WILLIAM FAULKNER AND GEORGE WASHINGTON HARRIS

WILLIAM FAULKNER AND GEORGE WASHINGTON HARRIS: FRONTIER HUMOR IN THE SNOPES TRILOGY

by Hugh M. Stilley

B.A., University of Southern California, 196l

A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF

MASTER OF ARTS in the Department

of Engli sh

We accept this thesis as conforming to the required standard

THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA October, I964

In p r e s e n t i n g t h i s t h e s i s i n p a r t i a l f u l f i l m e n t o f

the r e q u i r e m e n t s f o r an advanced degree a t t h e U n i v e r s i t y o f

B r i t i s h C o l u m b i a , I a g r e e t h a t t h e L i b r a r y s h a l l make i t f r e e l y

a v a i l a b l e f o r r e f e r e n c e and s t u d y . I f u r t h e r a g r e e t h a t p e r

m i s s i o n f o r e x t e n s i v e c o p y i n g o f t h i s t h e s i s f o r s c h o l a r l y

p u r p o s e s may be g r a n t e d by t h e Head o f my Department o r by

h i s r e p r e s e n t a t i v e s , , I t i s u n d e r s t o o d t h a t c o p y i n g o r p u b l i

c a t i o n o f t h i s t h e s i s f o r f i n a n c i a l g a i n s h a l l not be a l l o w e d

w i t h o u t my w r i t t e n p e r m i s s i o n .

Department o f E n g l i s h

The U n i v e r s i t y o f B r i t i s h Columbia Vancouver 8, Canada

Date S e p t e m b e r 3. 1965.

ABSTRACT

The influence of the p r e - C i v i l War Southwestern humorists

on the work of William Faulkner has long been hypothesized.

But i t has received scant c r i t i c a l attention, much of i t

erroneous or so general as to be almost meaningless. While

Faulkner's t o t a l v i s i o n i s more than merely humorous, humor

is a s i g n i f i c a n t part of that v i s i o n . And the importance of

f r o n t i e r humor to Faulkner's art i s further substantiated by

the fact that many of his grotesque passages derive from e l e

ments of t h i s humor.

Frontier humor flourished from I83O to I860, and while

a large group of men then flooded American newspapers with

contributions, i t now survives in anthologies and the book-

length c o l l e c t i o n s of i t s most prominent writers — Augustus

Baldwin Longstreet, Joseph Glover Baldwin, Johnson Jones

Hooper, William Tappan Thompson, Thomas Bangs Thorpe, and

George Washington H a r r i s . Their writings i l l u s t r a t e the

genre's growth from mere regionalism in eighteenth century

d i c t i o n to the robust and masculine humor in the frontiersman's

own language.

Harris i s the best of these humorists because he has a

better sense of incongruity and consistently t e l l s his stories

in the earthy vernacular of the frontiersman; and Faulkner

himself admires Sut Lovingood, p r i n c i p l e character-cum-raconteur

of Harris's best work. Therefore, in th i s thesis I focus on

i i

Harris's Sut Lovingood in re l a t i o n to the Snopes t r i l o g y of

Faulkner — h i s longest u n i f i e d work and a "chronicle* 1 of

Yoknapatawpha County with much f r o n t i e r humor in i t .

A major p a r a l l e l between Faulkner and Harris i s t h e i r

similar use of the story-within-a-story device and t h e i r

similar technical rendering of the highly f i g u r a t i v e and

even in Harris's time somewhat s t y l i z e d language of the

f r o n t i e r . Their common Southern heritage and the lack of

change in the post-bellum Southern backwoodsman conduces to

a similar m i l i e u . Harris's and Faulkner's recurrent theme

of r e t r i b u t i o n derives from the frontiersman's individualism

and from his concern for at least the rudiments of society.

Both authors create a large number of f r o n t i e r characters; at

and t h e i r p r i n c i p l e f r o n t i e r characters are at once superb

story t e l l e r s and epitomize the best ideals of the American

f r o n t i e r .

The purpose of th i s thesis, then, i s to examine the ways

in which Faulkner p a r a l l e l s Harris's f r o n t i e r humor. Having

established Harris as the best writer in his group, I discuss

the two authors' structures and techniques, t h e i r milieus and

themes, and t h e i r characters. The t r i l o g y ' s s i m i l a r i t i e s with

and deviations from Harris's Sut Lovingood help to illuminate

Faulkner's a r t i s t r y as well as to suggest the strength of

Harris's influence on Faulkner.

i i i

T a b l e of Co n t e n t s

Page

I I n t r o d u c t i o n 1

I I S o uthwestern Humor 11

I I I S t r u c t u r e and Technique 35

IV M i l i e u and Theme 72

V C h a r a c t e r 111

B i b l i o g r a p h y 149

I. Introduction

In his novels there i s ample evidence that Faulkner i s

well-acquainted with Southwestern humor in general. As early

as 1927, in Mosquitoes, his admiration for t h i s humor i s at

least t h e o r e t i c a l l y revealed in the words of F a i r c h i l d , who,

having t o l d a story about swamp-bred 'half-horse h a l f - a l l i g a

t o r s , ' explains to a foreigner:

We're a simple people, we Americans, kind of c h i l d - l i k e and hearty. And you've got to be both to cross a horse and an a l l i g a t o r and then f i n d some use for him. That's part of our national temperament.*

Faulkner's l a t e r reply to an interviewer, "I was born in 2

1826 of a Negro slave and an alligator...** may indicate an

even closer knowledge of the t a l l - t a l e species (for example,

the legends of Mike Fink and Davy Crockett), a branch of the

larger genre, f r o n t i e r or Southwestern humor.

That Faulkner has been influenced by the e a r l i e r humor

i s obvious. But to what extent this i s a " l i t e r a r y influence**

per se i s almost impossible to determine. The humorists of

the old Southwest depended on the oral t r a d i t i o n as well as

on t h e i r keen perception of f r o n t i e r events f o r t h e i r material.

The s i m i l a r i t y of th e i r f r o n t i e r and Faulkner's i s attested

by C e c i l D. Eby: [The] conditions and scenes described by the humorists p e r s i s t s t i l l , and the up-country domain of the piny-woods and the red-neck i n Faulkner's As I Lay Dying and The Hamlet would

2

s t i l l be r e c o g n i z a b l e t o a r e s u r r e c t e d Joseph B. B a l d w i n o r a Johnson Hooper.3

And John C u l l e n n o t e s the p e r s i s t e n c e of the o r a l t r a d i t i o n

i n N o r t h e r n M i s s i s s i p p i :

In t h i s c o u n t r y t h e r e i e a k i n d of s a l t y , down-t o - e a r t h f o l k humor based on t a l l t a l e s and understatement and o l d f r o n t i e r s o u t h e r n c h a r a c t e r . Because L a f a y e t t e County has remained so r u r a l as i t has, the e l e m e n t a l f r o n t i e r American c h a r a c t e r has been p r e s e r v e d more than i n most o t h e r s e c t i o n s of the c o u n t r y and the South....4

F u r t h e r , he comments on F a u l k n e r ' s remarkable s e n s i t i v i t y t o

l o c a l e v e n t s :

[ F a u l k n e r ] seems t o have remembered every o l d wartime s t o r y , every n o t o r i o u s and u n u s u a l c h a r a c t e r i n L a f a y e t t e County, every c a s u a l remark, and a l l the g o s s i p of a community. He has had the a b i l i t y and the keen mind t o look and l i s t e n , and t o use the most unu s u a l and i n t e r e s t i n g e v e n ts i n L a f a y e t t e County h i s t o r y and l i f e . 5

F a u l k n e r ' s m a t e r i a l , t h e n , i s s i m i l a r t o t h a t of t h e S o u t h

western h u m o r i s t s , and he i s e q u a l l y s e n s i t i v e t o i t . These

s i m i l a r i t i e s , p l u s the s t a s i s of the South i n g e n e r a l , and

N o r t h e r n M i s s i s s i p p i i n p a r t i c u l a r , might, then c o n t r i b u t e

t o the w r i t i n g of s i m i l a r s t o r i e s . Thus, a common h e r i t a g e

p a r t l y q u a l i f i e s the " l i t e r a r y i n f l u e n c e . "

The s i m i l a r i t y of much of F a u l k n e r ' s humor t o Southwestern

humor i n g e n e r a l i s o f t e n n o t e d , but r a r e l y examined. In f a c t ,

few c r i t i c s attempt more than a l i p - t r i b u t e t o F a u l k n e r as a

h u m o r i s t . Those who do d e a l w i t h h i s humor g e n e r a l l y p r e f e r

t o examine F a u l k n e r ' s more g r o t e s q u e i n c i d e n t s i n c o n j u n c t i o n

w i t h t h e i r own p r e d i l e c t i o n s f o r some 'ism' o r a n o t h e r . While

3

these rather esoteric treatments may conform to the tone of

much Faulkner c r i t i c i s m , a more basic point has been glossed

over — Faulkner's debt to Southern regionalism i s at least

one basis for his humor. This i s not to say that he, l i k e

many of his predecessors in the South, i s a mere chronicler.

In fact i t i s Faulkner's range of humor that often leads

c r i t i c s astray. By devoting t h e i r energies to the extremes

of Faulkner's humor and by p a r t i a l l y or wholly ignoring the

more domestic, the more American roots of Faulkner's humor,

c r i t i c s have often enlarged rather than diminished the popular

misconception of Faulkner's perverse abstruseness. In a recent

c r i t i c ' s opinion:

One problem to be faced in dealing with the extensive and varied writings of the author [Faulkner] i s the mass of commentary from the past, much of i t obsessively wrong-headed; ... one of the most persistent forms of carping has been the assertion that the work i s obscure, d i f f i c u l t , p r o l i x , extravagant, or needlessly redundant. Worst of a l l i s the suspicion that he did i t a l l on purpose. ...Part of Faulkner's p r o l i x i t y can be put down to temperament, and th i s does him no d i s c r e d i t . Temperament i s one aspect of genius. Another aspect of such genius strongly aware of complexity i s that i t creates and uses ways of seeing and knowing which pedantry has not yet c l a s s i f i e d . 0

And "pedantry," in i t s zeal to c l a s s i f y Faulkner's humor,

largely overlooks the extent to which i t can be related to

f r o n t i e r humor — a comparison not as esoteric as that to

surrealism, but one perhaps more germane to Faulkner's back

ground.

4

Of the c r i t i c s who have written book-length studies of

Faulkner, Mary Cooper Robb and Lawrence Thompson are two who

most consistently mislead in t h e i r comments on Faulkner's

humor in general and more s p e c i f i c a l l y , on The Hamlet, per

haps Faulkner's greatest extended work in the t r a d i t i o n of

regional humor. Miss Eobb, f o r instance, has d i f f i c u l t y

recognizing the i n t e r - r e l a t i o n s h i p of the elements of f r o n t i e r

humor — land, language, and people: "The humor [ i n Faulkner's

s t o r i e s ] does not l i e in the words themselves, but in the 7

characters and the situations i n which they are involved."

S i m i l a r l y , i n asserting Faulkner's a b i l i t y to delineate

character and forg e t t i n g such type characters as Mrs. T u l l

in The Hamlet and old Het in The Town, she again generalizes:

"there i s no character who i s present in a book just to supply

a laugh. Hone i s a caricature.™

Mr. Thompson writes with more assurance than c r i t i c a l

acumen or appreciation of Southwestern humor. Indeed, he 9

finds that "the entire action of The Mansion i s boring," and

that "throughout most of The Hamlet. Faulkner deliberately

descends to low comedy."*^ In a rather obvious attempt to

be more c o l o r f u l than judicious, Thompson pronounces that

Faulkner's "revisions [of the short stories incorporated in

The Hamlet] would seem to have been performed with a caval i e r

l a z i n e s s . . . . " * * These c r i t i c a l remarks, chosen for t h e i r very

ineptitude, reveal the uneven results of c r i t i c s who examine

the whole of the Faulkner canon.

5

More accomplished c r i t i c s tend towards greater caution.

Neither Irving Howe nor Cleanth Brooks neglects anything of

major importance and both show genuine insight into those

aspects of Faulkner they especially admire. Otherwise, they

describe rather than examine Faulkner's work. Howe, for

instance, says: "The talk [of The Hamlet] i s superb — r i c h l y

idiomatic, v i r i l e , brimming with high humor,** and the book

i t s e l f i s " d i s t i n c t l y American in idiom and observation, 12

heavily sprinkled with the sa l t of folk humor....** But he

does not draw any s p e c i f i c p a r a l l e l to the language of fol k

humor, cer t a i n l y a major element of that genre. That i s , he

reveals his appreciation of the regional humor in The Hamlet.

but almost ignores the s p e c i f i c elements of thi s humor. And

in concluding his chapter on t h i s novel, he confesses the hardships of any c r i t i c a l examination of humor:

Of a l l the l i t e r a r y modes, humor i s notoriously the most i n d i f f e r e n t to c r i t i c a l inspection, and in the end there i s l i t t l e to do but point and appreciate. Confronted with Faulkner's marvels the c r i t i c must f e e l that his task, though not irr e l e v a n t , i s a l l but hopeless; and may wish to cry out with the judge in the novel, "I can't stand no more. I won't! This court's adjourned. Adjourned! x3

Cleanth Brooks also notes the presence of f r o n t i e r humor:

"...the tone of The Hamlet i s a compound of irony and wonder...

The i r o n i c element frequently takes the form of a kind of folk

humor, and the wonder tends towards the mythic extravagance

of the t a l l - t a l e t r a d i t i o n . " 1 ^ But he prefers to discuss the

elements of thi s humor in terms, of p a r a l l e l s in English

6

l i t e r a t u r e , rather than those of American o r i g i n . Faulkner's

emphasis on the people, the land, and the things in t h i s land,

a l l common to Southern regional humor, are discussed thus:

Faulkner's pastoral mode i s , of course, more earthy and violent than Wordsworth's, and Faulkner's pastoral scene i s , much more than Wordsworth's, consciously set off from the dominant urban culture of i t s time. ...Faulkner has s t y l i z e d and formalized his world of Frenchman's Bend almost as much as Jonathan Swift s t y l i z e d and formalized the country of L i l l i p u t , but again l i k e Swift, he has rendered i t in almost microscopic detail.15

And however much more i n s i g h t f u l i t may seem to compare

Faulkner's "pastoral mode1* and "microscopic d e t a i l " with the

writings of Wordsworth and Swift than with the writings of

Faulkner's Southern predecessors — say, those of George

Washington Harris, for example — Brooks' comparison con

notes an influence for which there i s l i t t l e evidence. This

i s not to say that Faulkner could not have been influenced

by the romantic poets or by Swift; rather, that i n these

s p e c i f i c aspects of Faulkner's work, i t i s far more l i k e l y

that he was influenced by the regional humorists of h i s own

background.

Certainly, as a Southern writer, Faulkner could be

expected to have read Southern works with special attention.

And however much he might have known other writers in the

genre of Southwestern humor, he does comment favorably on

one writer i n p a r t i c u l a r — George Washington Harris. Faulkner

s a i d :

7

And then I l i k e Sut Lovingood from a book written by George Harris about I84O or '50 in the Tennessee Mountains. He had no i l l u s i o n s about himself, did the best he could; at certain times he was a coward and knew i t and wasn't ashamed; he never blamed his misfortunes on anyone and never cursed God for them.16

Here, as elsewhere, Faulkner reduces the a n a l y t i c a l c r i t e r i a

of l i t e r a t u r e to what was most important to him — the appraisal

of character. And, while perhaps i t i s in terms of character

that Faulkner was most influenced, there are other reasons

than the character of Sut Lovingood f o r Faulkner to have

admired Harris, just as there are other s i m i l a r i t i e s i n

t h e i r works.

Further, i t i s not unlikely that Faulkner knew some of

the lesser writers in th i s t r a d i t i o n . The inadequacy of the

scholarship which examines Faulkner's humor i n r e l a t i o n to

that of the regional humorists of the South indicates at least

two things: Faulkner's stature as a l i t e r a r y a r t i s t , and his

range as a humorist. This same inadequacy may also indicate

the tendency of Faulknerian c r i t i c i s m to emphasize the

e s o t e r i c . S t i l l , Faulkner's humor i s but a small part of his

entire v i s i o n , and his Southwestern humor i s an even more

minute part of that v i s i o n ; but the humor of the regional

t r a d i t i o n sets the tone for some of Faulkner's major works.

To be sure, Faulkner i s a figure of f a r greater l i t e r a r y

s i g nificance than the Southwestern humorists, and he would

be acclaimed as a genius had he never written a l i n e of humor.

However, his humor does enlarge h i s immense stature as an

8

a r t i s t ; and his acknowledgment of his close acquaintance

with Sat Lovingood. the culminating work of the ante-bellum

Southern humorists, i s noteworthy because much of Faulkner's

best humor derives from the early American t r a d i t i o n of

f r o n t i e r humor*

In this t h e sis, for the purposes of examining Faulkner's

connection with Southwestern humor, I focus on Faulkner's

Snopes t r i l o g y and Harris's Sut Lovingood. While Faulkner

uses f r o n t i e r humor sporadically throughout his canon (from

Mosquitoes to The Reivers), the Snopes t r i l o g y contains some

of Faulkner's best f r o n t i e r humor. Because i t i s a work uni

f i e d by character and event, the t r i l o g y i t s e l f helps to

unify and l i m i t the study. And, as a lengthy work, written

over a period of years, the t r i l o g y , for range of vision and

expression, i s u n r i v a l l e d by any of Faulkner's single novels.

The work contains both t r a g i c and humorous events; and the

humor in i t i s of s i m i l a r l y wide range. Indeed, wit, s a t i r e ,

irony, and both modern and f r o n t i e r humor exist side by side.

Moreover, many grotesque passages in the work derive from

Faulkner's emphasis on single aspects of f r o n t i e r humor. And

besides containing Faulkner's most lengthy and intimate study

of the Southern backwoodsman, the t r i l o g y affords a good cross-

section of Faulkner's generic range because each novel contains

revised short s t o r i e s . Thus, the t r i l o g y , i t s e l f a u n i f i e d

work of art, excels Faulkner's other works i n range of humor,

range of tone, and range of genre.

9

Sut Lovingood deserves our attention for at least two

reasons: Faulkner himself admires Harris's central character,

and the book i s the best and the culminating work of ante

bellum Southwestern humor* This i s not to say that Faulkner

was influenced only by Harris's Sut Lovingood: rather, the

connection between Faulkner's t r i l o g y and the genre of South

western humor i s most v i v i d l y i l l u s t r a t e d by reference to

p a r a l l e l s in Harris's work. S t i l l , while Faulkner's statement

perhaps substantiates t h i s p a r t i c u l a r influence, an under

standing of the genre and the r e l a t i o n of Sut Lovingood to

that genre w i l l serve to point out the elements of f r o n t i e r

humor, to indicate why Harris was the most successful of t h i s

group, and to suggest the scope of possible sources for

Faulkner's f r o n t i e r humor. This background material, then,

w i l l provide the knowledge necessary for an analysis of

Faulkner's rel a t i o n s h i p to these f r o n t i e r humorists — an

analysis that illuminates many p a r a l l e l s between Harris's

and Faulkner's works. Although Faulkner i s Harris's superior

in a l l a r t i s t i c matters, t h e i r s i m i l a r i t i e s in matters of

structure, technique, theme, milieu, and characterization

points towards Harris's influence on Faulkner. As Faulkner

i s a r t i s t i c a l l y superior to Harris, Harris's work, in terms

of f r o n t i e r humor, i s a r t i s t i c a l l y superior to those of the

other Southwestern humorists.

10

FOOTNOTES: CHAPTER I.

H f i l l i a m Faulkner, Mosquitoes (New York, 1962), p. 57.

2 Carvel C o l l i n s , "Faulkner and Certain E a r l i e r Southern

F i c t i o n , " College English. XVI (November, 1954), P- 94«

^ C e c i l D. Eby, "Faulkner and the Southwestern Humorists," Shenandoah. XI (1959), 14.

^John B. Cullen, in collaboration with Floyd Watkins, Old Times in the Faulkner Country (Chapel H i l l , 1961), p. 130.

$ I b i d . . p. 62.

^John Lewis Longley, J r . , The Tragic Mask: A Study of Faulkner's Heroes (Chapel H i l l , 1963), pp. 16-17.

7 Mary Cooper Robb, William Faulkner: An Estimate of his

Contribution to the American Novel (Pittsburgh. 1963). P. 29. 8 I b i d . , p. 32. 0 'Lawrence Thompson, William Faulkner: An Introduction

and Interpretation (New York,1 9 6 3 ) , p. 14.

