The characters in William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying are interpreted in a variety of different ways by the other characters as well as the novel’s audiences. How are the members of the Bundren family viewed by each other, the outside world, and the reader? Why do these differ and what is the significance, if any, of Faulkner’s choice?
The Modernist Novel
ENGL 387, Professor Allred, Spring 2021
Rich topic with a tight focus on “narratological” issues that are central to modernism. One issue you might explore is the way the narrative stages readers’ journey from relative ignorance to relative master vis a vis the other characters. In other words, we know much less than any of the characters at the start, yet by the end, we know more than any of the characters in ways that produces extreme “dramatic irony.” Kern’s book on the modernist novel is a good starting place: it’s focused on narrative issues and uses AILD as a reference point: https://onesearch.cuny.edu/permalink/01CUNY_GC/mjfrpc/alma9994403308406140