A Biblical Archetypal Study Of William Faulkner's Absalom, Absalom! And The Sound And The Fury

This thesis attempts to analyze Faulkner's novels from archetypal perspective with a focus on Biblical allusions in the novels. Through a exploration of different archetypes in Faulkner's fictions Absalom, Absalom! and The Sound and the Fury, my purpose is to induce a kind of pattern in Faulkner's writings which reveals the artist's capability to assimilate archetypes as well as displace them. His unique method of using archetypes remarkably foregrounds the themes of his fictions and marks him as an innovative and talented writer. My use of archetypal criticism will be illustrative rather than theoretical and it will be subordinate to the textual analysis.This thesis is composed of five chapters. Chapter I is a brief introduction to William Faulkner and the theory of archetypal criticism. Chapter II is a background study which analyzes the reasons why Faulkner consciously alludes to the Bible in his novels. This tendency is influenced by there factors: the rebirth of myth in 20th century modern literature; the cultural and social background of the American South and Faulkner's nostalgic feeling towards the past.Chapter III and Chapter IV are the body of the thesis. Chapter III deals with the Biblical archetypes in these two novels. I mainly present two kinds of parallel correspondences: one is between the Biblical narratives and the plots of Absalom, Absalom!, the other is between the Biblical figures and the characters in The Sound and the Fury. Chapter IV centers on the displacements of the Biblical archetypes as well as the relationship between these displacements and the themes of the novels. In Absalom, Absaloml, Faulkner displaced the archetypes in four aspects: motives of incest, attitudes towards incest, motives of fratricide and results of fratricide. Thus he foregrounded the themes of racism and the collapse of the old American South family. In The Sound and the Fury,Faulkner skillfully took the Biblical narratives in the Passion Week as the archetypes of the Compsons' experience. But all the parallel correspondences are inverted and ironic. In this week, Jesus Christ raised from death to life; while the Compsons, deteriorated from life to death. Through these ironic displacements, Faulkner stressed the root of the Compsons' doom: lacking love and mutual understanding between family members.In Chapter V, with an overview of the above analysis, I come to my conclusion. In most of his books, Faulkner seemed to have composed in the following order: imagination-Biblical pattern-pattern changed to fit imagination. He started with people, "the human heart in conflict with itself, with its fellows, or with its environment". He then added Christian symbolism (altered to fit the situation) when he thought it would help him to tell his story most effectively. This method of composition explains the paradox of his un-Christlike Christians. It is also this method that marks him as an innovative and talented writer.