1 0 I b i d . . p. 135. My i t a l i c s . 1 1 I b i d . 1 2 I r v i n g Howe, William Faulkner: A C r i t i c a l Study (New

York, 1962), p. 251.

1 3 I b i d . . p. 252.

^ C l e a n t h Brooks, William Faulkner: The Yoknapatawpha County r (New Haven, 1963), p. 175.

1 5 I b i d . , p. 176.

l 6 J e a n Stein, "William Faulkner: An Interview," in William Faulkner: Three Decades of C r i t i c i s m , eds. Frederick J . Hoffman and Olga W. Vickery (New York, 1963), p. 79.

11

I I . Southwestern Humor

Southern regional humor and "Down East" humor became

d i s t i n c t from one another in the early decades of the nine

teenth century. Together, they comprise an American humor,

and t h e i r simultaneous b i r t h in p r i n t attests Americans*

growing awareness of t h e i r p e c u l i a r i t i e s both as Americans

(in contrast to Europeans) and as members of s p e c i f i c

regions (in contrast to other regions of America). This i s

not to say that Americans were not humorous in the preceding

centuries, nor i s i t to assert that regional differences were

not noted i n the e a r l i e r eras. In fact, exaggerating and

emphasizing the p e c u l i a r i t i e s of l i f e , speech, and character

in the new world was a salient aspect of a self-conscious

eighteenth century America. A s t r i k i n g example, though not

the f i r s t , * i s the song, "Yankee Doodle."

The Revolutionary War, i t appears, f i r s t made Americans in general acquainted with t h e i r national p e c u l i a r i t i e s , and the B r i t i s h invaders evidently deserve credit f o r the discovery. The term, "Yankee," in widespread use to denote an. American dates back to about 1775, when i t was employed by invaders as a term of deri s i o n . "Yankee Doodle," a r o l l i c k i n g song which mysteriously emerged from the c o n f l i c t and became less of d e r i s i v e portrayal as the Yankees themselves perversely adopted i t , caught several q u a l i t i e s of the r u s t i c New Englander.... [The] d e t a i l s of a sketchy p o r t r a i t are made be l i e v able partly because i t i s presented by the Yankee himself with a number of lapses into homely dialect.2

Americans* perception and l i t e r a r y representation of the

d e t a i l s of t h e i r l i f e continued into the nineteenth century;

12

the accretion of these distinguishing, i n d i v i d u a l i z i n g

d e t a i l s f i n a l l y resulted i n an American humor, a humor

indigenous to America.

When the indi v i d u a l uses common or t r a d i t i o n a l materials and does something indubitably his own with them, we c a l l t h i s genius. When the achievement i s that of a people we are j u s t i f i e d . . . i n using the same word with the implication of fresh creative energy which i t c a r r i e s . Whatever the common base, something incontestibly our own has been expressed in that highly mixed aggregation which we c a l l American humor. Twists have been given, strong colors added....3

In part, American humor arises from attempts to define America

and Americans, f i r s t for the parent countries of Europe and,

la t e r , for Americans themselves. And perhaps regional humor

in the largest sense demands a foreign audience, an audience

which i s not f a m i l i a r with the i n t r i c a c i e s of l i f e in the

region. Should t h i s audience be unsympathetic to the region,

the native*s assertion of a perverse pride in the p e c u l i a r i t i e s

of his region can transform haughty scorn to an embarrassed

in c r e d u l i t y and magnify the importance of the area by asserting

the superiority of i t s values over those of the would-be c r i t i c s .

This c o n f l i c t of values i s one incongruity at the heart of

American humor. It i s manifested in the cases of Americans

in contrast to the B r i t i s h and of Southerners i n contrast to

Northerners. And as the Southwestern f r o n t i e r was i t s e l f

comprised of microcosmic s o c i e t i e s , often antagonistic to

one another, a s i m i l a r contrast must have existed on the

f r o n t i e r i t s e l f . ^

13

From th i s i s o l a t e d and sparsely s e t t l e d country emerged

a group of Southwestern humorists. Among those who have 5

achieved l i t e r a r y s i gnificance are Augustus Baldwin Longstreet,

Joseph Glover Baldwin, Johnson Jones Hooper, William Tappan

Thompson, Thomas Bangs Thorpe, and George Washington Harris.

To some extent, the growth of Southern humor i s revealed in

t h e i r works. However, chronological arrangement cannot be

considered very precise because much of these humorists'

material o r i g i n a l l y derived from the pervasive oral t r a d i t i o n

and appeared in newspapers before i t was c o l l e c t e d . ^ S t i l l ,

a pattern of growth can be detected. Not without exception,

then, this l i t e r a t u r e through the pre-war decades moves towards

greater i n d i v i d u a l i t y in character, more precise descriptions,

and more and fa s t e r action i n the s t o r i e s . An apparent acceptance

by l a t e r authors of f r o n t i e r values, such as speed, strength

and cunning results in fewer squeamish apologies and tiresome

moralizing. That i s , where Harris asserts his region's values,

Longstreet apologizes for them, but both authors recognize

them. Perhaps the most important tendencies of the genre's

development are the increasing amount and quality of humorous

backwoods f i g u r a t i v e speech and more and more emphasis on

violence as an i n t e g r a l part of f r o n t i e r l i f e . The t r a d i t i o n

i s not devoid of these elements at i t s inception; rather, the

l a t e r authors become increasingly confident i n the humorous

p o s s i b i l i t i e s of these elements. The t r a d i t i o n grows, then,

from what might be loosely characterized as an essay tone to

wards one more highly f i c t i o n a l , more highly anecdotal and o r a l .

1 4

As might be expected, Augustus Baldwin Longstreet*s

Georgia Scenes (I835), a seminal book in the t r a d i t i o n ,

r e f l e c t s a connection between the eighteenth century essay

and the humor that was yet to come. Perhaps the most widely

reprinted of the episodes in t h i s work i s "The Horse Swap,"

which i s notable among his episodes for i t s lack of polished

d i c t i o n . But at the height of t h i s t a l e , when the two horse

traders discover the f a u l t s of the horses they acquired in

the trade, Longstreet describes the situation in the abstract

rather than in concrete d e t a i l . "The p r e v a i l i n g f e e l i n g . . .

was that of mirth. The laugh became loud and general at the

old man's expense and r u s t i c witticisms were l i b e r a l l y be-7

stowed upon him and his late purchase." This i s the pre

v a i l i n g tone of the language in Longstreet*s work. His

interpretation of f r o n t i e r language often incorporates the

ungrammatical d i a l e c t , but lacks the f i g u r a t i v e language of

the l a t e r humorists. The juxtaposition of the l i t e r a r y

language and that of the f r o n t i e r i s incongruous, and t h i s

incongruity can be used to humorous ends; but Longstreet*s

pr e d i l e c t i o n to comment on the action of the story i s usually

a tiresome hindrance to the progress of events. The old

man's son t e l l s Blossom, the f l e e c e r , that the horse he now

owns i s both b l i n d and deaf. The boy continues: "Yes, dod drot my soul i f he e i n ' t I You walk him and see i f he e i n ' t . His eyes don't look l i k e i t ; but he'd l i s t as leve go agin the house with you...." The laughs was now turned on Blossom, and many rushed to test

15

the f i d e l i t y of the l i t t l e boy's report. A few experiments established i t s truth beyond controversy.8

Whether consciously or unconsciously, in "An Interesting

Interview," Longstreet does achieve a humorous effect from

the incongruity of these two languages. The opening para

graph of a story of two drunken farmers contains h i s thoughts

on drunkenness in such a sober tone that the reader may ques

t i o n Longstreet's in t e n t .

I hope the day i s not f a r distant when drunkenness w i l l be unknown i n our highly favored country. The moral world i s r i s i n g in i t s strength against the all-destroying vice...*?

He proceeds to describe the two farmers:

Tobias was just c l e a r l y on the wrong side of the l i n e which divides drunk from sober, but Hardy was "r o y a l l y corned" (but not f a l l i n g ) a . a 1

This i s f a r more humorous than the use of r u s t i c language

above because the tones, the p r e v a i l i n g emotions of the juxta

posed languages, are diametrically opposed, while the l i t t l e

boy's speech i s merely ungrammatical and i s included more in

the s p i r i t of a fa c t u a l report than that of the best f r o n t i e r

humor, in which f r o n t i e r speech i s exaggerated into a homely

sort of poetry. But as an early humorist of the f r o n t i e r ,

Longstreet catches as much of the f l a v o r of the expanding

west as his st y l e permits. He t e l l s of a violent f i g h t

between the "two best men i n the county which in the Georgia

vocabulary means they could f l o g any other two men in the

county."** But at the end of this episode he apologetically

16

moralizes thus: "Thanks be to the Christian r e l i g i o n , to

schools, •••such scenes of barbarism and cruelty...are now

of rare occurrence••.Wherever they p r e v a i l they are a d i s -12

grace to that community...."

At his worst as a f r o n t i e r humorist, Longstreet descends

to the depths of eighteenth century m o r a l i z i n g . ^ But at h i s

best, Longstreet i s a f a i t h f u l reporter of the re a l language

of the frontiersman, albeit sometimes a rather squeamish

one, 1^ and a writer keenly aware of the ironies of comic

re v e r s a l . His h i s t o r i c a l value l i e s in the fact that he was

one of the e a r l i e s t f r o n t i e r humorists, and his best stories

— admirable f o r t h e i r comedy, i f not comprised of the best

elements of f r o n t i e r humor are among the best i n the genre. 15

But Joseph Glover Baldwin's Flush Times in Alabama '

(1854), a much l a t e r work, while entertaining as a sketch of

the times, contains very l i t t l e f r o n t i e r humor. In f a c t , one

c r i t i c finds Baldwin's work to be even more that of an

essayist than Longstreet in Georgia Scenes.^ Baldwin's

humor i s often more i n t e l l e c t u a l and sophisticated than that

of h i s predecessors'. For instance, Baldwin says of Cave

Burton's f a v o r i t e story: Ho mortal man had ever heard the end of t h i s story: l i k e Coleridge's s o l i l o q u i e s , i t branched out with innumerable suggestions, each i n i t s turn the parent of others, and these again breeding a new spawn, so that the further he t r a v e l l e d the less he went on. 17

17

But Baldwin was capable of writing f r o n t i e r humor, even of

the quality that was published in The S p i r i t of the Times.

In Flush Times, more nearly a chronicle than the other works

in the genre, Baldwin occasionally writes of the f r o n t i e r

in a comic mixture of f r o n t i e r language and p l a i n prose.

When he relates the threat of a verbal bully to his lesser

r i v a l , Baldwin describes the bully as:

...regretting that he did not have the chance of blowing a hole through his carcass with h i s 'Derringer* that 'a bull-bat could f l y through without tetching airy wing,* and giving him his solemn word of honor that i f he, (Sam) would only f i g h t him, (Jonas), he, (Jonas) wouldn't h i t him, (Sam), an inch above his hip bone — which was c e r t a i n l y encouraging.^

But the prevalent tone i n his book i s far too i n t e l l e c t u a l

to be classed in any but the broadest d e f i n i t i o n of f r o n t i e r

humor -- a humor which becomes more pure as i t approaches

the o r a l humor of the frontiersman himself. Although the

frontiersmen of the South would enjoy the hyperboles, par

t i c u l a r l y the understatement, he certainly would not consciously

toy with figures in t h i s manner:

This distinguished lawyer, unlike the majority of those favored subjects of the biographical muse, whom a p a t r i o t i c ambition to add to the moral treasures of the country, has prevailed on, over the i n s t i n c t s of a native and prof e s s i o n a l modesty, to supply subjects for the pens and pencils of t h e i r friends, was not quite, either in a l i t e r a l or metaphorical sense, a self-made man. He had ancestors. "

Much of Baldwin's Flush Times f a l l s into the c l a s s i f i c a t i o n

of f r o n t i e r humor, then, only because i t i s about the f r o n t i e r ,

and not because i t i s the f r o n t i e r .

18

And the most p r i s t i n e f r o n t i e r humor is. t n e South. That

i s , the elements of the f r o n t i e r are ubiquitous within the

s t o r i e s . To compare Longstreet and Baldwin with Johnson Jones

Hooper i s to f i n d a pattern of development towards a l i t e r a r y

realism that tends to fuse the frontiersman and his speech

with the things he knows into a humor which he himself would

accept. P a r t i a l l y derived from an oral t r a d i t i o n fostered

by the men on the f r o n t i e r , the essence of f r o n t i e r humor

seems to be within the characters' speech. Three, i f not

more, developments to be seen i n Hooper's masterpiece, Simon

Suggs (1845), apparently conduced to increase the amount of

t h i s language. These developments are: Hooper's intensive

treatment of one cla s s , the southern poor white; his inven

tion of a strong central character, Simon Suggs; and the

author's s t r i c t adherence to a theme of economic a c t i v i t y ,

implying, even necessitating the interaction of characters,

and this verbally, i f not in other ways. Hooper consistently

excels Longstreet and Baldwin i n comic plot and de t a i l e d

descriptions of f r o n t i e r l i f e , or perhaps more accurately,

what became the d e t a i l s of the stereotyped f r o n t i e r l i f e .

Hooper, unlike Longstreet, whose stated desire was to

write about "the manners, customs, amusements, wit, d i a l e c t ,

as they appear in a l l grades of society to an ear and eye 20

witness to them," sensed that i t was the middle group, not

the planter or slave, but the poor white which would provide

the best material f o r humor. An oddity i n himself, fettered

by poverty and freed by his color, t h i s frontiersman became

19

the staple of successive f r o n t i e r humorists. Further, Hooper's

characters speak more and speak more t y p i c a l l y the speech of

f r o n t i e r humor than those of Longstreet or Baldwin. F i n a l l y ,

while those humorists have no strong central character in

t h e i r episodes. Hooper has a very strong, although not neces

s a r i l y consistent character, Simon Suggs — a scoundrel of

the f i r s t order.

Having cheated his father at cards for a horse and con

cealing with tobacco the pinch of gun powder he l e f t in his

mother's pipe bowl, Simon leaves home to make his way to

Atlanta. He l i v e s up to his motto, " I t i s good to be s h i f t y 2 1

i n a new country," by actually disappearing f o r twenty

years during which time he perfects himself in the art of

l i v i n g "as merrily and as comfortably as possible at the 22

expense of others...." Thus, Simon i s a mature and experienced

scoundrel for most of the book. His talents are c h i e f l y those

of preying on those weaknesses of human nature which are

heightened by the abnormalities of f r o n t i e r l i f e , and he

would more than l i k e l y perish in any other society. That

i s , Simon's exploits are those of f r o n t i e r scoundrels. He

i s " s h i f t y " in both senses of the word. He i s a dishonest

wanderer, a fortune-seeking picaro, a figure common to much

f r o n t i e r humor. To f i n d the American picaro we must follow the American pioneer; the f r o n t i e r i s the natural habitat of the adventurer. The q u a l i t i e s fostered by the f r o n t i e r were the q u a l i t i e s indispensable to the picaro: nomadism, i n s e n s i b i l i t y to danger, shrewdness, nonchalance, gaity. 2 3

20

While Davy Crockett or Mike Fink might have a l l of these

q u a l i t i e s , Simon most decidedly does not. Rather, h i s

inordinate shrewdness and self-concern leads him to be

extremely sensitive to the remotest p o s s i b i l i t y of danger.

His nomadism i s therefore not that of the adventurer but

that of a man f l e e i n g pursuit. And his gaiety i s short

l i v e d and without depth. He i s reported to be a r e v e l l e r ,

but the reader rarely sees t h i s aspect of him. What Simon's

fellows might take for nonchalance i s usually the detachment

of a man following the machinations of his scheming mind.

As Hooper*8 characterization of Simon serves to further

the development of the humorous f r o n t i e r picaro in l i t e r a t u r e ,

so does his use of language reveal his s k i l l f u l comic tech

nique. Here, as i n other aspects of f r o n t i e r humor per se.

Hooper proves to have far more genius than either Longstreet

or Baldwin. Like those humorists. Hooper uses a t h i r d person

point of view, but he can mix standard English and the

frontiersman's language for comic e f f e c t . For instance, when

he explains Simon's reasoning about f i n a n c i a l matters. Hooper

says, "As for those branches of the business [of land specula

t i o n ] , he [Simon] regarded them as only f i t for purse-proud

clod-heads. Any f o o l , he reasoned, could speculate i f he had 25 / money.™ But even more successful as f r o n t i e r humor (and

less frequent) i s Simon*s own speech. At his best. Hooper's o

manifest s e n s i t i v i t y to the incongruities of f r o n t i e r f i g u r a

t i v e language i s almost u n r i v a l l e d by his contemporaries.

21

For example, c a l l i n g for people to pray at a camp meeting

which he l a t e r b i l k s , Simon says, "Ante upl ...don't back

out! Here am J , the wickedest... of sinners...now come in on

narry p a i r and won a p i l e . ...the b l u f f game ain't played

herel ...Everybody holds four aces, and when you bet you

win!1* Even more c h a r a c t e r i s t i c of what becomes the s t y l i z e d

f i g u r a t i v e language of the best f r o n t i e r humor are references

to f r o n t i e r objects and animals. Simon, describing his

bravery as he gives his q u a l i f i c a t i o n s for leadership of the

motley "Tallapoosy Volluntares,*» uses just such an incongruous

but e f f e c t i v e s i m i l e : "Let who run [away from danger], gentle

men, Simon Suggs w i l l a l l e r s be found thar s t i c k i n g thar, l i k e 27

a t i c k onder a cow's b e l l y . " The incongruity of describing

bravery in terms of the stubborn tenacity of a t i c k provides

the humor — the juxtaposition of heroism and a blood-sucking

parasite may, indeed, serve to comment on Simon's character

as well. Further, Hooper, l i k e Longstreet and Baldwin, often

28 juxtaposes Latinate language and f r o n t i e r terminology for

humorous e f f e c t . Thus, Hooper writes, " I t was...an early

hour; in fact — speaking according to the chronometrical standard in use at Fort Suggs — not more than 'fust-drink

29 time....'" More often, however. Hooper achieves a less

masculine, less racy humor by going in the opposite d i r e c t i o n ,

from p l a i n prose to euphemised terms. "The widow Haycock

desired...a certain 'plug' of tobacco...to supply her pipe."

22

But, having gotten t h i s "plug*, she returns to Fort Suggs 30

"with the weed of comfort i n her hand." As these examples

might indicate. Hooper often uses the Incongruities of

language to effect f r o n t i e r humor and t h i s more purposefully

than Longstreet or Baldwin.

Hooper's repetitious theme of embezzlement enables him

to gain concrete and sometimes humorous examples of the poor 31

whites' independence and poverty. The frontiersman's s e l f -

reliance ( s p e c i f i c a l l y , his code's a r t i c l e which v i r t u a l l y

prohibited him from i n t e r f e r i n g with another man's business)

lends c r e d i b i l i t y to Simon's fraudulent escapades — escapades

which indicate the fast tempo of f r o n t i e r l i f e . Certainly,

the speed with which Simon turns any si t u a t i o n to his advantage

and the rapid transference of money in his deals tend to give

Hooper's stories the tone of more and faster action that the

s t o r i e s of Longstreet and Baldwin.

In Simon Suggs. Hooper, through the creation of his

picaresque hero, h i s regionalism, and his stories of action,

combines many elements of the best f r o n t i e r humor. His work

lacks but one element of the best f r o n t i e r humor -- the

frontiersman's narration. Perhaps Hooper i n t u i t i v e l y recog

nizes the real source of the autocthonic American and the

most laughable humor in his book, when he laments the inadequacy

of his own pen for the task of recording such a memorable

event as Simon's m i l i t a r y career. Hooper decides that u l t i

mately Simon would be his own best biographer: "Would that.

2 3

l i k e Caesar, he [Simon] could write himselft Then, indeed, 32 should Harvard y i e l d him honors, and his country — justice!""^

Indeed, the best and most p r i s t i n e f r o n t i e r humor i s ,

l i k e the r e a l "orature," t o l d by the frontiersman in his

inimitable speech. William Tappan Thompson, in Major Jones's

Courtship ( I 8 4 3 ) , thus uses the epistolary form. In t h i s

form — popularized by Seba Smith, the Northerner who created

Jack Downing i n the 1830*s — the central character unwittingly

characterizes himself. While Major Jones i s a believable

character and uses f r o n t i e r figures as a means of expression,

these l e t t e r s are about the domestic a f f a i r s i n s e t t l e d areas

and consequently lack the furious action common to the best

f r o n t i e r humor. In f a c t , B l a i r finds that " t h e i r greatest

merit may be...in t h e i r limning of P i n e v i l l e , • . . [ t h e ] depic-33

tion of community and domestic existence."*^ Thus, although

Jones's l e t t e r s perhaps describe l i f e in a Southern town more

than on the Southern f r o n t i e r , they may represent the humorists*

growing awareness of the comic value of the frontiersman's

character and language.

