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The Narrative of William Faulkner’s Novels
Shevlyakova Olga Department of English
State University – Higher School of Economics
Moscow 101000 Myasnitskaya, 20
Tel.:(495) 6211173
E-mail: severomar@mail.ru
1. Introduction
The Russian scholar Mikhail Bakhtin, well known for his studies of artistic prose , urges that the
most significant property of the narrative of the novel is that it is not monolithic, it incorporates a
diversity of styles and points of view ( or ‘voices’ ), it is basically ‘multivoiced’. There is a
dialogue-like relationship between the voices inside the novel. It is a very rare occasion that the
author’s ’word’ is focused on just the object of depiction. In most cases it is oriented towards other
words (or voices), which serve to reflect the object of depiction.
According to Mikhail Bakhtin, the object of depiction for a prose writer is the point of convergence
of voices serving as the background for the author’s voice This background of ‘alien’ (not the
author’s) voices activates and makes conspicuous the author’s point of view, his feelings and
emotions, his message ( Bakhtin 1975,75-76, 92).
The term ‘chuzhoe slovo’ (‘alien word’) is applicable to two kinds of situations. The ‘alien word’
can imply extratextual literary connections, or can be part of the text itself belonging to the
characters of the story. The second situation is highly characteristic of William Faulkner’s style.
The ‘ alien word ‘ serves as the basis of narrative in many novels and stories of the author. His
novels “Absalom, Absalom”, “The Sound and the Fury”, “The Hamlet”, “The Town”, “The
Mansion”, “As I lay Dying”, though different in form and content have one distinctive feature in
common – strong reliance on the characters’ ‘word’.
Speaking about his own technique of writing Faulkner admitted that the usual practice with him was
listening to voices and registering what they said. And even when he did not agree with what they
said he still left it unchanged (Faulkner 1966, 159). .
Faulkner’s novels are filled with voices. In “As I Lay Dying” the unusual story of the Bundren
family is told by the members of the family, the author’s traditional narrative having no place there.
The narrative of “The Sound and the Fury” is executed in four voices, three of them belonging to
the characters of the novel. In “The Town” the narration is conducted predominantly by three
character-narrators: Gavin Stevens, Charles Mallison and Ratliff.
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As a beginner writer Faulkner made an attempt at writing poetry but soon gave it up. Later he said
that he had failed as a poet and had to resort to prose because poetry is the most demanding form of
writing. Next comes the story and last – the novel ( Faulkner 1960 , 68 ).
It would be a very simplified explanation if we admitted that he turned to the novel because he
found poetry difficult. Poetry presupposes a clearly pronounced dominance of the author’s
discourse directly focused on the object of depiction and charged with straightforwardness and
finality of the author’s judgment, which did not very much appeal to Faulkner. His bias towards
‘multivoiced’ narrative (heteroglossia, as termed by M. Bakhtin and translated by Caryl Emerson
and Michael Holquist, 1981) explains why he preferred prose to poetry. He tended to convey his
message indirectly – by juxtaposing numerous ‘voices’ (or points of view) in his quest for “
narrative plentitude” (Gray, 1994, 254) thus activating the reader, making him participate in
literary communication.
2. Research Proposal
We propose to study the most typical types of narration to be found in Faulkner’s novels, to specify
the part they play in the formation of the writer’s unique individual style. We will mainly focus on
the Snopes trilogy as it is highly representative of Faulkner’s method and covers a rather mature
period in his writing career ( the years from 1940 to 1959).
We assume that there are three lingo-ideological spheres in a prosaic artistic text : the spheres of
the author, the characters and the reader. The first two are represented by definite narrative forms,
which will be studied further, while the latter has no immediate linguistic manifestation, though the
reader’s presence is reflected in the verbal layer of the text and is important for the meaning of the
whole.
Analyzing the narrative forms of Faulkner’s novels we will take into account that the authorial and
the characters’ spheres are very flexible - they overlap, penetrate each other and are in a state of
constant interactivity thus generating density of poetic information.
