Due to the biased stories told to Quentin Compson by Rosa Coldfield and Mr. Compson, Thomas Sutpen of Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner, can be viewed as either an evil man, or an ambitious man. Throughout all of Absalom, Absalom!, we are told many different versions of stories about Sutpen, and the supposed ruin he caused to many people. Quentin Compson symbolizes the reader, in that he too is learning about Sutpen through biased stories. The storytelling that takes place illustrates how the past is reconstructed by those who come after it. This reconstruction is a biased action. Those who retell stories add their own creativity into it by providing their own interpretations of what may have happened. They must also provide the thoughts, motives, and feelings of the people included in the story. The final product that is told is based on the storyteller's own personality, relationship to the people involved, and how much information they actually know.
             Rosa Coldfield is a woman whose stories are biased due to her unpleasant experiences with Thomas Sutpen. She believes he is an extremely evil man who ruined many lives. Rosa tells Quentin that Sutpen "wasn't a gentleman. He wasn't even a gentleman" (Faulkner 9). Saying that Sutpen "wasn't a gentleman" was a great insult during this time period, especially in the South, since the stress of respectability and proper manners was so prominent. Although Rosa does not know any facts about Sutpen's youth and past, she continues to state that, "what he fled from must have been some opposite of respectability too dark to talk about" (11). She thinks that simply because no one knows much of Sutpen's past or where he came from, and because she believes he ruined so many lives, that he must have come from a place of no respectability. She assumes he must have "fled" from his dark past, which he is ashamed of a...