Well, we're almost halfway through As I Lay Dying, and I'd say about half the class - myself included - have no idea what's going on. With maybe a dozen or more narrators, each with differing styles and conflicting opinions, with none perhaps actually being reliable and impartial, it can get a little confusing. So confusing, that one has to wonder why Faulkner wrote his book in this manner.
Supposedly, Faulkner wrote As I Lay Dying in six weeks, working only between midnight and 4 AM, and he never edited it. And let me say, you can tell. Even if it was the effect he was going for, the continuous spelling errors and odd ways of speaking can make the text hard to simply parse, let alone interpret. Add to that the fact that the plot itself is unclear and has no obvious path, and you've got a perfect storm of confused high-schoolers. I'm not going to get into how this trait is something I see as relatively common among "classic" literature. However, sometimes it does frustrate me that so much of the "burden of understanding" is placed on the reader, and not the author. It can seem as if an author can have their book be a towering edifice of metaphor and deep meaning simply by making it vague and confusing enough that all sorts of explanations can be attached to it. Not that I think that's what's happening with As I Lay Dying.
Anyways, I think that this core vagueness and ability to be interpreted in different ways makes it incredibly difficult to ascribe to any of Faulkner's characters the status of "hero." We talked a lot in class about who we think is the hero of As I Lay Dying, and good points were brought up for multiple characters. And maybe all those characters are/are going to be heroes, and maybe none of them. It really depends on how you want to see the book. You could see it as an unfortunate, bereft husband toiling to fulfill his dead wife's last request, or a young woman's struggle with herself and the baby growing inside her, or even a budding psychic beginning to come into his powers. Or all of these things and more.
Perspective is important always. It is very important when you are dealing with potentially unreliable narrators. And when you're dealing with dozens of all potentially biased or incorrect narrators, it could become the defining aspect of the story.
I agree that part of the reason that this book is so confusing is because Faulkner supposedly wrote As I Lay Dying in six weeks and didn't go back to edit it and the unique format of the text. Maybe Faulkner wanted the text to be confusing so the readers could try to put the puzzle pieces together to make his book stand out from others at the time?
ReplyDeleteI'm actually quite fond of a lot of "difficult" literature, and I often include notoriously "difficult" books on my syllabus. (_As I Lay Dying_ is your dose for this course!) As a reader, I'm drawn to books like this because they do make you work to understand the story, not just on a plot/events level but to understand what it means, or how it is seen differently by the different people taking part.
ReplyDeleteAnd in the case of _As I Lay Dying_, the difficulty has a lot to do with the fact that these characters have a distinctive and for many readers unfamiliar way of speaking/writing English. Faulkner lets the Bundrens (and others) tell their own story, in their own voices, and sometimes these voices can be difficult to comprehend (Vardaman!). But it's not just about figuring out "what happens"--a detailed summary of this novel, such as can be found on various websites of dubious repute, would in no way substitute for the experience of reading it. There's something to be said for Faulkner's method of immersing us in the Bundrens' world, and having us try to understand this whole thing from their point of view, in their voice. This requires us to take more than a few steps in their direction, but this makes the reading an *experience* that can't be paraphrased. People like the Bundrens don't typically write, or narrate, novels. Faulkner forces us to try to speak their language, in a way.
While the narration style is rather confusing, I find it makes the plot all the more interesting. We as readers have to take everything with a grain of salt and have to use other individuals to corroborate claims and piece together the narrative. It's almost like a puzzle. I also understand more characters on a different, deeper level, than when reading a book with one narrator.
ReplyDeleteI agree that the narrative style is confusing but you (talking after we have finished the book haha) can now kind of tell who the narrator is without reading the chapter title and you also pick up on how those characters see things and learn how to interpret it differently. However, I totally agree that it seems somewhat ridiculous that an author can just be vague or obscure or litter their book with metaphors and as a result you can extrapolate so much people consider it a master piece. On the flip side it can be kind of the point that people interpret it different ways and it's not just meant to be confusing and that's what makes it special.
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