STUDY GUIDE: As I Lay Dying
BIOGRAPHY
William Faulkner was born into an old Southern upper-class family as William Falkner on
September 25, 1897, in New Albany, Mississippi. He was the first of the four sons born to Murry
and Maud Butler Falkner. The family moved while he was still a child to Oxford, in central
Mississippi. Here he played football for Oxford High School.
Since he was turned down to serve in the United States Army because he was too short-he was
5'6"-Faulkner was forced to join the Royal Canadian Air Force and the RAF (Royal Air Force)
during World War I. Scholars speculate that the change in his name from Falkner to the more
British Faulkner occurred at this point. After the war, despite the fact that he never graduated
from high school, Faulkner attended the University of Mississippi in Oxford, Mississippi.
Faulkner takes racial prejudice and the decay of the South, which is very apparent in As I Lay
Dying, as the primary themes in most of his work. He wrote his first novel, Soldier's Pay, while
living in New Orleans, followed by the enormously popular The Sound and the Fury in 1929.
During the 1930's, a decade in which he was very prolific, he produced the literary works, As I
Lay Dying (1930), Light in August (1932), Absalom, Absalom! (1936) and The Unvanquished
(1938) in addition to his 1932 short story collection that includes the well-known "A Rose for
Emily," and "Barn Burning."
Mississippi, a highly complex multicultural geographical region, greatly influenced Faulkner's
life and work, and with the exception of temporary jobs in New York and New Orleans in his
youth, a short stint in Hollywood as a script writer, and a trip or two to Europe and Asia in later
life, Faulkner remained close to his familial Mississippi roots.
The fictional Yoknapatawpha County, which is based on Lafayette County, Mississippi, is the
geographical region, his "postage stamp," as he called it, in which Faulkner placed most of his
fiction. And some of his fictional characters move from one novel to another. For instance, in As
I Lay Dying, Jewel is forced to sell his horse to a member of the despicable Snopes family who
appear in other Faulkner novels, including The Hamlet (1940).
Faulkner also published two poetry collections titled The Marble Faun (1924) and A Green
Bough (1933) but as a poet, Faulkner didn't fare nearly as well.
In June of 1929, Faulkner finally married his first sweetheart, the recently divorced Estelle
Oldham Franklin.
Faulkner worked nights at the Oxford Power Plant and it is here that he wrote As I Lay Dying, he
claims, in six weeks without ever making a change. Shortly after, he purchased Rowan Oak in
Oxford, Mississippi, where he was to make his home for the rest of his life. He and Estelle had
one surviving daughter named Jill.
Numbered among Faulkner's awards are the Pulitzer Prize in 1949 for A Fable, two National
Book Awards for his Collected Stories (1951) and A Fable and the 1950 Noble Prize for
literature, the prize money of which Faulkner donated to a fund for new fiction writers. This
ultimately became the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. Each year, Faulkner lived for a few
weeks as Writer-in-Residence at the University of Virginia until his death in 1962.
Faulkner's style remains highly regarded for its use of long involved sentences, multiple points of
view, clear-cut, well-defined diction, out of time sequences, and especially for his use of the
Modernist stream of consciousness technique.
Key Facts about As I Lay Dying
When Written: 1930
Where Written: Faulkner famously wrote As I Lay Dying in a six-week period of time while
working at a local power-plant in Mississippi.
When Published: 1930
Literary Period: Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying is a representative work of literary
modernism, a movement which established itself in the early 20th century. The havoc of World
War I caused an impulse in society, demoralized by war, to challenge society’s very foundations
and to uproot tradition. Thus there was a movement in the realm of literature to challenge the
traditional values of literature – straightforward plot, omniscient narration, linear sense of time,
among others. Faulkner demonstrates modernism’s appreciation of all kinds of linguistic and
formal experimentation, and perpetuation of new and innovative stylistic techniques. Other
famous writers who participated most visibly in the modernist aesthetic include James Joyce,
Ezra Pound, T.S. Eliot and Gertrude Stein.
Genre: Novel
Setting: Mississippi in the early 20th century. Specifically, Faulkner introduces the
fictional Mississippi region of Yoknapatawpha County in As I Lay Dying, which he continues to
refer to in later novels. Faulkner said that Yoknapatawpha is merely a fictionalized version of
Lafayette County, Mississippi, from which he hailed.
Climax: Because As I Lay Dying breaks from a purely linear presentation of plot, it is
difficult to pin-point the exact climax of the action. That said, the climax of the novel arguably
occurs when Darl sets fire to Gillepsie’s barn, having told Vardaman earlier in the day that Addie
had requested removing herself from the sight of man. Given Darl’s rationalization, this action is
one that brings the question of heroism to the foreground of the novel, and also is ultimately the
cause for the Bundrens’ unexpected need to force the possibly-insane Darl to go to an asylum in
Jackson.
Antagonist: Because of the multiplicity of narrators in the novel, it is not possible to
identify a single antagonist. It is possible to see a character like Cora Tull in opposition to the
Bundrens, as she frequently expresses distaste for the family’s actions – specifically Jewel’s
cold-heartedness. It is also possible to see Jewel and Darl as antagonists to one another, with
Jewel believing whole-heartedly in action over words, and Darl prizing language and thought
above all else. From a reader’s perspective, though, it is likely that Anse is the most easily
disagreeable character in the novel, representing a man of pure selfishness, even in his parental
role.
Point of View: The novel unfolds in fifty-nine sections, told from fifteen different
narrators. The Bundren family members are the most common narrators, though Faulkner
includes the points of view of people like Peabody the doctor, Tull the neighbor, Armstid the
nearby farmer, to offer perspective on the Bundrens’ actions. Darl and Vardaman are the most
prominent narrators, while characters like Jewel and Addie each only narrate one section.
Discussion Questions
1. Faulkner utilizes a stylistic technique in As I Lay Dying that juxtaposes
serious events with comical situations. Describe this technique and the
results.
2. Addie Bundren's attitude toward each of her children reveals much about
them as characters. Describe her feelings for each and what those feelings
suggest.
3. Consider why Addie makes her family promise to take her body to Jefferson
to be buried.
4. The Bundrens honor Addie's dying request to be buried in Jefferson but all
of them have their own reasons for traveling to town. Describe each reason
and consider whether or not the individual Bundrens accomplish their goal.
5. Describe how Faulkner utilizes the stream-of-consciousness technique
popularized by Virginia Woolf and James Joyce.
6. THEME: How is As I Lay Dying a The Mock-Epic Journey.
7. THEME: Words vs. Actions.
8. THEME: Self-Interest Versus Heroic Duty
9. THEME: Mortality and the Nature of Existence
10.THEME: Family, Birth, and Death
11.THEME: Religion and Faith (Biblical Imagery)
12.SYMBOLS: The Coffin, Jewel's Horse, Fish, and Tools (Note how they are
used with various character chapters).