Dying Is William Faulkner\'s Story,

¶ … DYING is William Faulkner's story, which bears his trademark i.e. multi-layer consciousness. The story like all other works of Faulkner appears simple on the surface but hides layers beneath layers of meaning that can be unearthed with the help of symbols, imagery and narrative analysis. The story revolves around the burial of female protagonist, Addie who has four children, three boys and a girl and the story opens with her death scene. The woman is on her deathbed and it is her earnest wish to be buried in Jefferson, a place of her ancestors. Addie's husband Anse is determined to fulfill her last wish even though he is anything but a good husband. This is where we notice a conflict arising. Why would a man who never had any real sense of right and wrong and to whom, his wife was nothing but a child making-machine, would be so determined to bury his wife at the place of her choice. Was he actually sincere in his desire to fulfill her wish or was this just another action grounded in selfish motives? Unfortunately the latter is true in this case. Anse whom critic Andre Bleikasten terms as a character "loaded with faults and vices" (84) and who was always the opposite of Addie when it came to faith and a sense of right and wrong, desperately wanted to get a new set of teeth and a new wife and felt that Jefferson was the right place to get both. He therefore tries hard to take his wife's body to Jefferson even though all roads to the place are closed. Their neighbor Tull describes the situation appropriately when he says, "They would risk the fire and the earth and the water and all just to eat a sack of bananas." (p. 140). This explains the absolutely selfishness and absurdity of Anse's obsession with taking his wife's body to Jefferson. It is not just Anse who has ulterior motives; everyone else with the possible exception of Darl and Jewel is going to Jefferson for some reason other than the burial alone.

Dewey, the daughter of Addie, wants to have an abortion with the 10 dollars she was given by world- be father Lafe, Anse wants a new set of teeth, Cash wants a new record player while Dewey's son wants some bananas. Darl and Jewel are going without any real motive and it appears burial is the one thing on their mind. Darl is however not exactly as virtuous as he appears at times because he is intensely jealous of Jewel who was Addie's favorite son and Darl's half-brother. "Although I am fifteen feet ahead of him, anyone watching from the cottonhouse can see Jewel's frayed and broken straw hat a full head above my own." (p.3) His jealousy leads to some humiliating comments: "Jewel...whose son are you" and, "Your mother was a horse, but who was your father Jewel?" (p.212). Jewel with no real Bundren connection is the most selfless of all people and adores his mother.

In the book, it is clear that everyone has his or her own sense of right and wrong. Their actions are deeply grounded in their wishes, desires and motives and none is truly selfless. From closer analysis of the story, it appears that man considers 'right' what he believes fulfills his desires and helps him further his ambitions. For example for Cash there was nothing wrong in making the coffin for his mother, he thought this was the right thing to do but for Darl, the same equaled ostentatious display of Cash's talent. Darl believes that Cash is showing off his carpentry skills. Similarly Anse doesn't see anything wrong with his desire to get a new set of teeth. He considers it his right to have both since he needs them. Anse had always been a lethargic parasite who was using his sons for money and nothing else. But he did not consider this wrong either. He firmly believed and convinced everyone too that if he ever worked in the sun again, he might die. Even though Addie is resentful of his actions, there is little she can do. Everyone in the story considers themselves and their actions 'right' in their own way. But since their sense of righteousness is flawed, their plans fall apart and the ending is quite disastrous as Howe explains: "When they reach town, the putrescent corpse is buried, the daughter fails in her effort to get an abortion, one son is badly injured, another has gone mad, and at the very end, in a stroke of harsh comedy, the father suddenly remarries" (138).

Addie and Cora represent two different versions of right. For Cora faith is on lips all the time and she expresses righteousness through words, for Addie, actions are more important and thus she appears vain compared to Cora but has a deeper and more accurate sense of right and wrong. While Cora appears with utterances such as "I trust in my God and my reward" (70) and "Riches is nothing in the face of the Lord, for He can see into the heart." (7) Addie is not interested in this lip service and for her words are hollow expression of faith while actions are what really count. She says, "people to whom sin is just a matter of words, to them salvation is just words too." (168).