Source for The Sound and the Fury Michael A. Fredrickson
That William Faulkner was fascinated
with the idiot is evident from the appearance of this figure in at least
four of his novels.1 What
is not so evident, however, is the source of his fascination. I propose
to show that the idiot in The Sound and the Fury has probably been
modelled on the protagonist of Wordsworth's ballad "The
Idiot Boy" (1798). I came to reflect upon this indebtedness after noticing
the coincidence of Benjy Compson's birth date (April 7th) with
Wordsworth's. Upon comparing the section of the novel narrated by Benjy
with "The Idiot Boy," I found similarities in characterization and theme
that seem too close to be the result of coincidence.2
Second, because of their lack of awareness, the two idiots are incapable of interpreting experience. Johnny cannot distinguish between the sun and the moon, between the cocks and the owls, or - in other words - between day and night. When he does attempt to interpret his nocturnal experience, he blends it with his daytime routine. In like manner, Benjy believes that the fire he sees in the mirror exists within the mirror; for him it comes and goes in and out of the mirror.5 And Quentin IV's descent from her window is only a "shaking" to him (pp. 92-3). Third, in both works the condition of the idiot is said to be timeless. The poem begins with the words, "'Tis eight o'clock," and proceeds with references to the steady progression of time. Betty Foy's anxiety for her son increases with each stroke of the clock, and by three o'clock she considers taking her own life out of grief. To reinforce the consciousness of time, Wordsworth has his narrator frequently remind us that it is night by mentioning the hoot of the owls and the light of the moon.6 And just before Johnny is asked how he has spent his evening, there is a concatenation of words and images that have been previously used to designate time: The owls in tuneful concert strive; No doubt he too the moon had seen; For in the moonlight he had been From eight o'clock till five (11. 442-6; italics mine). Benjy's timeless condition in The Sound and the Fury has been widely recognized. In the appendix to The Portable Faulkner, Faulkner himself writes, "Now he [Beny] and TP could . . . follow timeless along the fence . . ." (p. 19; italics mine). Timelessness is one of the important themes in the novel. Although the section Benjy narrates subsemes about thirteen different periods of time, he makes no distinctions among them; he experiences them all as the immediate present, thus achieving a state of timelessness. As one critic has commented: Similarly, Benjy, who begins the novel, ends it in his own "glory." Since he cannot tolerate any change in the established patterns of his experience, he begins to howl in an "unbelievable crescendo" (p. 335) when Luster breaks precedent by turning left instead of right at the monument that stands in the middle of the town square. Ironically, it is Jason, the Compson with the least feeling for Benjy, who arrives to reprimand and punish Luster for not turning right - that is, for not obeying Benjy's wishes (pp. 335-6). In the novel the idiot also has the last word insofar as Jason feels himself obliged to defer to him. The final tableau is, in effect, under Benjy's control. There is no external evidence to suggest that Faulkner had Wordsworth's ballad in mind during the composition of the novel.10 As we have seen, however, there is sufficient internal evidence to suggest that, at least for the figure of the idiot and the theme of timelessness, the novel is indebted to the ballad. NOTES 1. Cf. Benjy's appearances in The Mansion (New York: Random House, 1959), pp. 322, 328; those of Jim Bond in Absalom, Absalom! (New York: Random House, 1936), pp. 214-216, 371, 376, 378; those of Isaac Snopes in The Hamlet (New York: Random House, 1940), pp. 86, 87, 98-100, 191, 193, 229 (pp. 188-213 are narrated from his point of view). 2. For help in explicating the poem, I am indebted to Mr. W. Harley Henry, instructor in English at Macalester College, St. Paul, Minnesota. 3.William Wordsworth: Selected Poems and Prefaces, ed. Jack Stillinger (Boston: Riverside Press, 1965), p. 65. Additional references to the poem are incorporated in the text of this essay. 4. The Early Letters of William and Dorothy Wordsworth (1787-1805), ed. Ernest de Selincourt (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1935), pp. 294-295. 5. The Sound and the Fury (New York: Vintage Books, 1946), p. 80. All subsequent references involving the novel are to this edition. 6. Cf. 11. 2, 3-6, 38, 80, 104, 106, 117-118, 143, 151, 174, 202-203, 215, 287-291, 349, 403, 432-436. 7. Irving Howe, William Faulkner: A Critical Study (New York: Random House, 1952), p. 111. 8. "Wordsworth's Humor," PMLA, LXXIII (March, 1958), p. 89. 9. Notes on the poems dictated by Wordsworth to Isabella Fenwick in 1843, in Stillinger, p. 507. (Cf. Footnote 3.) 10. There is similar internal evidence
to suggest that Sartoris, published six months before The Sound
and the Fury, evinces the influence of another romantic poet - John
Keats. Cf. Lawrance Thompson, Afterword to Sartoris (New York: Signet,
1964), pp. 304-316.
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