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  • Essay / Obscenity and Family Relations in Faulkner's Novel "As I Lay Dying"

    As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner presents an aggressive view of an unusual family. The Bundren family's mother figure, Addie, dies. While his body is transported to Jackson for burial, the six remaining family members struggle to return him alive, unharmed, and in time for the corpse to stop rotting and smelling. Jewel, one of the older brothers, remains the most determined and attached to their mother throughout their odyssey. However, he vocally and violently confronts those involved in his mother's transportation, including her family. During the trip, Jewel's use of the aggressive phrase "son of a bitch" illustrates the inverted ideas about family relationships within the Bundren family as well as the inability to differentiate between animals and humans. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay Jewel's main use of swearing is to refer to members of her family. As he lifts the coffin, he calls Cash a "fucking... thoughtful soul", calling him a "son of a bitch" as they try to balance him (96). At the same time, Darl taunts Jewel when they go to get supplies to bring Addie to Jefferson. He also retaliates by swearing (40). Jewel never uses this term to refer to other family members, leaving it to Cash and Darl. “Bitch,” by technical definition, is a female dog. Animals and their images appear throughout the book, with dogs appearing at all times. Jewel himself “looked like one of those bulldogs, like one of those dogs that didn’t bark” (235). Using this, if Cash and Darl are "sons of bitches", then they are no different from animals, just like Jewel. They are just puppies in a litter, young animals who cannot control themselves appropriately. This shows that while they are no different from animals, the older Bundren brothers do not need to act like humans. In doing so, they are not required to follow any human or societal ideology, but can create and follow their own, explaining the strange behaviors of the three: Darl's ability to simply "know" things, the stoic and "wooden" behavior » by Jewel and Cash's behavior. illogical logic. However, Addie is clearly their mother through genetics. Since they are consciously interpreted as "sons of bitches", that "bitch" is Addie. Addie is just a dog, which further blurs the line between animal and human in the Bundrens' minds. Vardaman's "mother is a fish" (84), while "'Jewel's mother is a horse'" although they are the same person (101). They are not able to differentiate between variations in thought and perception, but make it clear because they are all related. Then there's no way the siblings aren't dogs themselves. Although they despise each other, they are all the same on a genetic level and very primitive. Consequently, the line blurs between animal and human, continuing to make humans animalistic while animals remain themselves or more humanoid. In this way, dogs in packs constitute a family with a distinct hierarchical order. The head of the family throws them out or down if they don't obey, like Jewel, or if they have to follow Anse's rules. Even though he is useless, he leads Bundren's "pack". Addie herself is also a bitch in the insulting sense of the word. She had Jewel, who is not Anse's child, just to spite her husband. Jewel is his "jewel", making Jewel specifically his "son of a bitch"..