentin's inability to come to terms with his
ambivalence about it.