Analyzing the Concept of Focalization in William Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury - Seyyed Shahabed
Analyzing the Concept of Focalization in
William Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury
Seyyed Shahabeddin Sadati
Introduction
What are the definitions of narrative and narratology? Abrams in his A Glossary of Literary Terms defines narrative as follows: “A narrative is a story, whether in prose or verse, involving events, characters, and what the characters say and do.” And narratology: “a recent concern with narrative in general. It deals especially with the identification of structural elements and their diverse modes of combination, with recurrent narrative devices, and with the analysis of the kinds of discourse by which a narrative gets told” (Abrams 123). Thus, we can assert that narratology aims to analyze the structure of narratives.
In this essay with the help of Shlomith Rimmon-Kenan’s Narrative Fiction: Contemporary Poetics, I would like to analyze the concept of focalization in William Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury. Rimmon-Kenan follows the theories of Genette, and she divides narrative in three basic aspects: story, text and narration. In the second and the third chapters of her book, she elaborates the notion of story. In the fourth, fifth and the sixth chapters she describes the narrative theories of text, and in the seventh and the eighth chapters she depicts the concept of narration.
At the beginning of chapter six she introduces the notion of “focalization”. “The story is presented in the text through the mediation of some ‘prism’, ‘perspective’, ‘angle of vision’, verbalized by the narrator though not necessarily his, following Genette (1927) I call this mediation focalization” (Rimmon-Kenan 71). Then she points to the differences between focalizer and narrator:
In principle, focalization and narration are distinct activities. In so–called ‘third-person centre of consciousness’, the centre of consciousness is the focalizer, while the user of the third person is the narrator. Focalization and narration are also separate in first-person retrospective narratives. (Rimmon-Kenan 73)
In other words, the person who tells the story is the narrator and the person who sees is the focalizer.
Regarding the position of focalization in the text, there are two types of focalization: “internal” and “external”. “External focalization is left to be close to the narrating agent, and its vehicle is therefore called ‘narrator-focalizer’. This type of focalization is predominant in Fielding’s Tom Jones” (Rimmon-Kenan 74). We have also external focalization in the first person narratives, either when the distance between the temporal and psychological narrator and character is minimal (as in Camus’s L’Etranger, 1957) or when the perception through which the story is rendered is that of the narrating self rather than that of the experiencing self. A good example is James Joyce’s Araby (1914). Then, Rimmon-Kenan defines internal focalization as follows:
As the term suggests, the locus of internal focalization is inside the represented events. This type generally takes the form of a ‘character-focalizer’, like Pip the child in many parts of Great Expectations. But internal focalization is sometimes no more than a textual stance, although even such an un-personified stance tends to be endowed by readers with the qualities of a character. (Rimmon Kenan 74)
One way for distinguishing external and internal focalization is to rewrite the given part in the first person. If it is possible, the part is internally focalized, if not, the focalization is external. Another characterization of focalization is ‘degree of persistence’. In this view focalization may remain ‘fixed’ throughout the narrative, as in James’s What Maisie Knew (1897), it can also become variable, as in White’s The Solid Mandana (1966), or it would be a multiple focalization, as in Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury (1931).
Focalization has three facets. The first facet is the ‘perceptual’ which is determined by two main coordinates: space and time. The second facet is the ‘psychological’ which is concerned by focalizer’s mind and emotions, but perceptual facet talks with his sensory range. Psychological facet has two determining components: a) cognitive: know ledge, conjecture, belief and memory; b) emotive: it penetrates the emotions of the reader. The third facet is ‘ideological’ which is about the norms of the text, a general system of viewing the world conceptually. In the interrelations among the various facets, the perceptual, psychological and ideological facets may concur but they may also belong to different, even clashing, focalizers.
