Unreliable Narrators in Faulkner

Faulkner’s Use of Stream of Consciousness Mirrors History

Jan 9, 2009

William Faulkner uses stream of consciousness and unreliable narrators to create novels that reflect a historical perspective.

One technique that William Faulkner used in his books was stream of consciousness, which he would sometimes combine with multiple narrators to create multi-dimensional portrait of a person, group of people, or event.

On more than one occasion, Faulkner used an unreliable narrator for one of the perspectives in his novels. Faulkner’s method of combining stream of consciousness, multiple narrators, and unreliable narrators results in a narrative that is both a commentary on history and a reflection of history.

The Accuracy of History

Some historians would like people to believe that history is a chain of irrefutable facts that are set in stone and as a result our understanding of history is immutable. While grade school children are often taught history with this mindset and many people would be more comfortable with history if it held to this mindset, the reality is that history is humanity’s best understanding of an event or person and is inaccurate at best and completely wrong at worst. As it has been noted by more than one person, ‘History is written by the winners.’

William Faulkner’s use of multiple narrators in books such as The Sound and the Fury and Go Down, Moses would seem to create novels that would support a more complete and accurate view of the story and result in something that is more truthful; something, which historians would like for their accounts of history. However, a quote often attributed to Henry Youngman would suggest that this is a naïve wish; he says “After you've heard two eyewitness accounts of an auto accident, you begin to worry about history.”

In William Faulkner’s landmark novel The Sound and the Fury, Faulkner uses Benjamin “Benjy” Compson as the first narrative voice in the novel. Benjy is the mentally impaired youngest Compson child. The novel has no introduction to prepare the reader, it simply begins with Benjy’s thoughts. It doesn’t take long for the reader to lose nearly all sense of time because for Benjy, everything is the present. His memories of the past combine with the present moment to make up his ‘day.’

When a reader considers the events in the story through the eyes of Benjy, he immediately begins to realize that just because a person was present during an event, doesn’t mean that they can provide you an accurate understanding of what happened. Instinctively, the reader begins to seek out the more coherent views of the supposed normal siblings. However, it doesn’t take a brilliant person to realize that the emotionally disturbed accounts of Quentin are probably no more accurate than the mentally impaired accounts of Benjy. In fact, it isn’t long before one realizes that the anger and bitterness that informs every action of Jason renders his point of view warped.

If one wishes to use fiction as a commentary on the usefulness of eye witness accounts to our understanding of history, one need look no further than The Sound and the Fury.

In Faulkner’s novel Go Down, Moses, the short stories that comprise the novel are all given from the perspective of intelligent humans who can be, with the exception of Rider, considered emotionally competent. Despite these recommendations for the narrators of the story, the reader opens the book to a segment that is nearly as confusing as Benjy’s understanding of life. It is a landmark moment in the McCaslin clan’s life, when the Uncle Buck and Uncle Buddy chase after Tomey’s Turl and Uncle Buck is entrapped by Miss Sophonsiba.

The reason for the lack of clarity is that it is not a direct eyewitness account of the event. It is family legend. It is the account of the event as told by Edmonds McCaslin to his younger cousin Isaac McCaslin. Edmonds was too young at the time the events took place to fully appreciate or understand them and the reader learns them second-hand from Isaac when Isaac is approaching eighty. As a result, the reader hears this bit of McCaslin family history second-hand from a geriatric gentleman who heard it in his youth from a cousin who was there but who was too young to understand what was going on.

It would be easy to use the story of Uncle Buck and Uncle Buddy as the same sort of evidence as the reader would use Benjy’s account in The Sound and the Fury, an example of the completely worthless nature of eyewitness accounts. However, the McCaslin account not only serves the purpose of negating eyewitness accounts, it also gives the reader a more accurate picture of the nature of historical facts than the reader might want.

By the time history comes down through the generations to the present, the story is garbled. The original witness seldom has an accurate understanding of the event and by the time his story reaches the modern listener, the story is so garbled that the historian doesn’t have accurate facts with which to clarify the event.

Faulkner’s Intent

It is debatable as to whether or not Faulkner intended to make the commentary about history that this article infers. However, the result of his use of unreliable narrators, stream of consciousness, and multiple viewpoints creates a psychological realism that we can surmise was intentional. The psychological realism in Faulkner’s writing is uncomfortable and difficult to swallow. As a result, it is not surprising that Faulkner’s work doesn’t have a universal appeal and, perhaps, it sheds light on the reason why people don’t want to examine history too closely.

The copyright of the article Unreliable Narrators in Faulkner in Classic American Fiction is owned by Melissa Howard. Permission to republish Unreliable Narrators in Faulkner in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.