Certainly Thomas Bangs Thorpe, in his "The Big Bear of

Arkansas" (I841), focuses on the "Big Bar," a frontiersman

of the f i r s t order. In the story, a l i t e r a t e and interested

narrator reports h i s experience aboard a M i s s i s s i p p i steam

boat. This narration includes a verbatim story t o l d by the

"Big Bar" himself. At least as old as Chaucer*s Canterbury

Tales, t h i s narrative device, the mock oral tale (known also

24

as the framework narrative, story-within-a-story, and the

box-like structure), i s of immense value to the f r o n t i e r

humorists. Through i t s use they developed multifarious

lev e l s of i n c o n g r u i t y , 3 ^ long known to be the sine qua non

of comedy. But whatever humor arises from these incongruities,

the most important value of the mock o r a l tale in r e l a t i o n to

f r o n t i e r humor i s that i t provides for an abundant quantity

of humorous f r o n t i e r speech.

In Thorpe's story, the narrator describes the n B i g Bar,1*

**who walked into the cabin, took a chair, put his feet on the

stove, [and proceeded to extol the g l o r i e s of Arkansas] ...

the creation state,..*a state where the s i l e runs down to the

centre of the *arth...It*s a state without f a u l t , i t is.** 35

[And one passenger's retort] "Excepting mosquitoes,*"^ predi

cates the "Big Bar's" rambling comments on Arkansas mosquitoes.

Thus, the raconteur figure, the "Big Bar," continues to relate

short anecdotes about' h i s home state. The culminating yarn

i s about a mysterious, giant bear who, after successfully

eluding the "Big Bar" and his dogs for three years, submits

to his end by walking into the "Big Bar's" f i e l d s the day

before the "Big Bar" had vowed to hunt him. With the "Big

Bar's" reverent opinion (that this p a r t i c u l a r bear "was an

unhuntable bar, and died when hi s time come." ) ringing in

t h e i r ears, the whole group i s depicted by the o r i g i n a l

narrator. They s i t , s i l e n t l y contemplating the mysteries of

the story f o r a few moments before the "Big Bar" "asked a l l

25

present to • l i q u o r , 1 [and] long before day, I [the o r i g i n a l

narrator] was put ashore and...can only follow...in imagina-37

t i o n our Arkansas f r i e n d . . . . " ^

Indeed, the n B i g Bar** i s a memorable character. His

language, his manner, the attention of his auditors, and his

mysterious story r e f l e c t t h i s boisterous, fun-loving, super

s t i t i o u s braggart's character. Thorpe also sketches a scene

indigenous to the American f r o n t i e r — a cabin f u l l of men

who proudly d i s t o r t i n the i r own language the merits of l i f e

i n t h e i r regions. Thorpe portrays both character and scene

through the framework narrative. But "The Big Bear of Arkansas"

i s Thorpe at his best. In f a c t , B l a i r says, "Unfortunately

the t a l e i s not t y p i c a l of him. More often, he wrote passably good but e s s e n t i a l l y d u l l essays about various aspects of the

38 f r o n t i e r . . . . " J

George Washington Harris, however, uses the box-like

structure consistently; and thi s was at least a p a r t i a l reason

f o r h i s success. "He learned to employ the best method for

t e l l i n g a story..., making the most of the framework technique 39

f o r setting forth a mock oral tale."-' In the "Preface" to

Sut Lovingood. the t y p i c a l format of the best tales i n the

book i s established: 'You must have a preface, Sut; your book

w i l l then be ready. What s h a l l I write:' 'Well, i f I must, I must... Sometimes,

George I wished I could read and write just a l i t t l e . . . If I could write myself, i t would then r e a l l y been my book.*40

26

Thus, George, the writer, w i l l record Sut's tales as he t e l l s

them. Through the use of t h i s device, Harris consistently

bridges the gap between the printed page and the i l l i t e r a t e ,

h e l l - r a i s i n g backwoodsman.

Sut Lovingood d i f f e r s from the other figures examined

in t h i s chapter. His love of sheer d e v i l t r y and his very

human f o i b l e s separate him from Simon Suggs and the "Big Bar..1*

Sut's youth and i l l i t e r a c y separate him from Major Jones; and

no character in Longstreet»s or Baldwin's works approaches

the stature of Harris's-raconteur. Sut's down-to-earth p r a c t i

c a l i t y i s pervasive; and the subjects of his thoughts range

extensively — from s e x ^ (a topic almost foreign to the other

humorists) to writing a preface to a book. Sut finds the

l a t t e r to be:

...a l i t t l e l i k e c u t t i n of the Ten Commandments into the rind of a watermelon: i t ' s just slashed open and the inside et outen i t , the rind and the Commandments broke a l l to pieces and flung to the hogs and never thought of once't — them nor the tarnal f o o l what cut 'em there. (SL xxxi)

His human spitefulness and f r o n t i e r prejudices are revealed

in one c r i t i c ' s long l i s t of Sut's antipathies. These are:

"Yankee peddlars, Yankee lawyers, Yankee scissor-grinders,

any kind of Yankee, s h e r i f f s , most preachers, learned men

who use big words, tavern keepers who serve bad food and

reformers." Himself a reformer, Sut i s also a hick philosopher

and an ardent Southerner. Through his independence, he becomes

perhaps the epitome of Jacksonian democracy; and through his

insights, a vehicle for his creator's i d e a s . ^ As a prankster.

27

Sat i s often the catalyst that starts the riotous confusion

of h i 8 s t o r i e s ; and beyond whatever appeal his actions may

give him, Sut's language makes him more l i v e l y , more humanly

manscullne, and more humorous than any other character in the

genre*

The staple of humorous f r o n t i e r language i s the incon

gruity of hyperbolic figures; and generally, the humor of

these d i s t o r t i o n s i s proportionate to the contrast between

the object and the image. Harris's mastery of these incon

g r u i t i e s in t h i s speech i s perhaps the best in the genre.

Indeed, one c r i t i c finds, "If his [Harris's] writings were

better than the rest [of the f r o n t i e r humorists'], they were

better because he had more sense of incongruities, more

exuberance, more imagination...."^ In terms of incongruity

per se and the large number of f r o n t i e r figures i n his speech,

Sut Lovingood i s unrivaled. His description of S i c i l y Burns*s

bosom substantiates Harris's "sense of incongruities.** Sut

says, "Such a bosomt Just think of two snow b a l l s with a

strawberry stuck butt-ended into both on *em." (SL 3 5 ) And

in describing Bake Boyd*s suggestion that the Yankee razor-

grinder give public lectures, Sut uses an unusually large

number of f r o n t i e r figures — more than one i s l i k e l y to

f i n d in a whole story by Baldwin or Longstreet.

Bake dwelt long onto the crop of dimes to be gathered from the f i e l d [ l e c t u r i n g ] ; that he*d [the razor-grinder] make more than there.were spots onto forty fawns in July, not to speak of the big gobs of

28

reputation he'd tote away — a-shinin a l l * over his clothes l i k e l i g h t n i n bugs onto a dog fennel top. (SL 28)

In t h i s story, as in almost a l l of his s t o r i e s , Sut plays

a prank on a deserving person. Here, Sut and Blake arrange

the lecture for the avaricious Yankee razor-grinder, clownishly

prompt him too quietly and then too loudly (in a language that

sounds l i k e Cherokee), and, at the height of the lecturer's

embarrassed confusion, they shoot a cannon and douse him with

a "half b a r r e l f u l of water outen a puddle where a misfortunate

dead sow had been f l o a t i n f o r ten days.1* (SL 29) The movie-

house cartoon i s made of just such s t u f f . What i s humorous

i s the utter chaos, the confusion of things, and the pain of

the v i l l a i n who i s never permanently disabled. Sut's pranks

involve a l l of these elements; and the f r o n t i e r d i a l e c t in

which they are t o l d might be seen as a p a r a l l e l to the strange

scene created by the animator's pen, for both help to remove

the action from r e a l i t y . Yet Sut's own r e a l i s t i c thoughts

and emotions render his stories something more than simple

parables. Frontier humor i s at i t s most humorous when speedy

action i s being related by a capable and witty raconteur.

Detailed and figurative- descriptions of confusion, breakage,

and humorously p a i n f u l and dangerous circumstances are the

raconteur's stock-in-trade. His incongruous language

heightens the incongruous chaos in t o the unreal but altogether

j u s t i f i e d l o g ic of comedy in the world of fantasy.

In Sut Lovingood. Harris combines the best elements of

f r o n t i e r humor to produce a wealth of anecdotal farce. He

29

draws his characters quickly and makes e s s e n t i a l l y t r i t e

themes and d u l l plots i n t e r e s t i n g . To a large extent Harris*

unquestionable superiority derives from his consistent use

of the framework narrative. Through i t , Sut speaks, and

through Harris's v i v i d imagination, Sut becomes fa r more than

an untutored bumpkin. In f a c t , Sut's diverse and innumerable

bucolic figures make him the best s t o r y - t e l l e r of a book-

length work and h i s quick and r e t r i b u t i v e mind make him the

strongest character in the works examined in t h i s chapter.

At once he i s precise and poetic; simultaneously, he i s

i n s i g h t f u l and ac t i v e . In him the growth from genus American

to an i n d i v i d u a l , a Southern, devil-may-care mountaineer of

immense proportions, culminates. His values are those of the

f r o n t i e r and in his presentation, the reader accepts them.

As a f i r s t - r a t e raconteur, Sut has at least one quality of

the Southern orator — "'What orator,' said a Kentuckian,

'can deign to r e s t r a i n his imagination within a vulgar and

s t e r i l e state of f a c t s ? " * 4 5

The growth from an essay to an oral humor culminates in

Sut Lovingood. Indeed, Walter B l a i r finds that " i n Sut Lovin

good the antebellum humor of the South reaches i t s highest

l e v e l of achievement before Mark Twain.

And Faulkner i s , I think, the best f r o n t i e r humorist

since Mark Twain.

30

FOOTNOTES: CHAPTER I I .

F. 0 . Matthie8sen finds that "frozen-faced exaggeration had been a part of our t r a d i t i o n at least as f a r back as Fr a n k l i n . When confronted in London (1765) with a mass of misinformation and falsehood about America, instead of denying them he i r o n i c a l l y vouched for t h e i r truth by capping them with others of his own invention. In a l e t t e r to a newspaper he spoke of the cod and whale f i s h i n g in the upper Lakes, and added: 'Ignorant people may object that the upper Lakes are fresh, and that Cod and Whale are Salt Water F i s h : but l e t them know. S i r , that Cod, l i k e other Fish when attack'd by t h e i r Enemies, f l y into any Water where they can be safest; that Whales, when they have a mind to eat Cod, pursue them wherever they f l y ; and that the grand Leap of the Whale in the Chase up the F a l l of Niagara i s esteemed, by a l l who have seen i t , as one of the f i n e s t Spectacles in Nature.*'" (F. 0. Matthiessen, American Renaissance: Art and Expression in the Age of Emerson"and Whitman (New York. 1941). p. 639.

o Walter B l a i r , Native American Humor (San Francisco,

1960), p. 17.

^Constance fiourke, "Examining the Soots of American Humor," American Scholar. IV (Spring, 1935), 252.

4Eby comments: " i n the Southwest a man from the next county was a stranger, one from the next state a foreigner, and one from north of the Ohio was an inhabitant of a d i f f e r e n t c e l e s t i a l world." (Eby, p. 14-)

^Others who are s i g n i f i c a n t figures in t h i s genre are: Madison Tensas, M.D. (pseudonym), Sol Smith, Joseph M. F i e l d , and John S. Robb. The quantity and popularity of t h e i r material warranted the publication of c o l l e c t i o n s of t h e i r work. There i s an immense number of men within the peripheries of t h i s f i e l d , through t h e i r contributions of single l e t t e r s or stories to the backwoods newspapers and The S p i r i t of the Times, the most widely read and largest single source f o r regional humor. In th i s chapter I present a s i m p l i f i e d history of the genre's growth; my major conclusions, however, are substantiated by such eminent c r i t i c s in t h i s f i e l d as Walter B l a i r , Franklin J . Meine, and Bernard De Voto.

^John J . H e f l i n says, "A rather vast oral l i t e r a t u r e , an 'orature,* must be recognized as having existed on the f r o n t i e r . ...Yarn spinning and the r e l a t i o n of anecdotes found t h e i r way into preaching; the a b i l i t y to t e l l a good story was a prime r e q u i s i t e in e c c l e s i a s t i c a l promotion. P o l i t i c a l orators delighted in l e t t i n g t h e i r imaginations soar, pouring forth thundering metaphors in highly i n f l e c t e d

31

language. Corollary o r a l arts which must be mentioned are the b a l l a d and song in which the f r o n t i e r folk l i t e r a t u r e abounded.** (John J . H e f l i n , J r . . George Washington Harris (*»Sut Lovingood**): A Biographical and C r i t i c a l Study. Vanderbilt University Master»s Thesis (Nashville, 1934), p. 56. Franklin J . Meine finds that the growth of American humor, p a r t i c u l a r l y i n the Southwest, p a r a l l e l s the growth of the newspaper. "American humor has always been a spontaneous part of everyday American l i f e ; and so the newspaper, chronicler of daily doings and l o c a l l i f e , has offered a quick and easy vehicle for a l l manner of humorous anecdotes, stories and t a l l t a l e s . The American newspaper as we know i t today — the *penny press* — began gathering momentum shortly after I83O; and during the period I83O-6O, especially in the South and Southwest, i t s growth was notably rapid.** (Franklin J . Meine, ed.. T a l l Tales of the Southwest (New York, 1930), x x v i i . )

[Augustus Baldwin Longstreet], Georgia Scenes (New York, 1897), P- 32.

g Ibid.. p. 33. Many of the f r o n t i e r humorists use

i t a l i c s , misspellings and emphatic punctuation to represent the o r a l humor of untutored frontiersmen.

9 I b i d . , p. 220.

1 0 I b i d . . p. 221.

U I b i d . . P. 65. 1 2 I b i d . . p. 81.

*^In "The *Charming Creature* as a Wife," a young Georgian lawyer receives a l e t t e r from his industrious mother i n the country, not unlike those Richardson's Pamela received from her parents at Squire B...*s. The opening lines of t h i s l e t t e r w i l l give clear i n d i c a t i o n of Longstreet*s c a p a b i l i t i e s in t h i s vein. "We a l l admit...the value of industry, economy — in short, of a l l the domestic and s o c i a l virtues; but how small the number who practice themt Golden sentiments are to be picked up anywhere."(Ibid.. p. 121.)

^He footnotes Ned Brace's expletive, "d—n the man," with this apology: "I should cer t a i n l y omit such expressions as t h i s , could I do so with h i s t o r i c f i d e l i t y ; but the p e c u l i a r i t i e s of the times of which I am writing cannot be f a i t h f u l l y represented without them. In recording things as they are, truth requires me sometimes to put profane language into the mouths of my characters." (Ibid.. p. 51.)

32

15 Joseph 6. Baldwin, The Flash Times of Alabama and Mis s i s s i p p i A Series of'Sketches (New York. 185it). Hereafter referred to as Flush Times.

* ^ B l a i r , Native American Humor, p. 78. 1 7Baldwin, p. 161. 1 8 I b i d . . p. 195-1 9 I b i d . . p. 121. 20

Bishop 0. P. Fitzgerald, Judge Longstreet: A L i f e Sketch (Nashville, 1891), PP. 164-166, as quoted by B l a i r i n Native American Humor, p. 65 •

21 Johnson Jones Hooper, Adventures of Captain Simon

Suggs together with Taking the Census and other Alabama sketches (Philadelphia. 18L&). p. 12. While Simon Suggs i s Hooper's l i t e r a r y masterpiece, some of his other works are: A Ride with Old Kit Kuncker (1849), Dog and Gun (1856), Read and Circulate (1855). and Woodward's Reminiscences (185sY»

22 ' " i b i d . 2 3 L u c y L. Hazard, "The American Picaresque," The Trans-

M i s s i s s i P P i West (Boulder, 1930), p. 198 as quoted by B l a i r in Native American Humor, p. 87.

2 4Simon*s emotional responses are often mechnical. In one episode, Simon's "tears r o l l e d down his face, as naturally as i f they had been c a l l e d forth by r e a l emotion, instead of being pumped up mechanically to give effect to the scene." (Hooper, p. 62.)

2 5 I b i d . , p. 35. 2 6 I b i d . . pp. 129-130. 2 7 I b i d . , p. 88. 28

This s i m i l a r i t y may result from the fact that Longstreet, Baldwin and Hooper were lawyers.

29, Hooper, p. 97.

1 .

3 1 ,

3°Ibid.. p. 90.

Perhaps somewhat grim by modern standards, but undoubtedly humorous to the frontiersmen of Hooper's time i s a woman who i s : "accounted wealthy in consideration of the fact that she

33

had a hundred d o l l a r s in money, and was the undisputed owner of one entire negro." (Ibid.. pp. 85-86.)

3 2 I b i d . . p. 82. 3 3 B l a i r , Native American Humor, p. 89. 3 ^ I b i d . . p. 92. B l a i r finds "the method was p a r t i c u l a r l y

r i c h in i t s underlining of three types of i n c o n g r u i t i e s . " These are quoted in Chapter I I I , pp. 4 1 - 4 3 of t h i s t h e s i s .

•^Thomas Bangs Thorpe, "Big Bear of Arkansas," in Franklin J . Meine, T a l l Tales of the Southwest (New York, 1930), pp. 9, 11-12.

3 6 I b i d . . p. [21]. 3 7 I b i d . 3 8 B l a i r , p. 95-3 9 I b i d . . p. 101.

^George Washington Harris, "Preface", Sut Lovingood. ed. Brom Weber (New York, 1954), xxxi. Hereafter referred to as SL with page references in parentheses. In the "Preface" Sut reverses the mock epic sentiments of Longstreet's lament: "Most book weavers seem to be scary f o l k s , for generally they comes up to the slaughter pen shinin and waggin t h e i r t a i l s , a-sayin: they 'knows they i s imperfect,' that 'fou'd scarce expect one of my f i t , ' and so fo r t h , so on, so along. Now, i f I i s a-rowin in that boat I ain't aware of i t , I ain't; for I knows the tremendous g i f t I has for breedin scares among durned f o o l s . . . " (SL x x x i i i )

^*"But then, George, gals and ole maids ain't the things to f o o l time away on. It's widders, by g o l l y , what am the rea l sensible, steady-goin, never-scarin, never-kickin, w i l l i n , s p i r i t e d , smooth pacers. They come close't up to the hoss-block, standin s t i l l with t h e i r purty, s i l k y ears playing and the neck-veins a-throbbin, and waits for the word.... Give me a w i l l i n widder the earth over: what they don't know ain't worth l e a r n i n . They has a l l benn to Jamaicy and learnt how sugar's made, and knows how to sweeten with i t .... Widders am a s p e c i a l means, George, f o r ripenin green men, k i l l i n off weak ones, and makin 'ternally happy the sound ones." (SL 178-179)

^ 2 B l a i r , Native American Humor, p. 97-

34

43 Brom Weber finds that, in part "Sut obviously functions as a device to carry forward a s a t i r i c a l discussion of p o l i t i c a l and economic a f f a i r s , as well as Harris's thought about such matters as r e l i g i o n , temperance, women, and sentimentality. These wide-ranging intentions of Harris's overlapped, inevitably so because he was unable to devote himself exclusively to either f i c t i o n or journalism." (SL x x i i i ) H e f l i n explains, "A man of ambition in the Tennessee of that day was very l i k e l y to f i n d himself busily engaged in p o l i t i c s . The South's best minds were notoriously turned in that d i r e c t i o n . " (Heflin, p. 22.)