At the end of chapter six, Rimmon-Kenan talks about the concept of language and she defends the position of focalization in narratology:
To say that focalization is conveyed by various verbal indicators is not to cancel the distinction between focalization and narration with which I began. In itself, focalization is non-verbal; however, like everything else in the text, it is expressed by language. The overall language of a text is that of the narrator, but focalization can ‘color’ it in a way which makes it appear as a transposition of the perceptions of a separate agent. Thus both the presence of a focalizer other that the narrator and the shift from one focalizer to another maybe signaled by language. (Rimmon-Kenan 82)
Reading Strategy
I have chosen The Sound and the Fury for studying the notion of focalization in narratology. This novel contains four chapters by four different narrators; therefore, each narrator depicts the world and the characters and talks about different or similar things, but by different views. As I mentioned before in the “degrees of persistence” of the focalization, we have some shifts among several focalizers in The Sound an the Fury. During this study, I have analyzed the four chapters in this novel separately and then I have considered all the chapters as a whole. I have traced narrators and focalizers in these four chapters apart from each other and after that I was looking for a unique focalizer during the whole novel. The last important part of this reading is to consider all the facets of focalization in this novel. I will talk about these notions in detail in the next part of the essay.
Studying the Position of Focalization in The Sound and the Fury
The Sound and the Fury is a novel by William Faulkner, Published in 1929. A complex account of the history of the Compson family, the novel is divided into four sections, each under a different controlling perspective. The first section (April 7, 1928) is narrated by Benjy Compson the youngest member of the family, and an idiot. His section (a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury) blends present and past events into a single present–day narrative.
Like those of his brothers Quentin and Jason, Benjy’s main focus is on his relationship with his sister Caddy. Indeed, much of the grief, anguish, guilt and anger expressed in the first three sections are prompted by Caddy’s disappearance, which for Benjy amounts to the loss of the centre of his universe. The second section of the novel (June 2, 1910) is told by Quentin Compson, a freshman at Harvard. He is oppressed by his incestuous desire for Caddy and by the guilt this feeling evokes, and eventually he is driven to suicide. In the third section (April 6, 1928) Jason reveals his bitterness and anger at the opportunities he has lost because of the irresponsibility and selfishness which he feels predominate in his family. He is most enraged by the fact that Caddy, by leaving home, has evaded the family entrapment which he believes has ruined his life. The final section (April 8, 1928 – Easter Sunday) operates primarily as a commentary on the preceding three. In it the Compsons’ black servant, Dilsey, and her grandson, Luster, expose the degeneration of the white family and the distortion of its values. In 1946 Faulkner added an appendix which reviews the history of the Compson family from 1699 to 1945. It concludes with Faulkner’s assessment of the black people who have served the Compsons: “They endured”.
There are seven major characters in the novel which I would like to introduce them because it is necessary when we talk about the notion of focalizer:
Mr. Jason compson III: The head of the Cornpson family, Mr. Compson is a well-spoken but very cynical and detached man. He believes in a philosophy of determinism and fatalism. Despite his cynicism, however, Mr. Compson maintains notions of gentlemanliness and family honor, which Quentin inherits. Mr. Compson risks the family’s financial well-being in exchange for the potential prestige of Quentin’s Harvard education. When he teaches his son with the concept of family honor, Mr. Compson is unconcerned with it in practice. He acts indifferent to Quentin about Caddy’s pregnancy, telling him to accept it as a natural womanly shortcoming. Mr. Compson finally dies of alcoholism.
Candace Compson: She is the second oldest of the Compson children and the only daughter. Caddy is perhaps the most important figure in the novel, as she represents the object of obsession for all three of her brothers. She steps in as a mother figure for Quentin and Benjy in place of the self-absorbed Mrs. Compson. Caddy does feel some degree of guilt about her adultery because she knows, it upsets Benjy so much. She rejects the Southern code that has defined her family’s history and that preoccupies Quentin’s mind. Unlike Quentin who is unable to escape the tragic world of the Compson household, Caddy manages to get away.
Benjy Compson: The youngest of the Compson family, a moaning, speechless idiot, Benjy is utterly dependent upon Caddy, his only real source of affection. Despite his utter inability to understand or interpret the world, however, Benjy does have an acute sensitivity to order and chaos, and he can immediately sense the presence of anything bad, wrong, or out of place. He is able to sense Quentin’s suicide thousands of miles away at Harvard, and senses Caddy’s adultery and loss of virginity. In light of this ability, Benjy is one of the only characters who truly take notice of the Compson family’s progressing decline.
Quentin Compson: The oldest of the Compson children, he is a very intelligent and sensitive young man, but is paralyzed with a very traditional Southern code of conduct and morality. This Southern code defines order and chaos within Quentin’s world, and causes him to idealize abstract concepts such as honor, virtue and feminine purity. His strict belief in this code causes Quentin profound despair when he learns of Caddy’s adultery. When Quentin finds that his sister and father have disregarded the code that gives order and meaning to his life, he eventually is driven to suicide.
