A Study Of Faulkner’s Views On Women As Reflected In The Sound And The Fury

As a representative of the southern American literature, William Faulkner has been a focus for a long time. In his Yoknapatawpha stories, Faulkner reveals the cause of the destruction of Southern America and further explores the spiritual crisis of the southerners and modern men. Undoubtedly, women characters play a vital role in his works. In The Sound and the Fury, Faulkner portrays lots of women with various personalities, such as unqualified mothers, rebellious daughters, abnormal virgins, ideal southern ladies and kind black servants.With the development of female liberation movement, feminist literary criticism flourishes in the1960s. From then on, Faulkner’s works attracts more and more critics and his women characters become the objects of their research. Many contradictory debates are produced. Some critics stress the negative and evil aspects of women figures in Faulkner’s works. Thus, Faulkner is naturally labeled as a misogynist. Other scholars believe that his women characters are full of individuality, creativity and rebellious spirit. They assert that Faulkner has expressed real sympathy and even admiration for southern women.Is Faulkner a misogynist or a gyneolatrist? After some thorough study of Faulkner and his works, the author of this paper realizes that William Faulkner is neither a misogynist nor a gyneolatrist. Furthermore, this either-or characterization of Faulkner does no good to Faulkner studies concerning women. Because women in Faulkner’s literary works are too complicated, too paradoxical, and they are the product of the peculiar time in Southern history and culture. Therefore, it is one-sided to evaluate Faulkner’s representation of gender-based issues merely from the perspective of feminism.This thesis intends to reconsider Faulkner’s attitudes toward women from the perspective of the feminist literary criticism and psychoanalytical criticism on the basis of history and cultural background. The author of this paper tries to explore Faulkner’s contradictory feeling of sympathy and hate, admiration and ambivalence, understanding and reservation towards women through making thorough analyses of the three major female figures in The Sound and the Fury.