4 4 B l a i r , Native American Humor, p. 101. 4 5Constance Rourke, American Humor: A Study of the

National Character (New York, 1953), P» 58. 4 ^ B l a i r , Native American Humor, p. 101. Meine i m p l i c i t l y

substantiates t h i s : "For v i v i d imagination, comic p l o t . Rabelaisian touch, and sheer fun, the Sut Lovingood Yarns surpass anything else in American humor." (Heine, p. xxiv) And Twain himself attested Harris's genius i n a review of Sut Lovingood (1867): " I t contains a l l of h i s early sketches, that used to be so popular in the West, such as his story of his father ' a c t i n ' hoss,' the l i z a r d s in the camp-meeting, etc., together with many new ones. The book abounds in humor .... It w i l l s e l l well in the West, but the Eastern people w i l l c a l l i t coarse and possibly taboo i t . " (Mark Twain, "Letter from 'Mark Twain'," No. 21. Quoted in Hennig Cohen, "Mark Twain's Sut Lovingood." The Lovingood Papers (1962), P« [19]*) T n « relationship of Mark Twain to Southwestern humor i s c l e a r . B l a i r says, "But most important of a l l [other influences, such as Down East humor] was the influence in Mark's writing of the humor of the old Southwest. He grew up with that humor. It adorned the newspaper and p e r i o d i c a l exchanges which came to his brother's newspaper, for which he set type. He heard oral versions of i t in Hannibal where he l i v e d as a boy and on the r i v e r steamboats where he worked as a young man. It followed him to the P a c i f i c Coast, where i t was published, sometimes in i t s old forms, sometimes i n newly adapted forms, in the newspapers. To i t , he was greatly indebted." ( B l a i r , Native American Humor, p. 153). Furthermore, Twain did influence Faulkner, which suggests the p o s s i b i l i t y that Southwestern humor influenced Faulkner through Twain, rather than d i r e c t l y . In my discussion of Faulkner's r e l a t i o n to Southwestern humor I concentrate on Harris because Faulkner has expressed admiration for him, because Twain's influence on Faulkner i s i t s e l f worthy of a study larger, than t h i s t h esis, and because while Harris's Sut Lovingood i s pure f r o n t i e r humor. Twain i s , l i k e Faulkner, much more than a f r o n t i e r humorist.

35

I I I . Structure and Technique

Although a writer whose s e n s i b i l i t y encompasses extremes

in both tragedy and comedy and whose pred i l e c t i o n for incon

gruity per se leads him to be especially e f f e c t i v e in such

anomalies as tragi-comedy and the grotesque, Faulkner often

p a r a l l e l s the structures and techniques of the Southwestern

humorists in general, and Harris i n p a r t i c u l a r . T y p i c a l l y ,

the work of these regional humorists was f i r s t published

in newspapers and c o l l e c t e d at a la t e r date. Between news

paper publication and t h e i r appearance in book form, these

essays and "yarns** might be widely reprinted or revised. As

a consequence, t h e i r books are c h a r a c t e r i s t i c a l l y episodic

and sometimes inconsistent. The ostensible relationship

between the structure of these co l l e c t i o n s of yarns and

essays and the structure (in the largest sense) of Faulkner's

t r i l o g y i s indeed s l i g h t .

Faulkner himself claimed that he conceived the whole

t r i l o g y at one moment i n the 'twenties.* Asked in 1957

whether he had The Town (at that time unpublished) " i n mind

for a long time," Faulkner answered:

Yes, I thought of the whole story at once l i k e a bolt of lightning l i g h t s up a landscape and you see everything but i t takes time to write i t , and t h i s story I had in my mind for about t h i r t y years, and the one which I w i l l do next — i t happened at that same moment, t h i r t y years ago when I thought of i t , of getting at i t . *

And in a l a t e r interview (after the publication of The

36

Town) Faulkner speaks even more d i r e c t l y about conceiving

the t r i l o g y as a t r i l o g y :

I discovered then that to t e l l the story [of the Snopeses] properly would be too many words to compress into one volume. It had to be two or three. ... I would have to keep on writing about these people u n t i l I got i t a l l told, and I assume that one more book w i l l do i t , although I don't have any great hopes that i t w i l l . 2

But, as his ambivalent expectations of t e l l i n g the whole

story might indicate, the t r i l o g y was indubitably expanding

in i t s implications at t h i s time; and while Faulkner may

have seen the "entire landscape" t h i r t y years before, his

execution of the t r i l o g y as a t r i l o g y was anything but

orderly. In fact, his f i r s t expressions of that v i s i o n are

in the short story genre, and each novel of the t r i l o g y 3

does include revised versions of these short s t o r i e s . How

ever, Faulkner executed many of his novels in a si m i l a r

fashion and speaks about The Hamlet as i f transgressing

genre d i s t i n c t i o n s was a matter of l i t t l e importance to

him. "I wrote i t in the late twenties. . . . I t was mostly

short s t o r i e s . In 1940 I got i t pulled together."^ In his

foreword to The Mansion. Faulkner indicates what enables

him to speak of the various forms -- short story, novel,

and t r i l o g y — as i f they were allhpart of the same work

of a r t : ...the author has already found more d i s crepancies and contradictions than he hopes the reader w i l l — contradictions and d i s crepancies due to the fact that the author

37

has learned, he believes, more about the human heart and i t s dilemma than he knew t h i r t y - f o u r years ago; and i s sure that, having l i v e d with them that long time, he knows the characters in th i s chronicle better than he did then.

Indeed, Faulkner's p r e d i l e c t i o n to view his work in terms

of character rather than form (he says of The Sound and the

Fury: W I was just t r y i n g to t e l l a story of Caddy, the

l i t t l e g i r l who muddied her drawers..."^) indicates that his

e a r l i e r v i s i o n of the t r i l o g y was more than l i k e l y one of

character rather than of structure. Thus, the process from

which the structure of the Snopes t r i l o g y evolves i s p a r a l l e l

to the process of evolution of c o l l e c t e d editions of the

f r o n t i e r humorists.

While Harris's and Faulkner's works have a s i m i l a r

s t r u c t u r a l genesis (written f i r s t as short s t o r i e s , and

l a t e r collected into larger works), Sut Lovingood purports

to be no more than a c o l l e c t i o n of t a l e s , whereas the

t r i l o g y i s an organic work of a r t . Thus, t h e i r works of

f r o n t i e r humor are s i m i l a r l y episodic. But Faulkner, an

unquestionably superior l i t e r a r y a r t i s t , excels his pre

decessor in the subtle i n t r i c a c i e s of r e l a t i n g the episodes

to the large super-structure of the whole t r i l o g y , to the

structure of the novels, and to other episodes in the i n d i

vidual novels and the t r i l o g y . Harris relates episode to

episode by simple verbal references; in his t r i l o g y , Faulkner

makes an a r t i s t i c use of what has been c a l l e d the "episodic 7

looseness™ of such a work as The Hamlet. From Ab's horse

38

trade to Linda's purchase of the new car, Faulkner encourages

the reader to seek p a r a l l e l s in incidents. The free associa

tion of just such episodes throughout the t r i l o g y can be

i r o n i c and humorous. Moreover, a sort of l i t e r a r y realism

may evolve from t h i s free association. Indeed, Olga Vickery

finds that " t h i s simple device of repetition with v a r i a t i o n . . .

becomes in Faulkner's hands an astonishingly e f f e c t i v e means

for suggesting the quiddity of experience as well as the con-g

t i n u i t y of certain t r a d i t i o n s in the midst of change." Thus,

the number of p a r a l l e l s and the irony and humor and realism

in these comparable incidents i n the t r i l o g y are indications

of one way in which Faulkner's genius for s t r u c t u r a l orchestra

tion surpasses H a r r i s ' s .

Faulkner's i n d i v i d u a l novels are s t r u c t u r a l l y more com

plex than any of the f r o n t i e r humorists* works partly because

of his tendency to experiment, especially with the i n t r i c a c i e s

of d i f f e r e n t points of view, and partly because his novels

have large casts of characters. His s h i f t i n g of points of

view i s in part responsible for the varying amounts of f r o n t i e r

humor in the three novels as well as t h e i r success as novels.

For instance, his emphasis on such serious characters, whether

q u i x o t i c a l l y philosophic (as Gavin Stevens in The Town) or

b i t t e r (as Mink Snopes in The Mansion), tends to l i m i t his

f r o n t i e r humor as the themes and milieus of these l a t e r books

l i m i t i t s appropriateness. The Town i s s t r u c t u r a l l y the

weakest of the three novels. Miss Galbraith finds that "the

39

major weakness of the novel l i e s in the lack of integration

of structure and symbolic pattern. ...This i s partly due to o

the narrative method of The Town.** Faulkner's l i m i t e d point

of view in the novel leads him to make his characters comment

d i r e c t l y on p a r a l l e l incidents, a somewhat less commendable

a r t i s t i c device (and one used by the Southwestern humorists)

than that of The Hamlet, where, l e f t to make his own estimate,

the reader i s overwhelmed by the p a r a l l e l s and multifarious

i n t e r r e l a t i o n s h i p s and variations of similar incidents. Each

of the three novels contains i n t e r e s t i n g relationships of

sub-plot to plot as well as sub-plot to sub-plot; and The

Hamlet*^ i s f a r superior to the other novels in the t r i l o g y

in i t s a r t i s t i c rendition of these rela t i o n s h i p s . In a l l

matters of structure, Faulkner i s more an a r t i s t than his

predecessor.

The greatest s i m i l a r i t y of structure between Faulkner

and Harris l i e s in t h e i r p a r a l l e l use of the box-like struc

ture for humorous purposes. Faulkner does not l i m i t his use

of this device to humorous ends alone. In Absalom, Absalom!,

by no means a comic novel, he adroit l y transcends the barriers

of time and place by using t h i s structure. However, i t i s

not unlikely that his e a r l i e s t use of t h i s device was for

humorous purposes, for some of the comic short stories (such

as "Spotted Horses") which are incorporated into the Snopes

t r i l o g y were written before 1931, when the publication of his

•pot-boiler,* Sanctuary, increased the demand for his work.

But whatever the purposes of his e a r l i e s t use of t h i s structur

40

device, Faulkner's use of the framework narrative in the

t r i l o g y i s remarkably si m i l a r to Harris's use of i t i n Sut

Lovingood. And, as in his other st r u c t u r a l accomplishments,

Faulkner's use of t h i s device i s more a r t i s t i c , more complex,

and in the creation of a r e a l i s t i c l i t e r a t u r e , more e f f e c t i v e

than Harris's nineteenth century use.

In Sut Lovingood. Sut t e l l s a l l the t a l e s ; but i n

Faulkner's t r i l o g y , many characters p a r t i c i p a t e as raconteurs

of major or minor importance. And each novel has a d i f f e r e n t

basic point of view. That of The Hamlet i s omniscient, a l

though characters often t e l l s t o r i e s . In The Town there are

three people, R a t l i f f , Gavin, and Charles Mallison, t e l l i n g

the s t o r i e s . These characters incorporate parts of what the

other two say and relate other characters' versions of the

events. The point of view in The Mansion s h i f t s from the

omniscient and Montgomery Ward Snopes's points of view in

"Mink" to R a t l i f f ' s , Gavin's and Charles Mallison's in

"Linda** and back to the omniscient in **Flem.** This omniscient

point of view also enables Faulkner to make characters t e l l

a story. The p r i n c i p l e f r o n t i e r raconteur i s , of course,

R a t l i f f ; but the action passage i n "Centaur in Brass" in

The Town 1 1 i s t o l d by Charles Mallison (though he, l i k e

Sterne*s Tristram Shandy, i s yet to be born when the incident

takes place), who reports what his cousin, Gowan Stevens,

heard about i t from the b o i l e r watchman, Mr. Harker. The

st r u c t u r a l complexities of the t r i l o g y , then, derive from

both the d i f f e r e n t basic points of view in the separate novels

41

and from the fact that some stories from The Hamlet are

reto l d in The Town and stories from both of these are re

t o l d in The Mansion, from a point of view perhaps d i f f e r e n t

from those of e a r l i e r versions.

Faulkner's use of the box-like structure shows the same three types of incongruity B l a i r finds i n the f r o n t i e r humorists* use of i t . The "incongruity between the s i t u a tion at the time the yarn was t o l d and the si t u a t i o n i n the

12

yarn i t s e l f * * i s used often by Faulkner i n the t r i l o g y .

Certainly, S a t l i f f * s vision of Flem haggling about his soul

with the Devil in The Hamlet and Charles's account of what

K a t l i f f t e l l s Gavin about Tug Nightingales's battle with

Skeets in The Mansion o f f e r superb examples of the comic

necessity of detachment that Faulkner derives, l i k e Harris, 13

through t h i s incongruity. J Faulkner's most complex use of

the device for the sake of detachment i s in The Town. In

th i s novel Faulkner's use of the structure and the incongruity

between the action and t e l l i n g of the episodes conduces to

both bourgeois humor*4 and f r o n t i e r humor. Charles's account

of Eck Snopes's death i n the explosion of the o i l tank i s

heightened by a kind of grim humor when he uses Mr. Nunnery's

words and suddenly gives comic r e l i e f from an es s e n t i a l l y

t r a g i c event, the untimely death of the only "good**, mature

Snopes. Thus, the pain and tragedy of the si t u a t i o n i s

somewhat mitigated:

42

...she sai d she was s t i l l running when the explosion (she said she never heard i t , she never heard anything, or she would have stopped) knocked her down and the a i r a l l around her whizzing with pieces of the tank l i k e a swarm of bumble bees. (T, 109)

This episode, which occurred when Charles was four so that

he himself (not Charles v i a Gowan) can t e l l i t , i s t o l d in

the past tense u n t i l Charles, as raconteur, chooses to make

the action immediate and close. By moving through various

characters' versions, Faulkner renders variations of perspec

t i v e and detachment and, hence, of incongruity in the episodes.

Indeed, the action of The Town makes thi s incongruity

especially important in that novel. For The Town lacks the

exuberance of language and numerous c o l o r f u l incidents of

The Hamlet and the intensity of Mink's character i n The

Mansion. While The Town i s surely i n f e r i o r to the other two

novels in many respects, perhaps i t s lack of action i s more

true to the r e a l tone of l i f e in the South than the l i t e r a r y

realism Faulkner achieves in the rest of the t r i l o g y . And

i t i s in t h i s novel that Faulkner emphasizes incongruity not

only between event and raconteur, but also between raconteur

and raconteur.

To a great extent, then, Faulkner emphasizes the t e l l i n g

of the t a l e and not the tale i t s e l f in The Town. For instance,

Charles Mallison's description of Gavin's tendency to see

things d i f f e r e n t l y than others would see them i s in i t s e l f

humorous and i s a key to the bourgeois humor i n the novel.

Emphasizing the importance of narrator to event, Charles says:

43

. . . u n t i l now he sounded a good deal l i k e I sounded sometimes. But Gavin stood.•.[with] the eyes and the face that you never did quite know what they were going to say next except that when you heard i t you r e a l i s e d i t was only a l i t t l e cranksided thatanobody else would have said i t quite that way. (T 182)

Thus, the incongruity, more evident in the varied points of

view, deriving more from point of view per se than from

language, and more useful in detaching the reader from the

events of a small bourgeois town and focusing his attention

on the r e l a t i o n of t e l l e r to tale and t e l l e r to t e l l e r , i s

p a r t i c u l a r l y important for Faulkner's humor in The Town. In

his emphasis on the t a l e - t e l l e r relationship, Faulkner uses

the same incongruity of the framework narrative that merely

provides detachment from the event in Southwestern humor.

But Faulkner also uses t h i s incongruity for another sort of

detachment — one which allows him to treat the more mundane

aspects of h i s region and more bourgeois Jeffersonians in a

r e a l i s t i c i f not uproariously humorous way. By deviating

from Harris's emphasis on the t a l e to his own emphasis on

the t e l l e r - t a l e incongruity, as well as through other devia

tions from Southwestern humor, Faulkner gains range of

expression without s a c r i f i c i n g any of the necessities f o r the

more riotous f r o n t i e r humor.

The other two incongruities B l a i r finds in the box-like

structure are incongruities of language:

Incongruity between the grammatical, highly r h e t o r i c a l language of the framework on the

44

one hand and, on the other, the ungrammatical racy d i a l e c t of the narrator.

...Incongruity between realism -- discoverable in the framework wherein the scene and the narrator are r e a l i s t i c a l l y portrayed, and fantasy, which enters into the enclosed narrat i v e because the narrator selects d e t a i l s and uses figures of speech, epithets, and verbs which give grotesque coloring. 15

Both Harris and Faulkner make use of these language incongruities

in t h e i r works.

In such a novel as The Hamlet, their language s i m i l a r i t i e s

are manifestly evident. Faulkner's p r i n c i p l e raconteur,

V. K. R a t l i f f , i s as well acquainted with the technique of

f r o n t i e r language as Sut Lovingood. And in the reworked

version of *»Fool About a. Horse,1* the story of Ab Snopes's

horse trade with Pat Stamper, R a t l i f f ' s knowledge of f r o n t i e r

hyperbole and figure predicates much of the humor. For

instance his ungrammatical d i c t i o n and homely similes occur

in his description of Ab and his f i r s t horse leaving French

man* s Bend.

[The horse was].. .kind of half walking and half r i d i n g on the double tree and Ab*s face looking worrieder and worrieder every time i t f a i l e d to l i f t i t s feet high enough to step, when a l l of a sudden that horse popped into a sweat. It flung i t s head up l i k e i t had been touched with a hot poker and stepped up into the c o l l a r , touching the c o l l a r for the f i r s t time since the mule had taken the weight of i t when Ab shaken out the whip i n the l o t , and so we come down the h i l l . . . w i t h that horse[*s]...eyes r o l l i n g white as darning eggs and i t s mane and t a i l swirling l i k e a grass f i r e . (H 34)

After he trades Pat Stamper f o r the two mules and proceeds

to Jefferson, Ab finds his new team outside Cain's hardware

45

store. R a t l i f f 1 s narration offers a good example of the comic

hyperbole possible through the use of f r o n t i e r f i g u r e s :

"They [the mules] were laying down*..with t h e i r heads snubbed

up together and pointing straight up and th e i r tongues hanging

out and t h e i r eyes popping and t h e i r necks stretched about

four foot and t h e i r legs doubled back under them l i k e shot

rabbits.** (H 40) Thus, R a t l i f f proves to be as capable of

detailed description as Sut Lovingood; and they have a common

interest i n the incongruity between subject and image. In

fact, Sut uses very nearly the same image when he brags about

his new horse to the men in front of Pat Hash's grocery.

"You never seed a r e a l hoss t i l l I r i d up. You'se p'raps

stole or owned shod rabbits, or sheep with borrowed saddles

on...." (SL 4) R a t l i f f often achieves a comic effect by

describing one kind of f r o n t i e r animal by comparing i t to

another. Perhaps even more humorous than the mules that

looked l i k e "shot r a b b i t s " i s Ab's new horse which was,

R a t l i f f says, "...hog fat,....not l i k e a horse i s fat but

l i k e a hog: fat right up to i t s ears and looking tight as

a drum." (H 41)

Sut and R a t l i f f also use f r o n t i e r figures to describe

people and t h e i r p e r s o n a l i t i e s . Sut says: "Bake Boyd...

were nigh onto as clever a fellow as ever were borned.

There were durn l i t t l e weavil in his wheat, mighty small

chance of water in his whiskey... (SL 2 7 ) Ab's predicament,

that of having f i e l d s to plow and no team to do i t with.

46

would only be solved, R a t l i f f t e l l s b i s l i s t e n e r s , i f Ab

"walked up to Old Man Anse's and borrowed a span of mules

which would be just l i k e going up to a rattlesnake and

borrowing a r a t t l e . " (H 45) Sut and R a t l i f f can give t h e i r

own or other characters* moods through a well-chosen f r o n t i e r

f igure. Sut»s exaggerated praise for S i c i l y Burns r e f l e c t s

the exuberance of his puppy love for her. When George men

tions that she i s a handsome g i r l , Sut explodes:

'Handsome!* That-there word don*t cover the case. It sounds sorta l i k e c a l l i n good whiskey 'strong water* when you are ten mile from a s t i l l - h o u s e , i t * s a-rainin, and your flask only h a l f - f u l l . She shows among women l i k e a sunflower among dog fennel, or a hollyhock in a patch of smart-weed. (SL 35)

R a t l i f f * s and Ab*s dejection after the horse trade i s expressed

in R a t l i f f * s description of Ab's empty l o t . "It had never

been a big l o t and i t would look kind of crowded even with

just one horse i n i t . But now i t looked l i k e a l l Texas."

(H 47) But while Sut rarely changes moods — he i s always

exuberant — R a t l i f f increases the f e e l i n g of dejection he

and Ab share when Mrs. Snopes trades the cow for the separator.

