Motionless as an Idol - Columbus State University

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Bullock 8As I Lay Dying and The Sound and the FuryThe concrete, gritty details of the metaphors contained in As I Lay Dying and TheSound and the Fury work together to contribute to Faulkner's purpose of revealing theflaws within his community. Faulkner uses metaphors of art in As I Lay Dying and TheSound and the Fury in order to show his reader the restrictions of their societal positions.In As I Lay Dying Addie Bundren is watching her son. Cash, labor to construct her coffin.The symbolic implications of the coffin are imperative to understanding Addie. Herhusband, Anse, commissioned the coffin saying,It was her wish, [...][y]ou got no affection nor gentleness for her. Younever had. We would be beholden to no man, [. ..] me and her. We havenever yet been, and she will rest quieter for knowing it and that it was herown blood sawed out the boards and drove the nails. She was ever one toclean up after herself. (Faulkner 19)Any critical reader of the text will realize that Anse is not convincing Cash to make thecoffin because it is truly Addie 1 s wish, but because he is a consistently self-absorbedcharacter trying to save as much money as possible in order to be able to buy the thingsthat he wants. In this way, Anse controls Addie, even in her death. The homemade coffinrepresents a final false construction imposed upon Addie, crafted by her son. Itisessential to remember that Addie spends the majority of the novel within the coffin,framed within the final male construction 1 . Althoughshe is allowed enough autonomy tospeak for herself in the book, she is stillseen by the reader as framed inside a male1 I am indebted to Dr. Josh Eyler for the development of this idea. He suggested that the coffin serves as anartistic frame for Addie Bundren.
Bullock 9creation that is then directed and controlled by men, even posthumously. Susan V.Donaldson puts it this way, "As I Lay Dying, [...] literally confines Addie Bundren in amuch abused coffin and figuratively imprisons her voice within a cacophony of othervoices [...]" (72). Donaldson diminishes some of the emphasis Iplace on Addie'spersonal voice, although she is accurate in pointing out that Addie's voice facesaggressive competition from fifteen other narrators (Pearce 89). Faulkner includes ascene when Cash is making the coffin and Addie watches him from her bedside window:[Cash] looks up at the gaunt face framed by the window in the twilight. It is acomposite picture of all time since he was a child. He drops the saw and lifts theboard for her to see, watching the window in which the face has not moved. Hedrags a second plank into position and slants the two of them into their finaljuxtaposition, gesturing toward the ones yet on the ground, shaping with hisempty hand in pantomime the finished box. For a while stillshe looks down athim from the composite picture, neither with censure nor approbation. Then theface disappears. (Faulkner 48)Cash gestures to show Addie what he is creating, while Addie makes no suchmovements. Still, Cash is able to see in Addie the "composite picture" Faulkner mentionstwice (48). This picture of Addie's face, framed by the window, is imagined by Cash anddemonstrates how a child imagines his/her mother but, more importantly, how a manimagines a woman in his life as a reflection of himself and his experience. Cash reads herface because we know he is aware of the lack of "censure or approbation," but he doesnot apply these to Addie's personality overall. He does not seek to understand or interprether feelings, he only wants to know the facet of her as it relates directly to him (48).
Page 2 and 3: Digitized by the Internet Archivein
Page 4 and 5: Bullock 2TABLE OF CONTENTSINTRODUCT
Page 6 and 7: Bullock 4Iseek to establish my argu
Page 8 and 9: "Bullock 6wrote about the artists w
Page 12 and 13: Bullock 10Another art metaphor Faul
Page 15 and 16: Bullock 13essence, both necessary s
Page 17 and 18: Bullock 15We had long thought of th
Page 19 and 20: Bullock 17but no longer considered
Page 21 and 22: Bullock 19Miss Emily as idol, thus
Page 23 and 24: Bullock 21The art metaphor of Miss
Page 25 and 26: Bullock 23Community and Religion in
Page 27 and 28: Bullock 25Faulkner's response allow
Page 29 and 30: Bullock 27setting. It is this preoc
Page 31 and 32: Bullock 29male-dominated system whi
Page 33 and 34: Bullock 31for Faulkner to communica
Page 35 and 36: Bullock 33skewed sexuality and misp
Page 37 and 38: Bullock 35from all walks of life, "
Page 39 and 40: Bullock 37townspeople, readers can
Page 41 and 42: Bullock 39one in which male dominan
Page 43 and 44: The Eternal Feminine, Paul CezanneB
Page 45 and 46: Bullock 43—. AsI Lav Dying . 1930

Motionless as an Idol - Columbus State University

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