Absalom, Absalom: History, Identity, and Class Consciousness Ramon Saldivar Stanford University
Story and Plot in Absalom2 Faulkner as a Third World Writer u link between historical narrative and social and racial ideology u subject formation in relation to the emerging colonized world as it begins to throw off its colonial burden u Faulkner’s analysis of the colonial and emerging postcolonial subject
Story and Plot in Absalom3 Story and Plot in Absalom, Absalom n “The best novel yet written by an American” n Title of the novel: 2 Samuel n Sutpen’s “Design” Absalom p. 212
Story and Plot in Absalom4 Story and Plot n Viktor Shklovsky, Story v. Plot n Story is a THEMATIC concept n Plot is a COMPOSITIONAL concept made up of devices n Plot is the specific peculiarity of narrative art
Story and Plot in Absalom5 Three plots of Sutpen’s story n Chapter 1, Rosa Coldfield’s narrative, August 1909 n Chapters 2-4, Mr. Compson’s narrative, summer 1909 n Chapter 5, Rosa’s story continues n Chapters 6-8, Quentin Compson’s and Shreve McCannon’s narrative, Jan 10, 1910
Story and Plot in Absalom6 Romance n A lone hero n Embarks on a melodramatic Quest n Through a Symbolic Universe n Unformed by networks of social relations n Unfettered by the pressures of real social constraints n Object of his quest is eroticized and sensual
Story and Plot in Absalom7 Proairetic Code of Narration The logic of actions How the completion of an action can be logically derived from its initiation How these completed actions combine with other actions to form sequences
Story and Plot in Absalom8 The Hermeneutic Code of Narration Concerns the questions and answers that structure a story Their suspense Partial unveiling Eventual resolution into MEANING
Story and Plot in Absalom9 Plot: combination of Proairetic and Hermeneutic Codes n In Proairetic Actions and sequences of actions of the narrative are assembled into larger wholes n In Hermeneutic Sort things out to see the significance of actions
Story and Plot in Absalom10 Rosa’s Narrative of Southern Innocence n The Romance of the South n “The evil’s source and head which had outlasted all its victims” Absalom, p. 12 n “Fatality and curse on the South and on our family” Absalom p. 14 n “He was not articulated in this world. He was a walking shadow” Absalom p. 139
Story and Plot in Absalom11 Mr. Compson’s Narrative of Southern Irony n The Critique of Romance n Lawless opportunity n Moral Credit n Misogyny
Story and Plot in Absalom12 Quentin and Shreve’s Metanarrative n Romance Undone: Paradox and Contradiction n “Things that just have to be whether they are or not,” Absalom p. 260 n Social Construction and Aesthetic Design