Jason Compson IV: The second youngest of the Compson children, Jason remains distant from the other children. Like his brothers, Jason is fixated on Caddy, but his fixation is based on bitterness and a desire to get Caddy in trouble. Jason has no capacity to accept, enjoy or love and eventually he manipulates it to steal money from Miss Quentin behind Mrs. Compson’s back. Jason has no higher goals or aspirations and unlike Quentin, who is obsessed with the past, he thinks only about the present and the immediate future.
Miss Quentin: Caddy’s illegitimate daughter, she is the lone member of the newest generation family. Many parallels arise between Miss Quentin and her mother, Caddy, but the two differ in important ways. Miss Quentin repeats Caddy’s early sexual awakening and promiscuity, but, unlike Caddy, she does not feel guilty about her actions. Not surprisingly, we see that Miss Quentin is not nearly as loving or compassionate as her mother. She is also more worldly and headstrong than Caddy. Yet Miss Quentin’s eventual success in recovering her stolen money and escaping the family implies that her worldliness and lack of compunction, very modern values, indeed work to her benefit.
Dilsey: The Compson’s Negro cook, Dilsey is a pious, strong–willed, protective woman who serves as a stabilizing force for the Compson family. She is the only character detached enough from the Compson’s downfall to witness both the beginning and the end of the final chapter of the family history. Interestingly, Dilsey lives her life based on the same set of fundamental values, family, faith, personal honor, and so on, upon which the Compon’s original greatness was built. We sense that Dilsey is the new torchbearer of the Compson legacy, and represents the only hope for resurrecting the values of the old South in a pure and uncorrupted form.
Section One: April 7, 1928
In this section of the novel on the day before Easter, 1928, Luster, Dilsey’s grandson, takes Benjy out. It is Benjy’s thirty third’s birthday. Luster leads Benjy to a nearby golf course. When Benjy hears one of the golfers calling out to his caddie, he moans because the sound of the word reminds him of his sister, Caddy. From his moment, Benjy remembers some memories from 18 years ago, so this chapter includes not only the events that take place on April seventh. The narrator of this section is Benjy and he has no concept of time. He portrays all events in the present, regardless of when they actually occurred in his life.
The first focalizer in this part is Caddy when Benjy remembers her from the first page of the novel, the day when they were playing beside a river. Caddy is the internal focalizer, because she perhaps is the most important character in this novel, but she does not take part during the dialogues and we do not have her presence. After that Benjy remembers Uncle Maury and his love letters to Mrs. Patterson. These memories of Caddy make Benjy moans again. Other internal focalizers in this chapter are Mr. Compson, Quentin and his grandmother Damuddy whom Benjy remembers their death. During the next pages he again remembers Caddy, her wedding day in 1910 and he again moans and cries. We find Benjy as an objective narrator, as a camera which takes pictures from different events in different years. He is like a little child and can not focus on a special moment or character; therefore, we do not have a fixed focalizer or we can say there are shifts from one to another.
Sometimes Benjy returns back to the present day and he again remembers Caddy’s clothes’ smell and her adultery. In the present day he interrupts Miss Quentin’s love relationship with the man by the red tie. He then imagines those days when he was beside Caddy and remembers his name changing. Caddy’s lost of virginity and so on. In this part we can find the perceptual and psychological facets of focalizers because Benjy uses his eyesight, hearing, smelling and so on. This is perceptual and psychological because we are faced with his memories and emotions. As I mentioned above, we have multiple focalizers. At the end we can say the major facalizer is Benjy’s older sister, his mother–like figure Caddy.
Section Two: June 2, 1910
The narrator of the second chapter is Compson family’s oldest son, Quentin. During this part, like Benjy, sometimes he talks or narrates the story at the present time and most of the time he turns back to the past, he remembers the memories of his family’s past. Like Benjy, he has a big problem with the notion of time; he breaks his watch and does not like to know what time it is. In the beginning he remembers his conversation with Mr. Compson, his father, when they were talking about time and Southern codes. Then, he remembers the days when he was worried about Caddy’s adultery, and he wanted to pretend committing incest with Caddy for his beliefs in Southern code. In the present time we see him in Harvard University, a clock shop and his discussions with his classmates about virginity.
