Examining Faulkner's Use of Time in The Sound and the Fury

This week, I read Lawrence Edward Bowling's 1947 piece entitled "Faulkner: Technique of The Sound and the Fury," which examines the controversial chronological style that makes the novel so famous. In his piece, Bowling attempts to support Faulkner and his style, using a long and thorough argument to dispel accusations that the narrative technique is simply an "unnecessary obstacle" and providing relevant examples to show his reader how crucial the book's chronology is to the theme and the reader.

Essentially, however, Bowling sums his argument up in three main parts. First, he notes that, although utterly confusing, the disorder of time in the novel is necessary for the plot to make sense as a whole. Given the way that it was written, each of the book's four sections ultimately rely on the other three to be understood and if rearranged into chronological order by the dates at the beginning of each section, the novel could not make sense. This is because, peppered throughout the book, there constantly appear small facts and details that help us comprehend the story, yet, those facts are not always presented prior to a particular sections and sometimes are only revealed after the scene has taken place. Secondly, Bowling also argues that the random, stream-of-consciousness narration prevalent is crucial in helping each character develop a certain identity. In this book, we learn of the characters not by facts "but by [being presented] the reactions of certain characters to these facts" (Bowling 11). Therefore, the baffling and un-descriptive narration of Benjy and the soliloquy-esque, complex narration of Quentin are the only ways we as readers get to know the characters and understand how they work and think. Thus, Bowling points out that if all the narration in the book were like Benjy's or like Quentin's, there would be nothing unique and special about those characters and the reader would be left with a lesser understanding of what kind of people they truly are.

Finally, Bowling concludes his article with the point that Faulkner's narrative style is essential to the theme of the book. As he describes it, "The Sound and the Fury is a novel about disorder, disintegration, and the absence of perspective" centered around "the internal chaos of the characters,--their intellectual, moral, and spiritual confusion" (Bowling 15). Given the fact that much of the narration seems, at least to the reader, as chaotic and very confusing, Faulkner's style in this novel perfectly facilitates the novel's main theme and ultimately, we get a full understanding of the disorder in the characters' lives through it. Therefore, as Bowling puts it, "As an introduction to this theme, what could be more appropriate than the flat, perspective-less language of Benjy's section?" (Bowling 15). Thus, in the end, while the language is quite possibly the source of the reader's confusion, it is also the key to his or her complete understanding on the novel; a cruel double-edged sword.

All in all, I thought Bowling's piece on The Sound and the Fury was extremely enlightening and that it adequately explained why an author like Faulkner would use a technique so troublesome for his or her reader. It makes sense now why the story is written in such a fashion and with the information I have learned, such as Faulkner's attempt to use narration to portray disorder, disintegration, and absence of perspective, I can now apply that knowledge to better interpret the novel as I'm reading. Also, I found the article to be an interesting review of stream-of-consciousness as well, helping me to better understand much of what it is about. For example, Bowling, at one point, mentions how, in Quentin's section, Faulkner simplifies the thought processes to make it easier to understand. Given my personal perspective that section two was extremely complicated to begin with, I found it odd that Bowling would say this, but upon further reading, came to understand that if I myself were to write out my conscious thought process, it would also be quite confusing. Thus, it gave more meaning to my understanding of stream-of-consciousness and more credibility to Faulkner's narrative form.

In conclusion, I thought this work was a very thorough, informative, and ultimately enjoyable work on The Sound and the Fury

Article:

Faulkner: Technique of The Sound and the Fury
Lawrence Edward Bowling
The Kenyon Review, Vol. 10, No. 4 (Autumn 1948), pp. 552-566.
Published by: Kenyon College