Accordingly, R a t l i f f says, " I t [the l o t ] looked l i k e i t would

have held a l l Texas and Kansas too." (H 48)

In another major episode t o l d by, or rather thought by,

R a t l i f f in The Hamlet, he embellishes the fantasy of the

backwoods poetry by creating a setting of fantasy when he

envisions Flem i n H e l l . R a t l i f f * s Imagined biographical

sketch of the present "Prince" includes perhaps the best

47

f a n c i f u l d e t a i l s in Faulkner's Southwestern humor, i f not

in the genre. S a t l i f f , l i k e Faulkner, thinks in terms of

family and upbringing. Thus, the "Prince 1* has one of h i s

early tutors, perhaps i n about the same capacity as old

family servants in other Faulkner novels, as an advisor.

The d e v i l and his advisor argue v i o l e n t l y about the r e l a t i v e

merits of the current "Prince** and his father. S a t l i f f then

imagines the "Prince's" momentary sentimentalism thus:

But he [the Prince] remembered them old days when the old fellow was smiling fond and proud on his crude youthful inventions with BB size lava and brimstone and such, and bragging to the old Prince at night about how the boy done that day, about what he invented to do.. .that even the grown folks hadn*t thought of yet.

In addition to t h i s extremely f a n c i f u l v i s i o n , the incongruity

of R a t l i f f ' s c o u n t r i f i e d narration and the backwoods d i c t i o n

of Flem, as well as of the d e v i l in H e l l , combine to create

one of the most r i s i b l e of episodes in Faulkner's canon.

Faulkner's use of the framework narrative in ".-"Fool

About a Horse" and a device very close to i t in the Flem-

Oevil passage i s s i m i l a r to Harris's use of the structure i n

that both authors have a p a r a l l e l , i f not the same apprecia

t i o n of the possible incongruities between realism and

fantasy. Both raconteurs do t e l l s t o r i e s of fantasy, but

R a t l i f f also p a r t i c i p a t e s in the action of a complex novel.

R a t l i f f , as a character, discusses l o c a l events with such

men as Bookwright and W i l l Varner. These chats also provide

much f r o n t i e r humor, but i t i s a humor akin to wit. Further,

(H 152-153

48

almost a l l of the male characters at least can understand

and many of them do speak in t h i s language with varying degrees

of comic success. The reason that R a t l i f f seems to be respon

s i b l e f o r th i s language i s that he i s apparently the reader's

source of information, for again and again in The Hamlet

Faulkner returns to R a t l i f f , who speaks in t h i s c o u n t r i f i e d

language. Almost a l l the events in the novel are either part

of R a t l i f f ' s experience, or other characters t e l l him about

them, at which times he often analyzes the significance of

these events.

The language techniques of f r o n t i e r humor are used, then,

by Faulkner in the speech of many characters. While the

incongruity of t h i s f i g u r a t i v e speech i s generally humorous,

the frontiersman can be witty. Indeed, R a t l i f f ' s purposefully

•ague and non-committal f i g u r a t i v e answer to Jody Varner's

question about the Snopes's barn burning habits i s a splendid

example.

**I dont know as I would go on record as saying he set ere a one of them a f i r e . I would put i t that they both taken f i r e while he was more or less associated with them. You might say that f i r e seems to follow him around, l i k e dogs follow some f o l k s . " (H 1 3 )

This contains both the i n t e l l e c t u a l d i s t i n c t i o n s (which

usually center on the precise meanings of words) common to

wit and a superb example of f r o n t i e r understatement. Other

examples of f r o n t i e r speech are even attributed to anonymous

characters. One such i s a l i s t e n e r to R a t l i f f ' s t a le of the

Snopes-Stamper episode. Before R a t l i f f has started t e l l i n g

49

the story, the l i s t e n e r asks incredulously, **You mean he

[Ab] locked horns with Pat Stamper and even had the b r i d l e

l e f t to take home?" (H 3O) This p a r t i c u l a r comment i s

ostensibly Faulkner's reason for giving a short sketch of

t h i s horse trader and his Negro h o s t l e r - a r t i s t , who became

a legend within t h e i r own l i f e - t i m e . The culminating remark

in a comic discussion two anonymous frontiersmen have at the

auction sums up Flem's secretive nature: "Flam Snopes don't

even t e l l himself what he i s up to. Not i f he was laying i n

with himself i n an empty house in the dark of the moon.1*

(H 284) In addition to anonymous comments, Bookwright's

steadfast reduction of a l l things to his own earthy point of

view i s often e f f e c t i v e in s e t t i n g the tone of the f r o n t i e r

or poor-white l i f e in The Hamlet. For instance, when T u l l

orders steak at R a t l i f f ' s restaurant, Bookwright orders thus:

**I won't. ...I been watching the dripping sterns of steaks

for two days now.** (H 69) But the use of the f r o n t i e r language

i s not l i m i t e d to humorous purposes in The Hamlet, and Book

wright again provides a good example of a more serious use.

When R a t l i f f i s f i n a l l y exasperated about the Snopes family

and says that he w i l l do no more to help the inhabitants of

Frenchman's Bend or his larger cause -- rightness and freedom

— Bookwright answers him, **Hook your drag up, i t aint nothing

but a h i l l . * * (H 326)

These examples by no means exhaust the profusion of

f r o n t i e r f i g u r a t i v e language i n the speech of the characters

50

(other than the raconteur, R a t l i f f ) in The Hamlet. Rather,

these are merely representative instances of characters

r e l a t i n g t h e i r thoughts to the l i f e at hand. This phenomenon

of backwoods language pervades The Hamlet, in which (to judge

from the language) characters continually search for humorous

figures of speech.

The characters, then, either through the framework narra

t i v e or when merely speaking to each other, o f f e r good examples

of f r o n t i e r language. R a t l i f f , as both raconteur and ubiquitous

character, seems to be the source of much of t h i s language,

as indeed he i s . But the casual reader of The Hamlet probably

would be amazed to learn that the Snopes-Stamper episode and

the Flem-Devil passage are the only major episodes of The

Hamlet which are actually narrated by R a t l i f f . For we look

to him for the ra t i o n a l man's opinion about the events of the

novel and connect most of the f r o n t i e r language with his

character. But in The Hamlet. Faulkner often deviates from

the s t r i c t box-like structure of the Southwestern humorists

and uses an omniscient point of view, by which he gains freedom

and range of expression. Further, Faulkner's desire to make

R a t l i f f the primary protagonist against Flem Snopes again

l i m i t s R a t l i f f from actually t e l l i n g many of the t a l e s . The

"Spotted Horses" passage i s a case in point. R a t l i f f (Suratt)

does t e l l the e a r l i e r short story version but Faulkner's love

for the incongruities posed by the juxtaposition of numerous

languages could not be yoked to such a limited point of view

in The Hamlet version.

51

The "Spotted Horses" passage i s more than a good example

of Faulkner's genius for f r o n t i e r humor for there i s an immense

range of language in th i s episode — from Mrs. LittleJohn's

profanity to the highly romantic description of the pear tree.

Malcolm Cowley says:

The version of "Spotted Horses" used in The Hamlet . . . i s nearly three times as long as the magazine version printed ten years e a r l i e r in Scribner* s. as well as being nearly three times as good. I don't think i t would be too much to c a l l i t the funniest American story since Mark Twain.16

Cowley's enthusiasm i s e n t i r e l y j u s t i f i e d , both in terms of

the language and the action in the episode.

The Hamlet i t s e l f has a wide and e f f e c t i v e range of

language, but in the "Spotted Horses" section, t h i s range i s

integrated b r i l l i a n t l y in a short piece; and the incongruities

of the various language styles are an indication of Faulkner's

genius f o r the incongruity of language. We have seen that

Harris and his contemporaries reacted with varying success

against the Latinate language of the eighteenth century. Fred

Lewis Pattee characterizes the l a t e r , post-bellum s p i r i t of

f r o n t i e r humor thus:

Everywhere there was a swing toward the wild and unconventional, even toward the coarse and repulsive. The effeminacy of early Tennysonianism, the cloying sweetness of the mid-centural annual, Keatsism, Hyperionism...had culminated in react i o n . There was a craving for the acr i d tang of uncultivated things i n borderlands and f i e l d s unsown.17

One of Faulkner's major achievements in language technique

i s , I think, h i s successful integration of the two f i g u r a t i v e

52

languages, a feat that could not have been r e a l i z e d through

the s t r i c t use of the box-like structure. Faulkner incor

porates both romantic description and realism to suit his

purposes and to s a t i s f y his love of incongruity per se in

the following:

The pear tree across the road opposite was now in f u l l and frosty bloom, the twigs and branches springing not outward from the limbs but standing motionless and perpendicular above the horizontal broughs l i k e the separate and upstreaming hair of a drowned woman sleeping upon the uttermost f l o o r of the windless and t i d e l e s s sea.18

**Anse McCallum brought two of them horses back from Texas once,** one of the men&on the steps said. (H 281)

This and s i m i l a r n o n - r e a l i s t i c images give the episode a

fantasy-like super-reality. In r e l a t i o n to the humor of the

story, these passages have at least two purposes: they stop

and pace the motion and violence of the humorous passages,

and they present a further incongruity, that of the s t i l l

night and the utter confusion of the men chasing the horses.

Variously using the poetic languages of romantic poets

and f r o n t i e r humorists, Faulkner himself uses the f i g u r a t i v e

language of the f r o n t i e r i n t h i s episode. He describes the

horses, momentarily motionless, as being,

...larger than rabbits and gaudy as parrots.... Calico-coated, small-bodied, with delicate legs and pink faces in which t h e i r mismatched eyes r o l l e d wild and subdued, they huddled, gaudy motionless and a l e r t , wild as deer, deadly as rattlesnakes, quiet as doves. (H 275)

The contrast of the image and the object, the incongruity of

the poetry and i t s subject i s what provides humor. Precise

counterpointing of concepts i s one of Faulkner's f a v o r i t e

53

devices for humorous as well as serious writing. Thus, the

horses* eyes are at once "wild and subdued."

Another element of f r o n t i e r humor, p a r t i c u l a r l y Harris's,

appears in Faulkner's "Spotted Horses" section. This i s the

furious confusion, motion, and violence which i s the staple

of Sut Lovingood's humor, for Sut has a keen eye for detailed

description of breakage and damage. By rapidly l i s t i n g those

things which are broken in the melees that are c h a r a c t e r i s t i c

of what Sut finds humorous, he gives the reader some in d i c a

tion of furious speed and confusion. For instance, when the

Burns's b u l l , "Old Sock," backs into the house, he crashes

into a cupboard in one backward lunge.

'Pickle crocks, preserve jars, vinegar jugs, seed bags, herb bunches, paregoric bottles, egg baskets, and delf ware — a l l mixed damn promiscuously and not worth the s o r t i n by a d o l l a r and a h a l f . ' (SL 51)

And in the next lunge he makes a holocaust of the wedding feast.

'Tatars, cabbage, meat, soup, beans, sop, dumplins and the truck you wallers 'em i n . . . milk, plates, pies,...and every durned f i x i n you could think of in a week were there, mixed and mashed l i k e i t had been thru a threshin-machine.* (SL 52)

Faulkner's description of the horses* escape i s as de

t a i l e d as Sut*s description of the damage "Old Sock" did at

the wedding.

The herd [was] sweeping on across the l o t , to crash through the gate which the l a s t man through i t neglected to close...carrying a l l of the gate save upright to which the hinges were na i l e d with them, and so among the teams and wagons which choked the lane, the teams

54

springing and lunging too, snapping h i t c h -reins and tongues. Then the whole inextricable mass crashed among the wagons... (H 3 O 6 - 3 O 7 )

And Faulkner describes Eck's " f r e e " horse crashing into T u l l ' s w wagon both i n d e t a i l and with the aid of a f r o n t i e r s i m i l e .

The horse neither checked nor swerved. It crashed once on the wooden bridge and rushed between the two mules which waked lunging in opposite directions in the traces, the horse now apparently scrambling along the wagon-tongue i t s e l f l i k e a mad s q u i r r e l and scrabb l i n g at the end-gate of the wagon with i t s f o r e f e e t . . . (H 3 0 8 - 3 0 9 )

Faulkner's omniscient narration in these passages of

action has obvious p a r a l l e l s to Sut Lovingood*s. Both describe

the d e t a i l s of f r o n t i e r animals and objects in confusion.

Their descriptions are dominated by nouns and verbs to repre

sent the motion, mess, and noise of these comic events.

Their use of f i g u r a t i v e language of the f r o n t i e r enables

both to sum up and heighten the preceeding action in a single

v i v i d image. And both Faulkner and Sut f i n d noise and damage

conducive to h i l a r i o u s humor.

Although the "Spotted Horses" passage i s not pure f r o n t i e r

humor ( i t ranges through too many dif f e r e n t languages to f i t

into t h i s pigeon-hole) the episode i s perhaps Faulkner's most

b r i l l i a n t l y kaleidoscopic passage of f r o n t i e r humor in The

Hamlet. i f not in his canon. His achievement here i s the

result of his successful juxtaposition of multifarious incon

g r u i t i e s . For instance, in the language alone, he combines

such a n t i t h e t i c a l elements as high poetry and low comedy

55

through his use of the omniscient narrative. His own poetic

description of the pear tree, Eula, and the swirling masses

of horseflesh i s contrasted with the earthy speech of the

characters during the confusion and t h e i r swapping of ind i v i d u a l

accounts of the event afterward on W i l l Varner's porch. In

addition, there are somewhat less r e a l i s t i c elements —

Faulkner's own f r o n t i e r f i g u r a t i v e language and the peasants'

semi-poetic superstitions about the moon's effect on growing

things. Thus, rapidly changing the tone of the story by

juxtaposing these various languages, Faulkner indeed heightens

the atmosphere of swi r l i n g per se. and t h i s , l i k e Sut Lovingood,

with an extraordinary eye for d e t a i l and s e n s i t i v i t y to the

comic effects of fast action.

In The Town and The Mansion there are, I think, three

major episodes that are cl e a r l y in the t r a d i t i o n of f r o n t i e r

humor, and, l i k e Sut Lovingood's st o r i e s , a l l contain passages

of action. These are "Centaur i n Brass," "Mule in the Yard,"

and "By the People." A l l were o r i g i n a l l y short stories and

a l l are t o l d by more than one person. In these l a t e r novels

Faulkner finds that t e l l i n g a story through more than one

person's eyes increases the range of figur a t i v e language he

can use in any one s i t u a t i o n . None of these minor narrators

are as important as R a t l i f f , and some of them, old Het for

example, seem to exist solely for the comments they make.

As raconteurs or p a r t i a l raconteurs they might be considered

as extensions of R a t l i f f ' s s e n s i b i l i t i e s as they can enhance.

56

or detract from R a t l i f f ' s i n s t i n c t i v e l y excellent story

t e l l i n g s k i l l .

"Centaur in Brass" and "Mule i n the Yard" benefit from

r e v i s i o n . In the former story the anonymous narrator, as

well as Faulkner, R a t l i f f , and Chick in other novels, describes 19

Flam's eyes as the color of stagnant water, but in The Town.

Harker, a man well acquainted with machinery, describes Flem

thus: "him standing there chewing, with his eyes looking 20

l i k e two gobs of cup grease on raw dough...P (T 22) In the o r i g i n a l , the chase i s described thus:

...the two of them a strange and furious beast with two heads and a single pair of legs l i k e an inverted centaur speeding phantomlike just ahead of the board-like streaming of Tom-Tom's s h i r t - t a i l and just beneath the s i l v e r g l i n t , of the l i f t e d knife}... (Collected S t o r i e s . I64)

and by Harker in The Town:

"Jest exactly as on time as two engines switching freight cars. Tom Tom must a made his jump jest exactly when Turl whirled to run, Turl jumping out of the house into the moonlight with Tom Tom and the butcher knife r i d i n g on his back so that they looked jest l i k e — what do you c a l l them double-jointed half-horse f e l l e r s in the old picture books?"

"Centaur," Gowan said, "-looking jest l i k e a centawyer running on i t s hind legs and try i n g to ketch up with i t s e l f with a butcher knife about a yard long in one of i t s extry front hoofs..." (T 26)

Faulkner's addition of Harker's description i s not only con

sistent with Harker's character; i t has converted t h i s passage

into regional humor. The centaur image, presented in Harker's

uncertain manner, i s f a r more believable and for that matter,

v i v i d than in the previous passage. And Faulkner has increased

57

the humor of thi s image by means of the framework narrative

and the language technique of f r o n t i e r humor — r e l a t i n g the

event to a character's experience.

In another episode Faulkner achieves a range of tone

through his technique i n using t h i s device. Charles Mallison

introduces the "Mule in the Yard" passage: "This i s what

fiatliff said happened up to where Uncle Gavin could see i t . "

(T 231) As he t e l l s the Hait family history and the story

of the mules getting into Mrs. Hair's yard, R a t l i f f ' s narra

t i v e ends with the hypothetical s i m i l e : " i t [the mule]

probably looked t a l l e r than a g i r a f f e rushing down at Mrs.

Hait and old Het with the halter-rope whipping about i t s

ears." (T 237) A mule which looks l i k e a g i r a f f e i s incon

gruous enough, but Faulkner now has old Het narrate (through

R a t l i f f and Charles) in terms far more humous than R a t l i f f ' s .

Her superstitions make f o r the best image in the passage:

Old Het said i t looked just l i k e something out of the Bible, or maybe out of some kind of hoodoo witches' B i b l e : the mule that came out of the fog to begin with l i k e a hant or goblin, now kind of soaring back into the fog again borne on a cloud of l i t t l e winged ones;... (T 238)

And a new, although minor raconteur i s born. In this passage,

however, Faulkner also exhibits a carelessness about the cor

respondence of imagery to the narrator's probable experience

when old Het describes Mrs. Halt's plunge into the drove of

mules:

58

[Mrs. Hait] rush[ed] right into the middle of the drove, after the one with the f l y i n g h a l t e r - r e i n that was s t i l l vanishing into the fog s t i l l in that cloud of whirling loose feathers l i k e c o n fetti or the wake behind a speed boat. (T 239)

This p a r t i c u l a r inconsistency might result from a hurried

revision of the short story, where the only reference to a

boat i s that of "the cow...with her t a i l r i g i d and raked

s l i g h t l y l i k e the stern s t a f f of a boat." (Collected Stories

256) Generally, Het*s descriptions are more detailed (at

least in a bucolic way) than those in the short story. For

instance, when I. 0. f a l l s , the narrator describes him thus:

He lay f l a t on his stomach, his head and shoulders upreared by his outstretched arms, his coat t a i l swept forward by i t s own arrested momentum about his head so that from beneath i t his slack-jawed face mused in wild repose l i k e that of a burlesqued nun. (Collected Stories 256)

Het's description i s :

He was l y i n g f l a t on his face, the t a i l of his coat flung forward over his head by the impetus of his f a l l , and old Het swore there was the p r i n t of the cow's s p l i t foot and the mule's hoof too in the middle of his white s h i r t . (T 240)

Both are humorous passages. Old Het's i s i n the regional

t r a d i t i o n and, I think, more humorous. Her description of

I. 0. i s far less incongruous to the tone of the story.

In The Mansion, the best example of f r o n t i e r humor i s

R a t l i f f ' s outwitting Senator Clarence Egglestone Snopes. The

passage i s introduced by Faulkner: "Then i t was September,

Charles was home again and the next day his uncle ran R a t l i f f

59

to earth on the Square and brought him up to the o f f i c e . . . "

(M 315) And R a t l i f f t e l l s of a victory as decisive as Sut

Lovingood's victory over Parson John Bullen. The humor of

Snopes's elimination from the senatorial race i s derived more

from the story i t s e l f , than from the language. R a t l i f f i s a

far more sober character in The Mansion than in the e a r l i e r

novels; and indeed The Mansion i s a more sober novel. Certain

elements of f r o n t i e r humor are there in the embittered but

blunt up-country language of Mink, in the incongruity of

Goodyhay and h i s church, and i n Meadowfill's cantankerous

fury; but these elements exist alone and the ef f e c t s are far

from h i l a r i o u s . R a t l i f f ' s story i s a story of f r o n t i e r humor;

but his language i s that of f r o n t i e r humor only in a few places.