Quentin himself, as the narrator of the story at the present time, is the internal focalizer. But when he turns back to the past and his memories, we have multiple focalizers: his father and his sister Caddy. Another aspect is that we have the psychological and ideological facets of focalization. When Quentin turns back to his memories and emotions about the past, we witness the psychological facet, and when he thinks about Southern codes the ideological facet of focalizer becomes clear. Although Caddy is absent in the story she is again the major focalizer.
Section Three: April 6, 1928
Jason the second youngest of Compson family’s child is the narrator of this chapter of the novel. He begins this chapter as “once a bitch always a bitch, what I say” (Faulkner 198). From this beginning sentence we can find Jason’s view about life and family. Again like Benjy’s and Quentin’s narrations, Jason narrates the story in the present time and most of the time he thinks back on his family and his own personal history. When he is in the present day he struggles with Miss Quentin and accuses her of adultery, behaves very badly to the black servants and shows his separation from the family and society. When he turns back to the past he accuses Caddy for his misery.
During this chapter we can trace the symptoms of focalizatioin in Jason’s thought. In the present time he is the narrator and he himself is the focalizer because we are faced to his sadistic behavior toward the others. When thinks about the past we have two focalizers, the first one is he himself and the second one is Caddy. Therefore, we have multiple focalizers in this chapter, a shift from Jason to Caddy. In this chapter we have only psychological facet of focalization when Jason returns to his memories and emotions, however, he is the most emotionless character in this novel. Again like two previous chapters, we can conclude that the major focalizer in this chapter is Caddy, because Jason sees his life in relation with her sister and their past, and in this view Jason’s point of view is direct without any complexion in his narrative view.
Section Four: April 8, 1928
The narrator of this chapter is William Faulkner himself; therefore, we have an important difference between this chapter and the three previous chapters. The point of view in the previous chapters was third person limited omniscient because the narrators are the characters within the story. In the forth chapter, we have third person omniscient point of view. In this chapter, Miss Quentin steals Jason’s money from his bedroom and she escapes with her lover, the man with the red tie. We do not have flashbacks in this chapter. We are confronted with the events the day after Benjy’s narration. Jason goes for Miss Quentin and her lover for stopping them but the sheriff refuses to help without more substantial evidence of Miss Quentin’s wrong doing. At the end of the chapter, we see Dilsey who calms Benjy and wants to save the family.
We may expect Caddy to narrate the last section, however, Faulkner narrates this section and he focuses on black people in Compson’s family especially Dilsey. Dilsey is the internal focalizer in this chapter when the story goes forward from her view. We see the ideological and psychological facets of focalization when we are confronted with Dilsey and Luster’s kindness toward the other family members. Sometimes Jason is the focalizer because the story is about his money, so again we have a shift in focalization, multiple focalizers. And the last focalizer is Benjy, the novel closes where it started, we return to the world of order and chaos that exist in Benjy’s mind.
Conclusion
The Sound and the Fury is one of the greatest novels in twentieth century. In this essay, I tried to study this book with the view of the notions of narrator and focalizer. I have traced focalization in these four chapters of the novel to find: who is the narrator? Who is the focalizer? And what are the focalization’s facets? First, I wanted to show who is the narrator of the chapter and what are his characteristics. I have found that we have four different points of view by four different narrators: Benjy, Quentin, Jason and Faulkner himself. Second, I have tried to follow focalizer’s symptoms in these chapters. I have found that we have different or multiple focalizers during the whole novel. By narrating the story from changing the time, we have a shift between focalizers, from one to another. I understood that we have a fixed or major focalizer during these four chapters who is Caddy. Third, I have talked about the psychological, perceptual and ideological facets of focalization. I have found all these facets during the whole novel. By utilizing the notion of focalization which is one of the most important concepts in narratology, we can understand and analyze the text of the novels better. Another benefit is reading the characters, narrators and the concept of time more carefully.
Works Cited:
Abrams, M. H. A Glossary of Literary Terms. Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1993.
Beckoff, Samuel. The Sound and the Fury Notes. Simon and Schuster, 1973.
Faulkner, William. The Sound and the Fury. Random House, 1946.
Rimmon–Kenan, Shlomith. Narrative Fiction: Contemporary Poetics. Routledge, 1994.
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