Chapter Nine

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Chapter Nine

• William Faulkner (1897 1962)

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• Born in New Albany, Mississippi.
• The work which won Faulkner a Nobel Prize in 1950
  is often a depiction of life in his fictional
  Yoknapatawpha County, an imaginative
  reconstruction of the area adjacent to Oxford.

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• His major novels include The Sound and the Fury
  (1929), As I Lay Dying (1930), Sanctury (1931),
  Light in August (1932), Absalom, Absalom! (1936),
  and The Hamlet (1940).
• His books of short stories include These Thirteen
  (1931), Go Down, Moses (1942), and The Collected
  Stories of William Faulkner (1950).

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Text study Barn Burning

• 1. The story of Barn Burning
• The Snopes
• Sartys father
• Relationship between Sarty and his father.
• Blood is thicker than water.
• Sarty disliked his father in some way.

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• 2. Sartys inner conflicts in the last part of
  the story.
• Sarty wants to stop his father from doing wrong
  things.
• Sarty doesnt expect the death of his father and
  brother.

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• Sartys despair, regret and confusion expressed
  through his calling Pap! Pap! and Father. My
  father.
• Sartys understanding of his fathers barn
  burning to the remark of He was brave!
• Sartys psychological journey throughout the
  story.

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• 3. Language study
• - description of motion.
• - description of inner world.
• - complex sentences

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Questions to ponder

• What seems to motivate Abners violent,
  antisocial behavior?
• Why does he try to make his son Sarty an
  accomplice to the burning of Major de Spains
  barn?
• Why does Sarty finally defy him and try to warn
  Major de Spain?

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Assignment

• Try to find out the parts that describe the
  childs dissatisfaction with his father.
• Try to find out the parts that narrate the love
  between the father and the son.