3. Narrative forms
3. 1 First person narration
A very important narrative device with Faulkner is the use of the story-teller who is a participant
in the events. This narrative in the first person is very widely used in prose thanks to its expressive
potential. Thus, writers and critics mark that it allows to achieve greater authenticity, emotionality
and truthfulness of the depiction, it imparts to the story a certain individualized psychological angle
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that affects the perception of the events and characters creating an atmosphere of intimacy and trust.
The narrated events and characters are presented in a subjective manner , they are colored by the
vision of one person. As a general rule first person narration is narrow in scope, very private and
intimate and is widely used to present the inner world of an individual, the character-narrator.
Not in Faulkner’s prose. Faulkner manages to give a wide picture of life marked by an epic
significance through the use of this form. Formally, it seems, first person narration is employed by
the writer in its true form – the story-teller speaks in the first person, he is a witness and participant
in the narrated events, he seems to voice his personal opinions and judgments. However, an
attentive reader can not help noticing that more often than not the story-teller makes references to
other people’s points of view, to something that this or that character said or thought about the
narrated events and people. Thus, Charles Mallison, opening the narrative of “The Town”, makes it
clear that he is telling the story that his cousin Gown once told him, or maybe it was his uncle
Gavin Stevens, or maybe it was known to all citizens of the town: “…when I say ‘we’ and ‘we
thought’ what I mean is Jefferson and what Jefferson thought.” ( .Faulkner 1957, 3 ) Very often
the opinions contradict one another correcting, echoing or sometimes refuting what was said
previously, thus creating a gigantic dialogue . Instead of one voice the reader is exposed to a
multiplicity of voices and a plurality of viewpoints and instead of a subjective opinion of one
person there appears a multi-colored, multi-levelled picture , a collective , objective position of a
group of people, narrating the life of a big community, of the whole nation.
Faulkner expands the
aesthetic potential of first person narration.
Besides, this narrative form is favored by the writer, because his style is characterized by “the
method of deliberately withheld meaning” ( C.Aiken,1960, 38) that is actualized through heaping
up of various, very often contradictory, events, characters, opinions, inadequacies of all kind, which
for the most part are left uncorrected and uncommented upon. As a result the narrative gives an
illusion of live, haphazard, changeable, pulsating life – life as flux. First person narration is very
suitable for achieving this effect. The story-teller is not a writer, he is a common person who knows
nothing about literary technique, about being logical, clear and consistent. Therefore, he is
emotional, sincere and inconsistent in his judgments and actions as people often are in real life.
The reader is kept in suspense, he is left wondering about the message of the author and goes on
reading in order to discover it. The author intentionally withholds, retards the final message thus
creating tension and stimulating the reader’s interest.
3.2 Third person narration
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There is an opinion that the third person narration is the most popular form of writing among novel
writers: “Since novels have for the most part been written from the standpoint of omniscience ,
it must be supposed that novelists have found it on the whole the most satisfactory way of dealing
with their difficulties...” ( Maugham 1969,15)
Faulkner also uses the traditional author’s narration in the third person and the reader, along with
the characters’ ’voices’ perceives the easily recognizable author’s discourse – clear, logical and
exhaustive, the discourse of a cultured person.
This narrative form(usually called the narration of the omniscient author ) is used in the trilogy, for
example at the beginning of the novel “The Hamlet” where the writer presents the history of the
place and gives an outline of the community living in the village called Frenchman’s Bend – their
habits, preferences, relations. While the story unfolds the reader becomes aware of the fact that the
author’s narration is strongly affected by the expressiveness of the characters’ sphere ( the ‘alien
word’) . At the very beginning of the novel the author is by far above the world he is depicting, but
gradually the distance decreases and disappears and the author seems to be getting assimilated into
the world of his characters adopting their manner of thinking and judging events. This is how he
describes the ways of the inhabitants of the village:
“Federal officers went into the country and vanished. Some garment which the missing man had
worn might be seen – a felt hat, a broadcloth coat, a pair of city shoes or even his pistol – on a
child or an old man or woman.” (.Faulkner 1940, 4)
The quiet dispassionate tone of the narration runs counter to its content. The omniscient author
opening the narrative could not have spoken so indifferently about homicide. It is clear that this is
the way one of the villagers might have talked about the murder – in this wild community homicide
is an ordinary thing.