R a t l i f f , having been to New York, explains the location of

the "dog t h i c k e t " as being"jest above Varner's millpond where

i t w i l l be convenient for customers l i k e them c i t y hotels

that keeps a reservoy of fountainpen ink open to anybody that

needs i t right next to the writing room." (M 316) This i s

not the R a t l i f f of The Hamlet or The Town. While he retains

h i s regional grammar and pronunciation through h i s description

of the thicket, he selects far more sophisticated and euphemis

t i c images than he would have i n e a r l i e r years: "a dog way-

station, a kind of dog post o f f i c e . . • • Every dog in the

congressional d i s t r i c t . . . h a s l i f t e d h is leg there...and l e f t

h is v i s i t i n g card." (M 3I6) But as the story unfolds R a t l i f f

t e l l s i t in increasingly c o l o r f u l terms:

60

Clarence f e l t his britches legs getting damp or maybe jest cool, and looked over his shoulder to see the waiting line-up...them augmenting standing-room-only customers strung out behind him l i k e the knots i n a kites t a i l . . . t h e n f r u s trated dogs c i r c l i n g round and round...like the spotted horses and swan boats on a f l y i n g jenny, except the dogs was t r a v e l l i n g on three legs, being already loaded and cocked and aimed. (H 317)

Faulker, in passages of action in the f r o n t i e r humor

t r a d i t i o n , follows Harris's method. But Faulkner i s usually

careful (and t h i s with a large number of characters) to keep

the image consistent to the character, and has found by

using a comment-within-a-story-within-a-story he can achieve

a wide range of f i g u r a t i v e speech, and Het's "hoodoo witches'

B i b l e " i s a superb example of t h i s technique. Harris often

uses a profusion of figures leading towards the most emphatic

one. For instance, in one paragraph John Bullen stops

preaching: . . . a - l i s t e n i n . . . s o r t a l i k e a ole sow does when she hears you a-whistlin for the dogs ...(slaps himself) about the place where you cut the best steak outen a beef...(rubs himself) where a hoss t a i l sprouts.... Then he spread his big legs and give his back a good, r a t t l i n rub agin the p u l p i t , l i k e a hog scratches h i a s e l f agin a stump, leanin to i t pow'ful, and twitchin and squirmin a l l over as i f he'd slept in a dog bed, or onto a pissant h i l l . (SL 85)

Thus, the way in which the characters t e l l these stories i s

no small part of enticing the reader to l i s t e n to a mountain

h i l l - b i l l y or an i t i n e r a n t M i s s i s s i p p i sewing machine sales

man. Sut i s a man who has seen a l l the f r o n t i e r has to show;

R a t l i f f has seen most of i t , but knows with unerring

61

consistency when to l e t a poor-house Negro speak for him.

Het, more than l i k e l y i l l i t e r a t e , and Sut, admittedly so,

relate the things of the f r o n t i e r to the events they describe.

As an examination of these passages of action would indicate,

Faulkner and Harris usually d i f f e r in the number of f r o n t i e r

images they use — not in the technique or s p i r i t of that

use.

A further s i m i l a r i t y i s t h e i r representation of the r e a l

language of the f r o n t i e r , a language common to sharecroppers 21

and planters a l i k e . Speaking of t h i s oral f r o n t i e r humor, OeVoto says:

It i s the f r o n t i e r examining i t s e l f , recording i t s e l f , and entertaining i t s e l f . . . . I t was enormously male -- emphatic, coarse, v i v i d , violent...22

The folk everywhere are bawdy and obscene. The verbal humor of copulation and other physiological functions i s eternal and i t i s the least d i l u t e d form of folk art.23

And what got into print almost cer t a i n l y does not indicate

the extent to which these c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s apply to the oral

t r a d i t i o n which both-Faulkner and Harris knew. Mcllwaine

reminds us that only "the most sanitary [storiesJ...now and

then appeared in the l o c a l newspapers or the Spi r i t of the

Times." Indeed, Brom Weber, the editor of Sut Lovingood.

notes in his "Introduction** that he was forced by propriety

to delete "three lines of an extremely offensive nature,"

(SL x x v i i i ) and in some uncollected Sut st o r i e s , Sut indicates

a re a l love for the instance' of profanity per se. While

waiting for dinner under extremely adverse circumstances.

62

(the road-house was flooded and the passengers were standing

in the mire around an i n e f f e c t u a l stove), Sut t e l l s about but

does not record t h i s real language of the f r o n t i e r .

"••.sum[were] a cussin wun another, sum a cussin thersefs, sum a cussin Bull's Gap, sum a cussin wun ta v r i n , sum a cussin fur supper, sum a cussin the str i k e nine snake Whisky, an a l l a cussin thar l e v i l best."25

While Faulkner does not write slapstick of thi s variety, the

s p e c i f i c circumstance of women cursing i s real and humorous

to both Harris and Faulkner. They never f a i l to provide

suitable provocation for i t . As a frightened mule runs

through her yard, Mrs. Hait answers the avaricious I. 0 .

Snopes who wants his half of Mr. Halt's and the mules' com

bined, assessed value with "Catch that big son of a bitch

with the h a l t e r . " (T 239) S i c i l y Burns i s provoked by Sut's

r e t r i b u t i o n . F i n a l l y , angered by Sut's suggestion that she

cool off the rampaging bees with "a mess of SODA,...she l i f t e d

the crock so she could flash her eyes at me [Sut], and said,

'You go to h e l l ! ' just as p l a i n . " (SL 55) In general, Faulkner

l i m i t s the earthy speech of the f r o n t i e r to old women and men.

And Harris, whose S i c i l y Burns would be as much of a goddess

as Eula, had Sut been l i t e r a t e , also invents a tough old lady

who speaks in f r o n t i e r language. Sut describes Mrs. Yardley

as "a great noticer of l i t t l e things that nobody else ever

seed. She'd say, right in the middle of somebody's serious

t a l k : 'Law sakes! Thar goes that y a l l e r slut of a hen,

a - f l i n g i n straws over her shoulder.'" (SL 172) However,

63

Faulkner does not l i m i t his use of this language to humorous

ef f e c t s , as the "Mink** section of The Mansion, among many

other examples in the t r i l o g y , would indicate; but, l i k e

H a rris, he often employs th i s language for humorous ends and

to represent the r e a l i t y of an earthy f r o n t i e r .

There can be l i t t l e doubt about the h i s t o r i c a l accuracy

of Harris and Faulkner's treatment of the folk-speech.

Mcllwaine finds both Tennessee and northern Mi s s i s s i p p i to

be one of the "haunts ofp plain people. There the squires

very l i k e l y possessed the rough forthrightness of a certain

mythical Senator Jones of Arkansas who, in beginning his

harangue about changing the name of his state stormed at the

presiding o f f i c e r : 'Mr. Speakeh, God damn you, Sah, I been 26

t r y i n ' for half an hour to get yo' eye...*" Both Harris

and Faulkner f i n d such language i n high places humorous.

Certainly, when Wirt Staples throws a leg of venison at a

judge in a courtroom, Wirt's cursing him adds to an already

h i l a r i o u s event. "Thar's a dried subpoena for you, you damn

ole cow's paunch." (SL 147) And when Faulkner's character,

Henry Best, yells,"'Wait, god damn i t , ' so loud that they did

hush..." (T 86) , the confusion of the Alderman's board meeting

momentarily ceased.

A less oral and perhaps less humorous language technique

that Faulkner and the Southwestern humorists share i s that of

giving t h e i r characters peculiar names. Ty p i c a l l y , such names

are suggestive of dominant q u a l i t i e s within the character.

64

"Sut Lovingood," then, would perhaps suggest "smut" and

sexual prowess — a phase of h i s character not remarkably

well-developed. "Suggs" perhaps i s a better example. This

i s remarkably s i m i l a r to the word "s l u g , " in Simon's case,

i n d i c a t i v e of the slimy, skulking s n a i l rather than the hard

punch or b u l l e t that the word also means. Of Faulkner's

character-naming, Foster and Campbell say:

Caricature, a sa l i e n t c h a r a c t e r i s t i c of f r o n t i e r humor, [ i s ] . . . apparent i n what might be c a l l e d Faulkner's name humor. ...'Snopes,* then, i s a caricature of a l l "Sn-ishness" in human nature. ...Most important of a l l i s Flem Snopes — the bellwether of the clan. The name suggests two things to us. In the terminology of I. A. Richards, Flem as a "sense" metaphor, suggests "phlegmatic;" as an emotive metaphor, i t suggests phlegm (phonetically spelled "flem" in the d i c t i o n ary). Both f i t Flem's character. The medieval humor, phlegm, when predominant, made a person cold, apathetic, unemotional — so Flem — phlegmatic. As a mucous d i s charge from the mouth, i t bears further r e v o l t i n g connotations.

The name-humor i s further complicated by the introduction of animal nicknames, suggesting Aesopian animal c h a r a c t e r i s t i c , and grandiose Christian names negated by the incongruous nicknames.27

Indeed, Faulkner's clan have more humorous names than any of

those in the writings of the early Southwestern humorists,

perhaps partly because Faulkner paid more attention to t h i s

sort of d e t a i l and perhaps partly because the Southern and

Midwestern phenomena of odd names was not very well developed

in the ante-bellum era in which these humorists wrote. For

H. L. Mencken says:

65

Excessive inbreeding among the mountain people may be responsible in part for this vogue for strange given names "when forty-seven persons in one hollow...possess i d e n t i c a l surnames, the given name becomes the common distinguishing f actor.. ."28

And this inbreeding more than l i k e l y was a post-war phenomenon.

Thus, in both structure and language Faulkner p a r a l l e l s

the Southwestern humorists i n general and Harris in p a r t i c u l a r .

Obviously, Faulkner's use of t h e i r structures and techniques

i s more a r t i s t i c and more complex than Harris's. As his nar

ration of the "Spotted Horses" section in The Hamlet would

indicate, he often achieves a diff e r e n t (in that case,

heightened, super-real) comic effect by deviating from the

formulated practices of the best and purest f r o n t i e r humor —

that of George Washington Harris. These deviations are

conducive to Faulkner's range of tone in the t r i l o g y . Often

the humor i s heightened by his changes, but i n other passages

the results are far from humorous. Two examples of his devia

tion from t r a d i t i o n a l Southwestern humor may serve to indicate

some of the ways in which Faulkner's deviations increase his

range of tone. Both deviations are changes i n language.

The p r e v a i l i n g language i n the best Southwestern humor

i s oral and f i g u r a t i v e . This i s generally true of Faulkner's

most humorous passages. But in humor derived from language

Faulkner does not r e s t r i c t himself to the f r o n t i e r t r a d i t i o n

and regional d i a l e c t . In fa c t , when Jody takes Eula to

school, his " v i s i o n of himself transporting not only across

the v i l l a g e ' s horizon but across the embracing proscenium of

66

the entire inhabited world l i k e the sun i t s e l f , a kaleidoscopic

convolution of mammalian e l l i p s e s " (H 1 0 0 ) i s humorous because

of the poetic language in contrast to what we expect from

Frenchman's Bend in general and Jody Varner in p a r t i c u l a r .

T r a d i t i o n a l l y , the humor of the f r o n t i e r emphasizes the incon

gruity of the hick's language in juxtaposition to r e l a t i v e l y

p l a i n prose. Faulkner has reversed the emphasis of thi s

structure by contrasting t h i s exaggerated poetic prose to the 29

facts of the hick's world. This same pattern, as we have seen,

i s sometimes humorous in Longstreet's works, but while we may

question the e a r l i e r regionalist»s conscious intent, Faulkner

obviously intends humor in his passage.

Indeed, Faulkner has a passion for the incongruities of

language in r e l a t i o n to the event. And although incongruity

i s at the heart of comedy, incongruity per se does not insure

a humorous e f f e c t . Nowhere in his canon i s t h i s better shown

than in Faulkner's Ike-cow passage in The Hamlet. Incongruously

enough, Faulkner took this passage from the v a l i d but unprintable

s t r a i n that Southwestern o r a l humor often was. Faulkner's

frie n d , P h i l Stone, reportedly claimed: The story came to Faulkner as a vulgar anecdote of r u r a l sodomy t o l d by a professional p o l i t i cian campaigning through Oxford. As the p o l i t i c i a n t o l d i t to a few male hangers-on, i t was simply a b r i e f , b r u t a l l y pornographic joke.30

But through Faulkner's treatment, th i s "joke" becomes a story

of love, perhaps the fi n e s t example of Faulkner's counter-

pointing incongruities. Of the many superb scenes of Ike,and

67

the cow, the one most promising of humor i s that of Ike,

who, (having rescued her from a f i r e and tumbled down a

ravine), " l y i n g beneath the struggling and bellowing cow,

received the violent relaxing of her fear constricted bowels."

(H 176) This scatology offers every p o s s i b i l i t y of bawdy

humor, and i t i s instantaneously humorous and pathetic.

Aft e r he attempts to console her for " t h i s violent v i o l a t i o n

of her maiden's delicacy," (H 176) she becomes "maiden medi-

tant, shame f r e e . " (H 177) And in thus deviating from the

language of the f r o n t i e r , Faulkner renders t h i s tale of

"stock-diddling" a story of love which i s more in the realm

of the grotesque and extravagant than i n that of earthy, o r a l

humor. The difference between th i s episode and other episodes

in the f r o n t i e r t r a d i t i o n i s the absolute incongruity of the

language in r e l a t i o n to the event, and the perfect reversal

of the methods of f r o n t i e r humor. Faulkner's poetry here

renders the reader's detachment an i m p o s s i b i l i t y , whereas

the f r o n t i e r humorists' emphasis on backwoods language almost

guarantees t h i s detachment. While to some extent the poetic

language in "Spotted Horses" increases the humor of that

passage, here a s i m i l a r , i f more prolonged use of that language

renders t h i s episode equidistant between the uproariously

funny and the absolutely pathetic. The facts remain that i t

i s a deviation, a change in emphasis on what was o r i g i n a l l y

the stuff of o r a l f r o n t i e r humor to which both Harris and

Faulkner are manifestly indebted.

68

Both authors are geniuses in the f r o n t i e r humor genre.

Harris was the best of the early f r o n t i e r humorists because

of his a r t i s t i c use of the best device for t e l l i n g a tale

and for his superb sense of the incongruities of f r o n t i e r

speech. But Faulkner, i f f o r merely his a r t i s t i c innovations

on the structures and techniques of Harris, i s an even greater

genius. His successful integration of the f a r c i c a l episodes

in the complex t r i l o g y attests to a part of t h i s genius.

Another aspect of i t i s evident within the episodes where

his close p a r a l l e l s and reversals of the t r a d i t i o n a l techniques

of f r o n t i e r humor give ample evidence for his kinship with

Sut's inventor and a s e n s i b i l i t y d i s t i n c t from and greater

than George Washington Harris's.

Faulkner as a f r o n t i e r humorist surpasses Harris in the

same way Harris surpassed his contemporaries. As B l a i r finds

Harris better than they were, I f i n d Faulkner better than

H a r r i s : Faulkner's f r o n t i e r humor i s better because he has

"more sense of incongruities, more exuberance, more imagina

ti o n and because he has greater genius for tra n s f e r r i n g the 31

unique a r t i s t r y of the oral narrative to the printed page."^

Thus, in matters of structure and technique in the t r i l o g y ,

Faulkner incorporates Harris's methods for a somewhat deriva

t i v e and yet manifestly greater a r t i s t i c e f f e c t .

69

FOOTNOTES: CHAPTER III

Faulkner in the University: Class Conferences at the University of V i r g i n i a 1957-1958, eds. Frederick L. Gwynn and Joseph L. Blotner ( C h a r l o t t e s v i l l e , 1959), P. 90.

2 I b i d . , p. 193-3 •'The Hamlet contains revised versions of "Fool About a

Horse,* "The Hound," "Spotted Horses," "Lizards in Jamshyd's Courtyard," "Barn Burning," and "Afternoon of a Cow." The Town includes revisions of "Centaur in Brass," "Mule in the Yard," and "The Waifs;" and The Mansion includes "By the People."

^Faulkner in the University, pp. 14-15-

^William Faulkner, The Mansion (New York, 1959). Hereafter c i t e d in t h i s text as M with page references in parentheses •

^Faulkner in the University, p. 17. 7 'Brooks, p. 175-g Olga Vickery, The Novels of William Faulkner: A

C r i t i c a l Interpretation (Baton Rouge. 1959). P. 167. O r i g i n a l l y i n reference to The Hamlet, th i s passage applies equally to the t r i l o g y as a whole.

^Margaret Edith Galbraith, Faulkner*s T r i l o g y : Technique as Approach to Theme. University of B r i t i s h Columbia Masters Thesis (Vancouver, 1962), pp. 56-57-

l 0 W i l l i a m Faulkner, The Hamlet (New York, Vintage Edition), Hereafter c i t e d in thi s text as H with page references in parentheses•

1 1 W l l l i a m Faulkner, The Town (New York, 1961). Hereafter c i t e d in the text as T with page references in parentheses.

12 B l a i r , Native American Humor, p. 92.

* 3The whole of The Reivers i s t o l d some f i f t y years afterward but the use of thi s device for detachment i s not so e f f e c t i v e because the f i r s t person narrative of Lucius Prie s t dominates the book and the reader tends to forget the opening sentence, "GRANDFATHER SAID:" (William Faulkner, The Reivers (New York, 1962), p. 3-)

7 0

^The term bourgeois humor, as I use i t in t h i s thesis, indicates that humor which, in contrast to f r o n t i e r humor, tends to be more feminine than masculine, more learned than blunt, and which focuses on subjects that are more concerned with s o c i a l consciousness than with individualism. While f r o n t i e r humor involves highly f i g u r a t i v e language and often derives from violent action, the language of bourgeois humor i s often p l a i n or euphemistic and i t s action i s usually without violence. It i s tame and quixotic. Gavin Stevens and the Mallisons are often the characters of Faulkner's bourgeois humor and perhaps the most laughable example of i t i s "the Rouncewell Panic." (T 7 0 - 7 2 )

15 ' B l a i r , Native American Humor, p. 92. This last incon

gruity (that between realism and fantasy) because the "narrator selects d e t a i l s " [ i t a l i c s mine] implies character revelation — one subject of Chapter V of t h i s t h e s i s .

l 0The Portable Faulkner, ed., Malcolm Cowley (New York, 1946), p. 366.

17 Fred Lewis Pattee, A History of American Literature

since 1870 (New York, 1915), P. 83. 18

Indubitably romantic, t h i s image resembles one in Shelley's "Ode to the West Wind" which Faulkner might have known•

...there are spread On the blue surface of thine aery surge. Like the bright h a i r u p l i f t e d from the head Of some f i e r c e Maenad.... [l l - 1 8 - 2 1 ]

19 'William Faulkner, "Centaur in Brass," in Collected

Stories of William Faulkner (New York, 1950), p. 152. Hereafter c i t e d as Collected Stories with page references in parentheses.

20 *wMy i t a l i c s . 21

Mcllwaine says: " A l l but the most refined planters had one l i t e r a r y standard for books read in the family c i r c l e and anecdotes related to guests on the veranda, another for the yarns swapped on the courthouse square, at the l i v e r y s t a b l e . . . . " (Shields Mcllwaine, The Southern Poor White (University of Oklahoma, 1939), p. 41-)

2 2Bernard De Voto, Mark Twain's America (New York, 1933), P. 92. 23 Ibid., p. 153-

71

24 Mcllwaine, p. 4 1 . 25

George Washington Harris, "Sut Lovengood at Bull's Gap," The Lovingood Papers ( 1 9 6 2 ) , p. 3 9 .

2 6McIlwaine, p. 4 1 .

27 Harry Campbell and Ruel Poster, William Faulkner; A

C r i t i c a l Appraisal (Oklahoma, 1 9 5 1 ) , PP. IO4-IO5. ~ 28 H. L. Mencken, The American Language (New York, 1 9 3 7 ) ,

p. 5 2 3 . (Mencken quotes Miriam M. Sizer, "Christian Names in the Blue Ridge of V i r g i n i a , " American Speech ( A p r i l , 1 9 3 3 ) . )

29 See Chapter II, page 15 of thi s thesis.

30 ^ P h i l Stone as guoted by Campbell and Foster, p. 9 9 . 31 ^ B l a i r , Native American Humor, p. 101.

A-

72

IV. Milieu and Theme

To arrive at a balanced view of the South i s a task

beset at the outset with complications. Writings about the

South are notorious f o r being more an indication of the

writers' prejudices than t h e i r facts because accounts other

than mere s t a t i s t i c s (and even those sometimes) are doomed

to attack from other vantage points. Much of the confusion

stems from attempts to c l a r i f y the whole South and much

stems from too hasty generalizations from too few pa r t i c u

l a r s . Further confusion arises from the South's r e l a t i v e

i n s u l a r i t y both before and after the C i v i l War. This

i n s u l a r i t y , besides greatly hindering the development of any

universally acceptable description of the South, gave sus

tenance to the South's regional consciousness, which was

born in the f i r s t decades of the nineteenth century and

became especially acute in the l a t t e r half of that century.

