The second chapter in the Sound and the Fury is Quentin's chapter. One might assume this chapter might be easier to understand because unlike Benjy, Quentin is an unbelievably intelligent man who attends Harvard. This is far from the truth. With Benjy we got to see an unbiased view of a string of events but with Quentin we see his inner psyche which is just as hard, if not harder to understand than Benjy's string of events. Quentin talks a lot about time and through Quentin, Faulkner continues to explore the concept of time. The difference between Benjy and Quentin is that, they both have memories of the past but on top of that Quentin gives us insight on his complicated inner psyche.
Quentin is constantly talking about the past whenever something happens in his present tying back into Faulkner's idea of time. From the very beginning of Quentin's chapter we see Quentin waking up to an alarm, then breaking his clock, yet the hands still move. No matter what Quentin does he is stuck in time. He breaks his clock, he walks into a clock shop yet asks not to know the time. He notices the shadows in the water which is a reference to the sun. Time haunts Quentin and we see that through his thought process giving us an even more intense, chilling chapter than the first one.
One of the main points made in this chapter is Quentin's obsession with helping Caddy and his disgust at her actions. He is disgusted by her actions and wants only to clear his family name. Quentin is obviously hurt by Caddy's actions as he always tries to fix her actions, although fails. Quentin is further upset because Mr. Compson clearly doesn't care about Caddy's choices.
Overall, Quentin is obsessed with southern tradition and time is constantly haunting him resulting in a very confused and scared man. He is losing control and with a guy like him that is toxic. Obviously, it resulted in suicide.
I think your focus on he concept of time really strengthened your arguments, good job.
ReplyDeleteDo you think there was a moment in Quentin's that made him so focused on time? I like the connections you made about the sun and shadows and time.
ReplyDelete* in Quentin's life
DeleteI think that you have done a great job discussing this chapter. I like how in deep you went to into Quentin's obsessions with time and Caddy's behavior.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you on the fact that Quentin is disgusted with Caddy's actions; I think he is actually very Jealous of Caddy because he's a virgin. Quentin hasn't got to experience of sex, and he upset that his younger sister gets to experience it.
ReplyDeleteI never thought about the fact that Quentin should have been easier to read because of his high intelligence level but yes, in fact he was just as confusing as Benjy who was no where near the level of Quentin.
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