The villagers are very adventurous, reckless, obstinate and illogical. This finds reflection in the
manner of their speech. For example, instead of simply saying “What must I do?” they say: “ What
do you think you would like for me to do if you was able to make me do it?” (.Faulkner 1940, 5)
The villagers’ speech is as illogical and inconsistent as their behaviour. And when the author
describes these people he imitates their speech, especially the syntactical feature – their way of
combining elements in a sentence. He writes “They were Protestants, Democrats and prolific.”
(.Faulkner 1940, 5 ) It is the author’s observation but it imitates a feature of the characters’ speech –
a very specific way of combining in one sentence elements that are hardly compatible.
This feature of the characters’ form of expression when imitated in the author’s narration strongly
affects the content and this gives rise to the type of narrative that could be called mixed narrative ,
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combining the first and the third person points of view, where the authorial voice is suppressed by
that of the characters – which fact has given the critic reason enough to suggest that the author’s
voice “is frequently invaded or even usurped by the voices of other narrators or characters “ and “it
would be a mistake…to assume omniscience in any Faulkner narrative, however external the voice
may seem,” ( Robinson 2003, 58-59)
It can be argued, however , that occasionally the pure authorial voice is clearly discernable on the
background of ‘ heteroglossia’ pervading the narrative – lyrical, elevated , rich in literary
associations – unmistakably the voice of the author:
“ They stood, clumped darkly in the silver yard and called up at the blank windows until suddenly
someone was standing in one of them. It was Flem Snopes’ wife. She was in a white garment, the
heavy braided club of her hair looked almost black against it. She did not lean out, she merely
“heavy gold hair, the mask not tragic and perhaps not even doomed: just damned, the strong faint
lift of breasts, beneath marblelike fall of the garment; to those what Brunhilde, what Rhinemaiden
on what spurious river-rock of papier-mache, what Helen returned to what topless and shoddy
Argos, waiting for no one.” ( .Faulkner 1940, 310-311)
But, even though the wording, the style of discourse here definitely belong to the author the optical
position is that of the characters – “They stood…”
Here, again, as in the case with the first person narration, we discover a very strong reliance on the
characters’ point of view, their perception. The characters’ discourse is not to be found in such
cases – formally it belongs to the author, but the perceiving consciousness of a concrete person is
always there, as in the following scene:
“ He (the Justice) sat behind the table and looked at them – at the gray woman in the gray
sunbonnet and dress, her clasped and motionless hands on her lap resembling a gnarl of pallid and
drowned roots from a drained swamp; at Tull in his faded and absolutely clean shirt and the
overalls which his womenfolks not only kept immaculately washed and starched and ironed also…
At Mrs. Tull, a strong, full-bosomed though slightly dumpy woman with an expression of grim and
seething outrage …at Eck and the little boy, identical save for size, and Lump the clerk…who
between spells of rapid blinking would sit staring at the Justice with the lidless intensity of a rat…”
( Faulkner 1940, 328-329)
The optical position of the author is clearly indicated: he seems to be sitting at the desk next to the
Justice and looking at the characters – they both are looking but only the author is voicing the
scene. The Justice’s speech is not participating in the description but his presence affects the
author’s discourse. The fact that there is a concrete character perceiving the object of depiction
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allows the author to be detailed and concrete in his presentation and evoke in the reader a sense of
authenticity and trust, of getting information first-hand, straight from the horse’s mouth.