The rest of the country, as Howe says, "was becoming a s e l f -

conscious nation... [while] the South, because i t was a

pariah region,...struggled desperately to keep i t s e l f i n t a c t .

Through an exercise of the w i l l , i t i n s i s t e d that the regional

memory be the main shaper of i t s l i f e . " ^ " And the cultured,

often romanticized South i s a part of this memory. As the

rest of the nation became increasingly urbanized and indus

t r i a l i z e d , t h i s romanticized South, as well as the somewhat

less romantic backwoods areas, did in fact become a "pariah

region."

73

As observers and historians from Frederick Law Olmsted

to C. Vann Woodward have pointed out, the c l a s s i c a l and c u l

tured old South, while to some extent a fact in V i r g i n i a , i s

largely a myth i n r e l a t i o n to the facts of almost any other

Southern state. W. J . Cash finds that " i t was actually 1820

before the plantation was f u l l y on the march, s t r i d i n g over 2

the h i l l s of Carolina to M i s s i s s i p p i . . . . " He further explains the chronology of the South*s growth thus:

From 1820 to 1860 i s but forty years — a l i t t l e more than the span of a single generation. The whole period from the invention of the cotton gin to the outbreak of the C i v i l War i s less than seventy years — the l i f e t i m e of a single man. Yet i t was wholly within the longer of these periods, and mainly within the shorter, that the development and growth of the great South took place....

The inference i s p l a i n . It i s impossible to conceive the great South as being, on the whole, more than a few steps removed from the f r o n t i e r stage at the beginning of the C i v i l War. It i s imperative, indeed, to conceive i t as having remained more or less f u l l y in the f r o n t i e r stage for a great part — maybe the greater part — of i t s antebellum history.3

And t h i s i s the South that the antebellum re g i o n a l i s t s write

about.

In general, frontiersmen as a group were bound together

by a common closeness to and struggle with the land. This

struggle largely dictated t h e i r everyday l i v e s . And the

fact that they chose to grow cotton to the exclusion of

other crops, and t h i s at a time when "cotton was king,"

when only a f o o l or a dunce would grow anything less

74

pr o f i t a b l e , had a great effect on the l a t e r Southern f r o n t i e r s

men — in fact, t h i s , along with the i n s u l a r i t y of the South,

i s perhaps another reason many l a t e r Southerners remained

v i r t u a l frontiersmen, or at least "red-neck farmers," too

poor even to leave the "pariah region." The f i n a n c i a l burden

of the cotton monopolies and the natural burden of cotton's

tendency to deplete and erode the s o i l effected disaster for

generations of Southerners.

Another common denominator of this f r o n t i e r i s the nature

of i t s i n s t i t u t i o n s . By comparison with those of the North

and the seabord states, the s o c i a l i n s t i t u t i o n s of t h i s f r o n t i e r

— i t s r e l i g i o n , education, and government — were at best

inchoate. They were growing, but they were anything but stable.

The camp meeting, the school which met only when a teacher was

available and then only when the children were not needed by

t h e i r parents in the f i e l d s , and a t r a v e l l i n g l e g a l system

were the s o c i a l i n s t i t u t i o n s of t h i s f r o n t i e r . This i s not

to say that there was no common meeting ground for f r o n t i e r s

men. Their meeting place was the store, the inn, wherever

they might speak to one another. But they constituted perhaps

the most heterogeneous group of peoples since the Tower of

Babel.

"It was as i f a l l the world had gone on a picaresque journey by general consent in various quarters, and at the chance roundup for nightly rest and refreshment f e l l to t e l l i n g what, and especially whom, they had met with."4

75

The frontiersmen, in spite of t h e i r g a r r u l i t y , were

anything but homogeneous. As t h e i r i n s t i t u t i o n s and hetero

geneity might f o r e t e l l , the pervasive common denominator and

the r e a l core of t h e i r existence was t h e i r individualism:

...even at the best and f u l l e s t , the idea of s o c i a l r e s p o n s i b i l i t y which grew up i n the South remained always a narrow and purely personal one. The defect here was fundamental in the primary model. The Virginians themselves, i f they had long since become truly a r i s t o c r a t i c , had nevertheless never got beyond that brutal individualism — and for a l l the Jeffersonian g l o r i f i c a t i o n of the idea, i t was brutal as i t worked out i n the plantation world — which was the heritage of the f r o n t i e r : that i n d i vidualism which, while w i l l i n g enough to ameliorate the s p e c i f i c instance, r e l e n t l e s s l y l a i d down as i t s basic s o c i a l postulate the doctrine that every man was completely and wholly responsible for himself.5

Although there i s t h i s "brutal 1* i n d i v i d u a l i s t i c aspect of the

frontiersman's nature, there also i s at least a hint of r e f i n

ment. Because he shared the planters* acceptance of the

V i r g i n i a n a r i s t o c r a t as a model worthy of imitation, the

common yeoman farmer gained a certain degree of g e n t i l i t y .

Cash speaks about these farmers as having n a kindly courtesy,

a level-eyed pride, an easy quietness, a barely perceptible

f l o u r i s h of bearing, which, for a l l i t s obvious angularity

and fundamental plainness, was one of the finest things the

Old South produced.**^ And further, even the poor white gaine

something of t h i s q u a l i t y . Indeed,

A l l the way down the l i n e there was a softening and gentling of the heritage of the backwoods. In every degree the masses took on, under t h e i r slouch, a sort of unkempt politeness and ease of port, which rendered them d e f i n i t e l y superior.

76

in respect of manner, to t h e i r peers in the rest of the country.7

As Cash's words might indicate, the pervasive, relentless

individualism governed every aspect of the common whites'

l i v e s . Theoretically i t explains much of t h e i r provincialism.

Further, this individualism i s at the core of the f r o n t i e r l s

enigmatic paradoxes — for instance, the paradox of b r u t a l i t y

and courtesy or the apparent oxymoron of a slouching p o l i t e

ness. And these paradoxes indicate the variety of ways in

which t h i s f r o n t i e r may be described. And thus, there are

multifarious f r o n t i e r milieus of which the f r o n t i e r humorists'

i s but one. And c e r t a i n l y , these f r o n t i e r humorists created

— by emphasizing certain r e a l i t i e s of this f r o n t i e r — a

s t y l i z e d and, to the eye of the modern reader, perhaps a

romanticized m i l i e u .

There are, then, three f r o n t i e r milieus which are r e l e

vant to f r o n t i e r humor: the stereotyped romanticized South,

i f only because i t i s generally absent i n the best of f r o n t i e r

humor; the h i s t o r i c a l Southern f r o n t i e r ; and the f r o n t i e r of

the Southern humorists, the l i t e r a r y f r o n t i e r . The South,

as portrayed by both Faulkner and Harris, does have a h i s t o r i c a l

relevance, and the h i s t o r i c a l v a l i d i t y of t h e i r writings i s ,

in some instances, an illuminating way to come to t h e i r works;

but of more importance, I think, i s the s i m i l a r i t y they achieve

in the creation of a l i t e r a r y f r o n t i e r — especially for the

purposes of f r o n t i e r humor. In other words, to what extent

Faulkner's and Harris's f r o n t i e r s are h i s t o r i c a l l y accurate

77

i s of less importance to a study of t h e i r f r o n t i e r humor

than the fact that these f r o n t i e r s , as they present them,

are s i m i l a r . Thus, the p a r a l l e l s between nineteenth century

Knoxville and twentieth century Oxford are not r e a l l y as

important as the p a r a l l e l s between Pat Nash's grocery and

W i l l Varner's store.

Both authors achieve a certain degree of realism by

t h e i r emphasis on the land and i t s objects. Not only do t h e i r

characters tend to view l i f e in terms of t h i s land, but the

authors themselves emphasize the things (the animals and

objects) of the f r o n t i e r in t h e i r descriptions of the land

and the people. Technically, t h i s i s f a r more true of Faulkner

than of Harris, for in Sut Lovingood nearly a l l of the des

cr i p t i o n s are Sut's. Nevertheless, in introducing Sut to

the public, Harris describes his p r i n c i p a l character as

being:

.•.hog-eyed, funny sort of a genius — fresh from some bench-legged Jew's clothing store; mounted on Tearpoke, a n i c k - t a i l e d , bow-necked, long, poor, pale s o r r e l horse, half-dandy, h a l f - d e v i l , and enveloped in a perfect network of b r i d l e , reins, crupper, martingales, straps, surcingles, and red f e r r e t i n g — who reined up in front of Pat Nash's grocery among a crowd of mountaineers f u l l of fun, foolery, and mean whiskey. This was Sut Lovingood. (SI 3 -4)

Faulkner's attention to d e t a i l i s even more thorough than

Harris's, and in the f i r s t two pages of The Hamlet Faulkner

describes Frenchman's Bend and i t s people. The land was:

...parcelled out now into small s h i f t l e s s mortgaged farms for the directors of Jefferson

78

bank8 to squabble over before s e t t l i n g f i n a l l y to W i l l Varner,... [One of the things of this land i s an old plantation house which these people] had been p u l l i n g down and chopping up — walnut newel posts and s t a i r spindles, oak fl o o r s — ...for firewood.

[The s e t t l e r s o r i g i n a l l y came to th i s land] in battered wagons and on mule-back and even on foot, with f l i n t l o c k r i f l e s and dogs and children and home-made whiskey s t i l l s and Protestant psalmbooks...They brought no slaves and no Phyfe and Chippendale highboys; indeed, what they did bring most of them could...carry in t h e i r hands. They took up land and b u i l t one- and two-room cabins and never painted them... (H 3-4)

Both Harris and Faulkner, then, sense that the basic r e a l i t y

of the backwoodsman l i e s in what he does with what he has.

And Faulkner, following his p r e d i l e c t i o n for showing the other

side of the coin, achieves a heightened realism by explaining

what they do not have. ("They brought no slaves and no Phyfe

and Chippendale highboys...™) And thus, he himself repudiates

the myth of an aristocracy (at least in r e l a t i o n to the world

of Frenchman's Bend).

Another way in which these two authors* l i t e r a r y fron

t i e r s are similar i s through Faulkner*s lack of emphasis on

twentieth century mechanization. C e c i l Eby may be generous

in his estimate of how long the f r o n t i e r was unaffected by

modern technology, and his implied date of the cotton gin's

invention i s late ( i t was invented in 1793), but he does

comment on the s i m i l a r i t i e s between th i s backwoods South and

the antebellum South. "Although the time [of The Hamletl

i s about 1890, [Faulkner said 1907 8] i t could well be I84O

7 9

of 1940 f o r with the exception of a cotton gin and the sewing

machine, there i s nothing which depends upon technological 9

orientation within a p a r t i c u l a r period.™ Thus, Faulkner

presents a l i t e r a r y f r o n t i e r in which his emphasis on the

things and general lack of anachronisms render his f r o n t i e r

p a r a l l e l to Harris's f r o n t i e r . Faulkner does, however, in

some instances (such as the old Frenchman's place) portray

a post-bellum f r o n t i e r , but his poor whites show a provincialism

p a r a l l e l to that which Harris himself expresses in his comment

on the "bench-legged Jew" and comparable sentiments which

appear freguently in uncollected Sut episodes.*^ For example,

Faulkner's poor whites would have considered that "...anyone

speaking the tongue with a foreign f l a v o r or whose appearance

or even occupation was strange, would have been a Frenchman

regardless of what n a t i o n a l i t y he might a f f i r m . . . . " (H 3)

With the exception of Faulkner's portrayal of Mink i n

The Mansion, neither Harris nor Faulkner consciously emphasize

the pathos of the poor whites* poverty. But the p a r a l l e l

instances of Sut's father "playin hoss," albeit for comic

eff e c t , and the report from an anonymous bystander that

"• when t h e i r [the Armstid's] mule died three or four years

ago, him and her broke t h e i r land working time about i n the

traces with the other mule'" (H 318) are i n d i c a t i v e of the

lack of work animals and a general poverty as well as the

struggle against the land that pervades th i s l i t e r a t u r e about

the f r o n t i e r . Both Harris's and Faulkner's lack of emphasis

80

on the pathos of the poverty of t h e i r characters tends to

make the modern reader accept this poverty as a sort of

elemental condition against which to some extent a l l the

characters struggle. And indeed some c r i t i c s would argue

that Faulkner's frontiersmen are not poverty-stricken. For

instance. Brooks makes a v a l i d point when he argues that not

a l l of the characters are "poor white trash.**

They are white people, many of them poor, and most of them l i v i n g on farms; but they are not to be put down necessarily as *poor whites.* ...[The unwary reader] may too e a s i l y conclude that the McCallums and the T u l l s are simply poor white trash.-11

Sut's poverty i s never acknowledged by Harris in direct

statements and perhaps, by modern standards, his ubiquitous

flask would make him anything but poverty-stricken. While

Sut i s too busy running away from and into trouble to have

any job, a l l of the people of Frenchman's Bend (with the

exception of W i l l Varner) work at something — although for

much of The Hamlet they s i t (true to t h e i r backwoods g a r r u l i t y )

carving and chatting on the porch of W i l l Varner's store.

But i f Harris and Faulkner f a i l to emphasize the poverty

of the f r o n t i e r , they do not f a i l to exaggerate i t s other

aspects. Both emphasize action in t h e i r humor, and the action

of the frontiersman has long been exaggerated for comic

e f f e c t . This and another common element of f r o n t i e r humor —

the motley men the f r o n t i e r was often supposed to attract —

are substantiated by Boatright, who quotes an early Texas

newspaper:

81

"They have a l i t t l e town out West...which is ' a l l sorts of a s t i r r i n g place.* In one day they recently had two street f i g h t s , hung a man, rode three men out of town on a r a i l , got up a quarter race, a turkey shooting, a gander p u l l i n g , a match dog fi g h t , and preaching by a circus r i d e r , who afterwards ran a foot race for apple jack a l l around, and, as i f thi s was not enough, the judge of the court, after losing his year's salary at single-handed poker, and whipping a person who said he did not understand the game, went out and helped lynch his grandfather for hog stealing.**12

Neither Harris nor Faulkner write episodes with t h i s much

action in them. They both prefer to give detailed descrip

tions of single moments of extremely fast action and Faulkner

even carr i e s this d e t a i l e d description into the development

of tableaus where the result i s not the possible suspended

abstraction but a reaffirmation and heightening of his

l i t e r a r y f r o n t i e r . That the real f r o n t i e r had moments of

fast action can hardly be doubted, but that they were as

universally comic as Faulkner and Harris render them i s quite

questionable. But here the reader's ignorance or w i l l i n g

suspension of d i s b e l i e f i s part of th e i r c r e d i b i l i t y . Brooks

finds that the setting of The Hamlet

. . . i s one that few modern urban and suburban Americans know anything about at f i r s t hand and about which they are perfectly w i l l i n g to believe anything p a r t i c u l a r l y because i t i s set in the South and populated by poor whites. The association that most c i t i z e n s have with such a community i s l i k e l y to be through A l Capp's cartoons of Dogpatch.13

Henry Watterson, writing of Sut Lovingood, romantically i n d i

cates a further distance from our modern world — that of

82

time. The Southwestern humorists wrote in an era when the

i n t r i c a c i e s of l i f e were more homely and uncomplicated.

Wat t e rs on s ay s :

They flourished years ago in the good old time of muster days and quarter-racing, before the camp-meeting and the barbecue had lost t h e i r power and t h e i r charm; when men led simple, homely l i v e s , doing t h e i r love-making and the i r law-making as they did t h e i r f i g h t i n g and th e i r plowing, in a straight furrow; when there was no national debt multiplying the dangers and magnifying the expenses of d i s t i l l a t i o n in the h i l l s and hollows, and pouring in upon the logr o l l i n g , the q u i l t i n g , the corn-shucking, and the f i s h - f r y an i n q u i s i t o r i a l crew of tax-gatherers and detectives to s p o i l the sport and d u l l the edge of p a t r i o t i c husbandry•

And the men who inhabit these l i t e r a r y f r o n t i e r s are just as

removed as the sett i n g and time in which they are placed.

For, as Howe says, "none of the conspicuous actors in

Faulkner's world come from the major s o c i a l groups we are 15

accustomed to meeting in l i f e or l i t e r a t u r e . "

Thus, there i s actually a second l e v e l of the l i t e r a r y

f r o n t i e r , a l e v e l of fantasy which arises from exaggeration

and d i s t o r t i o n of action and values and i s predicated by the

reader's u n f a m i l i a r i t y and naivete. Such a legendary figure

as Davy Crockett i s a product of thi s sort of fantasy on the

f r o n t i e r where emphasis, exaggeration, d i s t o r t i o n and implica

tions of un i v e r s a l i t y a l l combine to portray a character that

i s larger than l i f e . But where the gargantuan fantasy-

figure of Crockett remains t o t a l l y removed from r e a l i t y .

83

Faulkner's and Harris's figures o s c i l l a t e between fantasy

and r e a l i t y . Brooks finds that Fulkner's (and certainly

the same would apply to Harris's) use of t h i s o s c i l l a t i o n

gives the effect of a " d i s t o r t i o n mirror."

...The folk community...is so far removed from our own that i t seems simple to the point of fabulousness, and yet we continue to believe in i t . Perhaps i t i s r e a l l y a d i s t o r t i o n mirror which turns our faces into grotesquely comic caricatures...[and] returns to us...the image of ourselves.1"

Harris's and Faulkner's settings are also s i m i l a r . Both

authors* passages of action are often placeless. It i s as i f

they viewed t h e i r scenes through telephoto lenses for indeed

they focus on s p e c i f i c things and present only the rudiments

of a complete scene. By pinpointing t h e i r attention on d e t a i l s ,

they increase the reader's sense of speed and confusion to

the minimizing of his sense of i d e n t i f i a b l e place. For a l l

of Harris's s p e c i f i c i t y about the things of the f r o n t i e r , for

a l l his emphasis on traces, reins and h a l t e r s , mules and

horses, l i z a r d s , bees, and whiskey, there i s no sense of

s p e c i f i c place in his passages of action because his comic

episodes could happen anywhere — anywhere on the f r o n t i e r ,

that i s . Perhaps th i s placelessness in Harris's episodes

indicates a sort of u n i v e r s a l i t y , for Brom Weber notes that

"the geography...is scrambled together so that Sut...is

everywhere at once. The physical background i s vague, though

Sut i s f u l l y capable of precise d e s c r i p t i o n . " (SL xxiv)

And while Faulkner's The Hamlet i s set in the mythical world

of Frenchman's Bend, The Town i s set in Jefferson and The

Mansion has various settings. This would perhaps indicate

that the l a t t e r two novels ought to contain less f r o n t i e r

humor of action than The Hamlet, as indeed The Mansion does.

But though Faulkner's episodes, l i k e Harris's, are t y p i c a l l y

placeless, both authors* episodes seem r e a l to some extent

because they are permeated with things of the f r o n t i e r . As

an examination of his episodes w i l l reveal, Faulkner t y p i c a l l y

sets these passages of action outside of Jefferson, i n a place

where, for example, the chase i t s e l f , as well as the fa n t a s t i c

image of Tom Tom and Turl looking l i k e **them double-jointed

half-horse f e l l e r s in the old picture books1* (T 26) becomes

credible. Placelessness may also exist within Jefferson in

such an episode as a **Mule in the Yard.** Here, the furious

tangle of mules, people, and barnyard animals extends into

the realm of fantasy by Faulkner*s careful attention to boun

daries and atmosphere. The result i s that the minute yard,

enveloped by a thick fog, becomes microcosmic and indeed

placeless during the melee.

Faulker and Harris, besides exaggerating the action of

th e i r l i t e r a r y f r o n t i e r s , exaggerate and perhaps even d i s t o r t

for comic effect the frontiersman's values and attitudes.

