| I. PreludeAny writer, whatever opinions and attitude he holds towards the cultural traditions and district where he was brought up, he is the product of that district, society and cultural tradition. His mode of thinking, value concepts and aesthetic standards will be influenced imperceptibly by the traditions, which constantly play an important role. That a writer's career and his education background will certainly affect to a great extent what to write, how to write and how to judge his works in particular.Being a native American and a descendant of a plantation owner, William Faulkner was certainly influenced by social awareness, traditional culture and value concepts of the South. He settled himself down the culture of his native country and established a fictitious "Yoknapatapha", with which he demonstrated a vivid and historical picture scroll of American southern society. Faulkner's emotions to the South is rather mixed. Firstly, love for his homeland was the source of his works of literature. Beautiful landscape and customs of his homeland together with his feelings gradually became potential genes and blended in his passion. It is obvious that his sympathy for the South, understanding and deep affection for the cultural traditions of it were presented in his series of works. Nevertheless, the fact made him realize human nature distorted and alienated after traditional value of the South was lost with the invasion of modern capitalist civilization. This forced him to rethink so-called "South Mythology". At the same time he also thoroughly revealed and criticized old systems of the South, sneered at losses sustained by the society and spiritual sufferings brought by modern capitalist civilization. His complicated feelings were clearly showed in his novel, His art techniques are closely associated with his continuous exploration and criticism towards society, history and traditional culture of the South. In spite of this, his writing styles and skills also come from his exploration and criticism. This paper intends to discuss his expressive skills with special characteristics behind this masterpiece and then unveil Faulkner's true feelings for the South and II. Psychological Space in the Stream of Consciousness Faulkner thinks that real, inner world of the heart and potential consciousness can display objective world. In < The Sound and the Fury> he extensively and successfully employed the skill---- the stream of consciousness, by which the novel reflects the spirit of the family numbers and crisis that the South was facing, and writer's feelings as well. The first three chapters records the stream of consciousness of the three brothers---Jim, Kudun and Jason in the Compsons in different ways. Jim was an inborn idiot who frequently confused something happened in the past with that in reality. Although he was unable to think logically, he was the one who knew tender feelings best in the family. In the novel, through the description of Jim's feelings of attachment for Kathy, we can sense Faulkner's strong nostalgia of his affection for the family members. In Kundun's consciousness there always existed two mappings. One is in a rational and conscious state. The other is in an unconscious condition, i.e. to appears without a process of thinking. Due to the influence by South traditions, we can recognize in his conscious activities that he had a strong sense of identity and dependence of his family honor, outlook of virtuous maiden and family relationship which were taught in his childhood. Because he was in the times when the new replaced the old, he got himself completely involved in the serious crisis and he could do nothing about it.Therefore, he always showed morbid sensitive, sorrowful and anxious beyond description. Faulkner felt great sympathy for Kundun who could also help embody Haulkner's complicated feelings of the South. In Jason's narration, he appeared as a guy whose stream of consciousness was logical and rational, somehow wit... |
PDF Full Text Request