4 .Conclusion
William Somerset Maugham summarizing his own experience as reader and writer arrives at the
following: “There are two main ways in which a novel may be written…One way is to write it in
the first person, and the other is to write it from the standpoint of omniscience.( Maugham 1969,14)
Unlike other writers William Faulkner when setting to the task of writing a novel did not seem to
bother which of the two techniques to choose – as a rule he used both , but in his own, modified
and innovative way.
Third person narrative, which is supposed to demonstrate the author’s omniscience, in Faulkner’s
novels fails to do so. The authorial voice which is expected to prevail in the narrative very often
“follows his characters”( Robinson 2003, 66) , the author is never imposing, he avoids passing
judgment and tends to be highly impersonal and objective,
First person narration is modified to such a degree that it turns into its opposite. It does not serve to
depict the small closed inner world of an individual but provides a wide panorama of the American
reality , its past and present, and in general - “ the unfinished openness of human life” ( Evans
2008, 236 ).
The spheres of the author and the characters are so closely knit together that it is difficult to say
who exactly is the creator of the narrative. All the episodes and heroes are presented either through
the consciousness of the character-narrators, whose observations lack precision, and opinions definiteness and finality, or through that of the author, who is in close proximity to his characters
and is in no way better at drawing conclusions. In Faulkner’s undetermined, open-ended narrative
it is the reader who is supposed to pass final judgments.
References
1. Aiken, C. The Novel as Form. Three Decades of Criticism. Ed. F.J.Hoffman and
O.W.Vickery. East Lansing, Michigan State University Press, 1960
2. Bakhtin, M. Voprosi Literaturi i Estetiki. Moscow, 1975
3. Bakhtin, M.M. The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays. Transl. Caryl Emerson and Michael
Holquist. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1981
4. Evans, David H. William Faulkner, William James and the American Pragmatic Tradition.
Lousiana State University Press, 2008
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5. The Faulkner-Cowley File. Letters and Memories. N.Y.,The Viking Press, cop.1966
6. William Faulkner. (An Interview. Jean Stein). Three Decades of Criticism. Ed. F.J.Hoffman
and O.W.Vickery. East Lansing, Michigan State University Press, 1960
7. W.Faulkner. The Hamlet. N.Y., Random House, 1940
8. W.Faulkner. The Town.N.Y., Random House, 1957
9. Gray, Richard. The Life of William Faulkner. A Critical Biography. Oxford:Blackwell,
1994
10. Maugham, W.Somerset. Ten Novels and Their Authors. Harmondsworth, Middlesex,
England. Penguin Books Ltd., 1969
11. Robinson, Owen. Interested Parties and Theorems to Prove: Narrative and Identity in
Faulkner’s Snopes Trilogy. The Southern Literary Journal, Volume 36, Number 1, Fall
2003.The University of North Carolina Press.
The Narrative of William Faulkner’s Novels
Olga Shevlyakova
Summary
The paper is devoted to the study of William Faulkner’s narrative technique. The author of the
paper proceeds from M.Bakhtin’s theory of the novel, which stresses that the narrative of the novel
is not monolithic, it incorporates a diversity of styles and points of view – those of the author,the
characters and character- narrators, if the author chooses that they should tell the story – which is
often the case with William Faulkner. In his narrative various styles and points of view are
juxtaposed and contrasted to each other with the effect that the object of depiction gradually
emerges out of this ‘heteroglossia’ - .incomplete, unfinished, requiring still another definition.
Faulkner uses the traditional , generally accepted narrative forms to tell his stories, but in an
innovative way. Thus, third person narration is devoid of its main characteristic – omniscience, and
the author, whose mode of expression betrays a learned person is surprisingly close to his
characters, common dwellers of Frenchman’s Bend. First person narration , which is the writer’s
favorite, is modified to such an extent that it loses its main characteristic and turns into its opposite.