As I Lay Dying: The Burning Barn
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner explores the dynamics within afamily who prepares to fulfill the dying request of the matriarch, Addie.Her request is to be buried in Jefferson, and her surviving family preparesto make the arduous journey from the rural town Yoknawpatapha. Thehardships experienced on this journey serves to reveal the decay begun byAddie's act of adultery with a minister. The result of this act is innerfamilial decay through a lack of love on Addie's part. At her death thedecay worsens, and is symbolized by the burning barn. The most prominent relationships explored in the novel are those ofAddie with her son, Jewel, and the rest of her family. Jewel, as the nameimplies, is Addie's most treasured son. He is the product of anillegitimate union between Addie and a priest. Jewel is for her the symbolof having lived intensely in preparation for death. She carries on thisparadigm in pouring her entire capacity for love into her relationship withJewel to the exclusion of the rest of her family. The love that Addie withholds from her family is particularlypersonified in Darl. It is also Darl who also has the most prominentnarrating role in the novel. Darl is
The way in which Darl describes Jewel shows the intensity of hisaesthetic appreciation. He was the result of her preparation for death byliving life as intensely as she knew how. He also callsthe rest of his family to help. The implication of this isthe destruction of decades of effort. Cora, the personification of conventional religion, is shockedat this prophecy, which she regards as blasphemous. In the novel then Darl expresses in language all that he feels, bothregarding Jewel, his deceased mother, and the fate of his family. In this way the fire of Addie's passion is also the fire of herfamily's destruction. In death it isJewel's quick unthinking action that saves her corpse. Indeed, Cora reports Addie's prediction regarding both disasters(Faulkner 156): "He is my cross and he will be my salvation. Vardamaninterprets these tears as grief for the death, but Darl's tears have adeeper meaning. Darl starts the fire, and it is Jewel who not only savesthe livestock nearly single-handedly, but also saves his mother's coffin. The conflict between these twoviewpoints, and also within Darl himself, reaches a climax during thisincident. Her love for Jewel however saves herboth in life and in death. The actions of Jewel and Darl also show their opposite views of theirmother's death.
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