Narrative Analysis On The Sound And The Fury From The Perspective Of Appraisal Theory

William Faulkner (1897-1962) is recognized as one of the most celebrated andmost prolific American writers, who created19novels and75short stories during allhis lifetime. His notable fiction The Sound and the Fury, published in1929, isuniversally considered to be the most innovative and experimental work, and at thesame time, Faulkner’s most favorite among all his works. This classical novel reflectsthe once at a time glorious Compson family’s irrevocable disintegration throughinterior monologues of the Compson family members, which exposes the decay anddecline of traditional moral values in the American south. Previous interpretations ofthis work The Sound and the Fury mostly center on major figures, stylistic features,feminism, psychoanalysis and narrative techniques and ignore the interpersonalmeaning contained in lexical and grammatical levels in this novel. Therefore, basedon the perspective of the Appraisal theory, this thesis will conduct an analysis oflexical and grammatical levels in two narrative focalizations, that is, an analysis ofnarrators’ evaluation of people’s feelings, character and things in two narrativefocalizations, so as to reveal the author’s standpoint and attitude towards theAmerican south.The Appraisal theory is a relatively complete system developed on Halliday’sSystemic Functional Linguistics(SFL). There are three sub-categories in this system:attitude, engagement and graduation, and these three sub-categories can also bedivided into their own sub-systems. For example, the sub-category attitude is made upof affect, judgment and appreciation. Up to now, the Appraisal theory has beenadopted in the analysis of distinct sorts of discourses and its feasibility is definitelyproved. And through the analysis of evaluative resources of attitude system in thenovel The Sound and the Fury, all evaluative resources can be found. Accordingly, ananalysis of this novel from the perspective of the Appraisal theory is practicable.Along with the development of narratology, Genette’s theory of focalization hasalso been explored by literary theorists and employed in literary works during theshort period of several decades. According to Genette, focalization can be categorizedinto three types: zero focalization, internal focalization and external focalization. Onthe basis of the categories of Genette’s focalization, the novel The Sound and the Furycan be clustered into two patterns, that is, the first three sections, including Benjy’s narration, Quentin’s narration and Jason’s narration, are labeled as internalfocalization and the fourth section including only Dilsey’s narration is labeled as zerofocalization.In a word, through the combination of Appraisal theory, attitude system inparticular and narrative focalization, this paper attempts to explore four narrators’evaluation of the leading figure Caddy, other characters, events and environmentssurrounded by them from two narrative focalizations, that is, the interpersonalmeaning embodied in each narrative focalization to reveal Faulkner’s paradoxicalemotions towards the American South: on one hand, Faulkner harbors hatred towardsthe inherent maladies of the traditional moral values in the American south, on theother hand, he also places great hope on the southern society, in the hope that thebeauty of human nature will live for all eternity.