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Cyclopedia of Literary Places

As I Lay Dying

Author: William Faulkner (1897–1962)

First published: 1930

Type of work: Novel

Type of plot: Psychological realism

Time of plot: Early twentieth century

As in most of William Faulkner's novels, the setting in this novel is Yoknapatawpha, his fictional Mississippi county that reflects his own corner of the re-created American South. As such, it is meant to be archetype, prototype, and mythotype combined into one. Herein, geography abets theme in order to reveal the social corruption and moral decay of the unreconstructed post-Civil War Old South of the pre-Depression 1920's in America.

Bundren house. Home of Addie and Anse Bundren, located in Yoknapatawpha County on a ridge far removed from a secondary gravel road and nearly inaccessible. The house is a fortress of “white-trash” values, tension, and ignorance. There, Anse and Addie have reared five children, all of whom characterize some aspect of the Old South in its demise. The family members occupy the house in disharmony, at odds not only with one another but with the universe itself. Nevertheless, they are representative members and products of their society, who manifest the stench of the South's decay. Addie dies in the house in the opening chapter, and the family's struggle to dispose of her body drives the rest of the narrative.

Road. Unnamed and little-traveled road leading to New Hope Baptist Church and Varner's Store that provides the main backdrop of the novel's setting during the Bundrens’ six-day journey conveying Addie's body forty miles to Jefferson. Taking the form of a mock epic, the funeral journey occurs mostly on a backwoods route that is beset by a dangerous flood and a fire. Though remote and isolated, the road contains much to mimic and intimates the cosmic setup of the universe as the Bundrenfamilyattempts to getAddie's decomposing body to town so they can bury her in the cemetery she chose before she died.

Barns. Like most barns in totally agrarian societies, the barns in the novel indicate the livelihood and sustenance of the society itself. Symbolic of continued perseverance and orderliness and more important even than homes to these farmers and share croppers, barns provide settings for two pivotal scenes in the novel. In the barn of the Bundrens’ neighbors, the Tulls, buzzards discover Addie's body and begin to follow the wagon and funeral procession ominously. Later when the body is being stored in a barn belonging to a helpful stranger named Gillespie, who lives outside Jefferson, Darl Bundren tries to perform an act of sanity by burning down the barn to cleanse his mother's body with fire. Instead, he fails and is sent to an asylum for the insane.

River. Unnamed stream that is more a creek than a river and that impedes the Bundrens’ progress when it becomes too swollen to cross. The river's waters universally represent the water of cleansing, purification, birth, and baptism that a flood can provide through total destruction. Although the river is the most formidable obstacle that the Bundrens confront on their journey, it is the one that can, perhaps, provide the greatest chance of redemption: Nature itself rebels against the continued attempt of the family to outrage God by not burying the body at once. The family escapes the river just as it escapes the flames of the burning barn.

Drugstore. Pharmacy where Dewey Dell Bundren tries to buy an abortion “medicine” from a corrupt employee, who later seduces her as part of his treatment. Representative of the ability of science to correct moral faults, this pharmacy fails to provide any relief and serves only to worsen the predicaments of the members of the family.

Jefferson. Seat of Mississippi's Yoknapatawpha County, in whose cemetery Addie is finally buried, after Anse borrows a shovel to dig her grave. This small southern town gives shelter and approval to the Bundren family for their actions by hypocritically ignoring the violation against nature that the delayed burial manifests. Thus, the town itself participates in the further corruption of the entire society.

—Carl Singleton

Citation Types

Type
Format
MLA 9th
"As I Lay Dying." Cyclopedia of Literary Places,Salem Press, 2015. Salem Online, online.salempress.com/articleDetails.do?articleName=CLP_0070.
APA 7th
As I Lay Dying. Cyclopedia of Literary Places,Salem Press, 2015. Salem Online, online.salempress.com/articleDetails.do?articleName=CLP_0070.
CMOS 17th
"As I Lay Dying." Cyclopedia of Literary Places,Salem Press, 2015. Salem Online, online.salempress.com/articleDetails.do?articleName=CLP_0070.