For instance, while Sut and R a t l i f f often have penetrating

insights of a r e a l i s t i c nature, they are both humorous in

t h e i r exaggerated f r o n t i e r evaluations of the r e l a t i v e worth

of those two elements which play such an important part in

85

the comedy of The Hamlet — horses and women. Sut, in

describing Parson Bullen's breach of confidence explodes,

'•[that].. .stinkin ole ground-hog! He'da heap better a-

stole some man's hoss [than reveal to the cuckolded husband

Sut and his camp-meeting friend's love making]; I'da thought

more of him." (SL 82) But while Sut implies the f r o n t i e r s

man's higher esteem f o r a horse than a woman, R a t l i f f (in

his comment on Flem's acquisition of Jody's horse) magnifies

th i s esteem beyond c r e d i b i l i t y when he says, "A man takes

your wife and a l l you got to do to ease your feelings i s to

shoot him. But your horse. 1* (H 85) Thus, the humor i s

heightened by R a t l i f f ' s thinking in the terms of t h i s fantasy

f r o n t i e r where present-day values are topsy-turvy. And fur

ther comedy may result from our uncertainty as to whether

th i s i s the thought of R a t l i f f , the frontiersman, or R a t l i f f ,

the bachelor.

On the subject of Yankees, p a r t i c u l a r l y the men of Northern

industry, we f i n d Sut to be the more f a n t a s t i c ; true to the

l i t e r a r y fantasy of Harris's f r o n t i e r , Sut speaks with blatant

exaggerations and well-chosen d i s t o r t i o n s .

He [the Yankee] were hatched in a crack — in the frosty rocks where nutmegs am made outen maple, and where women paints clock-faces and paints shoe-pegs, and the men invents rat-traps, man-traps, and new-fangled doctrines for the aid of the D e v i l . (SL 69)

And i f the reader should have any doubts as to Sut's attitude

toward an intruder, especially a Northerner, he more than

c l a r i f i e s t h i s when George asks whether Bake Boyd's man was

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a Negro. "Worse nor t h a t . He was a mighty mean Yankee

razor-grinder....™ (SL 2 6 ) , But R a t l i f f t a k e s a more

r e a l i s t i c a t t i t u d e :

[ N o r t h e r n e r s ] . . . d o e s t h i n g s d i f f e r e n t from us. I f a f e l l o w i n t h e c o u n t r y was t o s e t up a goat r a n c h , he would do i t p u r e l y and s i m p l y because he had t o o many goats a l r e a d y . He would j u s t d e c l a r e h i s roof or h i s f r o n t p o rch ...a g o a t - r a n c h and l e t i t go at t h a t . [ B u t ] when [ a N o r t h e r n e r ] does something, he does i t w i t h a o r g a n i z e d s y n d i c a t e and a book of p r i n t e d r u l e s and a g o l d - f i l l e d d i p l o m a from the S e c r e t a r y of S t a t e at J a c k s o n . . . . (H 80)

Both c h a r a c t e r s see the c o n f l i c t s between the i n d u s t r i a l N o r t h

and the a g r a r i a n S o u t h . R a t l i f f ' s statement i s o b v i o u s l y more

t r u e of what we might expect from a S o u t h e r n e r ; and i f h i s

statement i s l e s s v i n d i c t i v e than S u t ' s , i t i s not any l e s s

s t r o n g l y f e l t . That R a t l i f f , h i m s e l f a country-man, makes

h i s l i v e l i h o o d from s e l l i n g sewing machines i s a t y p i c a l ,

a l t h o u g h i n t h i s case not n e c e s s a r i l y a c o n s c i o u s , F a u l k n e r i a n

i r o n y , which stems from the i n c o n g r u i t i e s of h i s l i t e r a r y

f r o n t i e r — a m i l i e u , l i k e H a r r i s ' s , which i s a p e r f e c t jumble

of the r e a l and the f a n c i f u l .

Both m i l i e u s , by v i r t u e of t h i s o s c i l l a t i o n between the

r e a l and the f a n c i f u l , p r o v i d e i d e a l comic i n c o n g r u i t i e s f o r

b o t h w r i t e r s ; but i n F a u l k n e r ' s h a n d l i n g , t h e s e i n c o n g r u i t i e s

a r e , as we have seen, a n y t h i n g but s t r i c t l y comic. Indeed,

h i s o b s e s s i o n w i t h i n c o n g r u i t y per se i s one source of the

marvelous c o m p l e x i t i e s of the t r i l o g y . In c r e a t i n g t h e i r

l i t e r a r y m i l i e u s , t h e n , H a r r i s and F a u l k n e r make the i n c r e d i b l e

seem c r e d i b l e , and the c r e d i b l e , the r e a l , seem somewhat

87

marvelous. And in t h e i r l i t e r a r y f r o n t i e r s , the state of

flux, both re a l and f a n c i f u l , i s conducive to humor and

inordinately complex incongruities of e f f e c t . The f r o n t i e r

f l u x i s that between government and anarchy, between ethnic

groups, classes and clans who are remarkable for t h e i r pro

v i n c i a l outlook at once more rea l and d i s t o r t e d than that

of, or even acceptable to, the p r e v a i l i n g culture outside

t h i s "pariah region," which was inhabited by hyper-rindi v i d u a l i s -

t i c people who are simultaneously brutal and somewhat reserved

and who are motivated by t h e i r need for money and fun in a

generally drab but by no means motionless land where the crop

i s one which requires hard work at planting and harvesting

and no work between those times. This f l u x and confusion and

i n s u l a r i t y , plus the reader's ignorance of the region, gives

the writer a poetic license, a horizon of imaginative freedom,

the boundaries of which remain undiscovered.

II

The complexities and incongruities in t h e i r l i t e r a r y

milieu and in the t r a d i t i o n of f r o n t i e r humor, then, provide

fo r the use of simple c o n f l i c t s and themes. In the largest

sense, Harris's Sut Lovingood i s b u i l t on the simplest of

a l l c o n f l i c t s -- that between good and e v i l . The same con

f l i c t permeates Faulkner's Snopes t r i l o g y . And both writers

are masters at varying this c o n f l i c t . Their l i t e r a r y f r o n t i e r s

provide highly regionalized values — values that imply strange

88

new goods and e v i l s . But Faulkner's superior variation on

t h i s c o n f l i c t stems from his creation of o s c i l l a t i n g thematic

characters (such as Tomey's Turl) who represent r e l a t i v e

goods and e v i l s .

Harris, by having Sut t e l l his own story and by making

him his own moral judge and the protagonist against e v i l ,

d e f t l y captures his reader's suspension of d i s b e l i e f . Sut's

language and i n s i g h t , as well as his cleverness in arranging

"big scares'* for those he considers evil-doers, gains him the

reader's sympathies. We never guestion John Bullen's hypoc-17

r i s y . It i s fact — Sut says so — and Bullen r i c h l y

deserves what treatment he gets. Just as excessive in his

invective and declamatory statements as he i s in his e f f o r t s

against his enemies, Sut portrays his enemies as i f they were

Satan's henchmen on the f r o n t i e r . For example, S t i l l y a r d s ,

the former schoolmaster, was, Sut says, ...as o i l y , slippery a lawyer as ever took a fee...[who] practiced on a l l the misfortunate d e v i l s round that c i r c u i t t i l l he got sassy, got niggers, got rich,...got r e l i g i o n and got to Congress. The f i r s t thing he did there were to p r o f f e r to tend the Capitol grounds in onions and beans on shares; ...when he dies h e ' l l make the fastest trip to the center of soot, sorrow, and smoke on record, not even exceptin ole Iscariot's fast time. (SL 70)

Rarely does Faulkner draw such an e v i l f i gure. Rather, by

his tendency to complicate characters and themes by v a r i a

tions in point of view, he often draws more than one side

of a character, and the reader may be faced with the dilemma

of deciding which of the multifarious r e a l i t i e s i s most r e a l .

89

One need only contrast Mink Snopes of The Hamlet with Mink

in The Mansion to see what remarkable changes Faulkner i s

capable of. In short, Faulkner avoids drawing characters

who are, throughout the t r i l o g y , consistently and absolutely

e v i l , and his sense of incongruity effects some r a d i c a l

changes in character. And many of his figures (such as

Turl) are caricatures, capable of being presented again and

again in the Yoknapatawpha books with a d i f f e r e n t emphasis

on t h e i r character — good or e v i l — as Faulkner requires.

Besides presenting the same basic c o n f l i c t , a further

s i m i l a r i t y in Harris's and Faulkner's episodes of f r o n t i e r

humor i s t h e i r p a r a l l e l use of an equally simple theme —

that of r e t r i b u t i o n . . Certainly this theme i s consistent

with both authors* milieus and i t does indeed r e f l e c t the

"brutal individualism** of the r e a l f r o n t i e r . There, the

violence such a theme might imply could even be considered

a pastime or entertainment. Eby explains, "The f i g h t , l i k e

the quarter race or the hunt was accepted as a competitive

sport, an affirmation of manhood. [And] violent personalized

action, detached from vindictiveness or meanness, was a 18

favori t e subject of the regi o n a l i s t s . .. But violence per

se i s hardly humorous; and i t i s through the confusion of

men, beasts, and things in Harris*s Sut Lovingood that this

f r o n t i e r commonplace becomes humorous. Having j u s t i f i e d his

r e t r i b u t i o n to the reader, Sut i s unusually regular in meting

90

out one variety of punishment — pain. In fact, there i s

hardly an episode of r e t r i b u t i o n in which Sut's adversary i s

not at least in physical pain, and often the embarrassing

circumstances which accompany many of Sut's pranks might be

considered mental pain. The redundance of t h i s theme and

the r e s u l t i n g violence i s , in fact, one of the defects of

Sut Lovingood as a book-length work, for the s i m p l i c i t y of

Harris's s t o r i e s , combined with the r e p e t i t i v e confusion,

violence, noise and damage can be quite tiresome.

While the whole of the t r i l o g y might also be considered

a story of r e t r i b u t i o n , no such defect mars Faulkner's work.

One of his greatest a r t i s t i c achievements i s his meaningful

treatment of simple themes; and indeed, while r e t r i b u t i o n as

a theme i s pervasive in the t r i l o g y , Faulkner's shading of

p a r a l l e l incidents, his a b i l i t y to vary the outcome, the

motivation, and the mode of r e t r i b u t i o n and to present the

f r u s t r a t i n g lack of r e t r i b u t i o n heightens the already complex

language and s t r u c t u r a l incongruities in the work as a whole.

For instance, Faulkner's treatment of the a l l too f r u s t r a t i n g

lack of meaningful r e t r i b u t i o n in The Hamlet, besides i n d i

cating T u l l ' s (indeed, Frenchman's Bend's) f r o n t i e r attitude

of "It aint none of our business," (H 72) gives r i s e to much

of the tension in the novel. This i s even more true of The

Town, for Jefferson's bourgeois morality hinders the towns

people from taking even such s o c i a l l y acceptable retributions

as R a t l i f f ' s mainly economic and i n t e l l e c t u a l attacks on Flem

in The Hamlet. A l l but Tom Tom and Turl's victory over Flem

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in The Town and R a t l i f f ' s e f f e c t i v e r e t r i b u t i o n on Clarence

Snopes in The Mansion produce somewhat hollow r e s u l t s . These

hollow results perhaps r e f l e c t the twentieth century confusion

of ethics with s t a b i l i t y and of r e s p e c t a b i l i t y with the d o l l a r .

For instance, by worsting I. 0. Snopes, Mrs. Hait unwittingly

helps Flem remove one more obstacle towards his goal of

gaining r e s p e c t a b i l i t y in Jefferson. Even more irony l i e s

in the fact that i t i s Flem Snopes and not Gavin Stevens (the

most vocal of Faulkner's anti-Snopes triumverate) that rids

Jefferson of the rapacious family in The Town. That The Mansion

contains a huge range of effects (from murder to R a t l i f f ' s

comic victory) which evolve from the simple theme of r e t r i b u

tion i s additional proof of Faulkner's l i t e r a r y a r t i s t r y in

varying his treatment of t h i s theme.

Faulkner's humorous episodes, although far more complicated

than Harris's, have a si m i l a r tendency towards this recurrence

of r e t r i b u t i o n as a theme. But what complicates Faulkner's

humorous episodes thematically i s his p r e d i l e c t i o n to t e l l

more than one story at a time, to use a large number of charac

ters, and more importantly, to extend the simplest form of

re t r i b u t i o n , violence, into realms of a more bourgeois nature,

among which one of his favorites i s that of business. In

fact, the variety of ways in which Faulkner's characters get

back at evil-doers i s one reason that the world of The Hamlet

seems more rea l than that of Sut Lovingood. And thus,

Faulkner, by varying the forms of r e t r i b u t i o n and by presenting

92

r e a l i s t i c h a l f - v i c t o r i e s , complicates a simple theme. The

effect i s one of c r e d i b i l i t y ; and the reader's reaction i s

l i k e l y to be incredulous wonder that so much might be wrought

from so l i t t l e .

Faulkner and Harris, in the i r use of ret r i b u t i o n as a

theme, f i n d various reasons for this human act. Both writers

make use of the most obvious of a l l reasons for getting back

at someone — s e l f - i n t e r e s t . This personal r e t r i b u t i o n ,

personal because i t i s primarily motivated by s e l f - i n t e r e s t ,

i s perhaps the most r e a l i s t i c of f r o n t i e r r e t r i b u t i o n s . And

certainly i t i s not one, especially i n the South, conducive

to the peaceful settlement of guarrels. For, as one c r i t i c

points out, "recourse to legal aid to redress a wrong was

often a confession of cowardice, for the Southernerfelt a 19

man should f i g h t his own b a t t l e s . " And Sut and Wirt Staples,

whose fear of law of any sort i s overcome by whiskey, do just

that. Many of Faulkner's characters s i m i l a r l y avenge them

selves on those who have wronged them. Excellent examples

of t h i s type of re t r i b u t i o n are Harris's " S i c i l y Burn's

Wedding" and Faulkner's "Centaur in Brass™ episode in The

Town.

Neither Faulkner nor Harris f a i l to give suitable reasons

for t h e i r character's r e t r i b u t i o n ; but sur p r i s i n g l y , Harris,

who i s usually overly generous in finding reasons for Sut to

r e t a l i a t e , presents Sut with a very human reason for taking

93

r e t r i b u t i o n on the Burns family — he i s hurt by t h e i r s o c i a l

s l i g h t . Sut's motivation for t h i s r e t r i b u t i o n r e f l e c t s one

attribute more in d i c a t i v e of him as a human than as a stereo

typed frontiersman. As he thinks of the Burns's snobbery, he

remembers S i c i l y ' s prank, "I were sloungin round the house

for they hadn't had the manners to ask me i n . . . I were pow'fully

hurt 'bout i t and happened to think —'SODA!' So I set in

a-watchin for a chance to do somethinl** (SL 49) What he does

do brings pain to everyone inside the house. He puts a basket

over the b u l l ' s head; the b u l l backs against the beehive, and

continues to back into the wedding feast, by which time the

b u l l , Sut says, "were the leader of the biggest and the maddest

army of bees in the world.** (SL 50) The people who are hurt

are so riotously humorous in t h e i r antics, at least as Sut

describes them, that we never consider t h e i r pain. For instance,

"Missis Clapshaw** i s described on top of the table, " a - f i g h t i n

bees l i k e a mad windmill with her c a l i c o cap in one hand fo r

a weapon and a cracked frame in t'other; and a-kickin and a-

spurrin l i k e she were r i d i n g a lazy hoss after the doctor;

and a-screamin "Rape," 'Fire,* and *Murder* as fast as she

could name *em over.** (SL 52) As might already be indicated,

the pain of the wedding guests i s removed through Sut*s

language and the fast action. Moreover, his own nonchalance

about the event tends to further remove us from any real

sense of pain. For instance, he describes the wedding as the

most **mis fortunate... since Adam married that h e i f e r — what

94

were so fond of t a l k i n to snakes and eatin apples.... 1*

(SL 5 5 ) Further, Sut says, S i c i l y ' s wedding **were the

worst one for noise, disappointment, scare, breakin things,

hurtin, trouble, vexation of s p i r i t , and general swellin.™

(SL 5 5 - 5 6 ) The humorous way in which Sut admits his mean

ness — **If I were just as smart as I am mean and ornery,

I'd be President of a wildcat bank in less'n a week** (SL 5 6 J

— removes the last traces of any conceivable disapproval,

for Sut knows his own f o i b l e s .

Faulkner's treatment of the theme of personal r e t r i b u t i o n

in the "Centaur in Brass™ passage in The Town i s far more com

plex. Rarely content to t e l l a single story, here he combines

two stories of r e t r i b u t i o n so that there i s a s p l i t in the

forces for good; and, c h a r a c t e r i s t i c a l l y , Flem stands in

s t a t i c opposition to t h i s divided force. The chase i s a

minor episode in the whole story of Flem's defeat as power

plant superintendent. Turl's adultery with Tom Tom's young

bride offers more than enough motivation for Tom Tom's attack

on T u r l ; and Turl's shock, i f not necessarily his fear, i s

mitigated by an element of fantasy which arises from the fact

that Charles narrates Gowan's narration of Barker's mere

supposition of what happened when Turl climbed in the window

and found ™to his h o r r i d surprise...Tom Tom lying f u l l y

dressed beneath the g u i l t with a naked butcher knife in his

hand.™ (T 2 6 ) Only on t h i s h a l f - r e a l f r o n t i e r would no one

get hurt i n a si t u a t i o n such as t h i s . In the ditch after

95

t h e i r furious chase the two Negroes confederate when they

r e a l i z e what has happened and, as Gavin t e l l s Chick, they

reach "a r a t i o n a l i t y of perspective" and re a l i z e that "Tom

Tom's home [was] not vio l a t e d by Tomey's Turl but by Flem

Snopes; Turl's l i f e and limbs put into jeopardy not by Tom

Tom but by Flem Snopes." (T 28) And with this r e a l i z a t i o n ,

t h e i r inordinately clever r e t r i b u t i o n on Flem proceeds. Having

joined forces (in i t s e l f a victory over Flem, who well knows

that he can not r e s i s t the power of concerted e f f o r t of any

opposition), they put the brass where Flem o r i g i n a l l y said

he wanted i t — in the water tower. Thus, they successfully

r e t a l i a t e against Flem. But here, where Faulkner, by giving

a sign of Flora's human emotion at the news of his defeat,

could have i l l u s t r a t e d any aspect of Flem's warped humanity,

he chooses to leave him at an abstract l e v e l by understating

the r e s u l t s : "Though by the time water...would begin to taste

brassy enough for someone to think about draining the tank,

. . . i t wouldn't be Mr. Snopes. Because he was no longer superin

tendent now...." (T 29) The implications of the p a r a l l e l

between Flem's and Tom Tom's cuckoldry are clear; Tom Tom

i s an active agent for good. Tu r l , by virtue of his humanity

(one indicat i o n of which might be his sexual appetite in

contrast to Flem's s t e r i l i t y ) joins the forces for good, and

Flem's inhumanity i s challenged in a meaningful way by the

two Negroes, who are motivated to r e t a l i a t e by Flem's actions

against them.

96

The theme, as i t i s used for humor by Faulkner and

Harris, provides for comic reversal. The Negroes are, at

least in Flem's scheming mind, too stupid to grasp his design

and in t h e i r furious chase we laugh .at them and thus, since

they are subject to r i d i c u l e i n the sub-plot, t h e i r ultimate

victory i s a comic reversal. Sut's v i c t o r i e s are universally

those of the t h e o r e t i c a l underdog. While his language alone

reduces him to a bumpkin, his v i c t o r i e s prove him to be

equally as clever and imaginative as Tom Tom and T u r l .

Surprisingly, neither Faulkner nor Harris use t h i s type

of r e t r i b u t i o n very much. Although t h e i r f r o n t i e r milieu i s

a place where we would expect to f i n d abundant personal

r e t r i b u t i o n , in t h e i r humorous episodes, neither writer

emphasizes th i s theme. Faulkner, of course, prefers to use

i t in such serious s t o r i e s as Mink's two murders; and had

Harris consistently used th i s theme, Sut's c h a r a c t e r i s t i c

good-naturedness and f a n t a s t i c speed in outrunning trouble

would have been much less credible.

Other reasons fo r r e t r i b u t i o n might be described as

a l t r u i s t i c , for they involve the recognition of and a desire

to protect something other than oneself. The object may be

another person or some p r i n c i p l e the protagonist admires.

Harris's and Faulkner's humorous use of t h i s version of the

r e t r i b u t i o n theme usually stems from a situation involving

a wronged f r i e n d or a broken code. The works of both authors

9 7

contain good examples of the wronged fr i e n d motif as both

writers f i n d i t conducive to heightened humor in that they

can make the wrong which i s i n f l i c t e d seem humorous. Cer

tainly, "Rare Ripe Garden Seed," the story of Mary Mastin's

early c h i l d , i s in i t s e l f humorous. Two more sto r i e s ,

"Contempt of Court — Almost" and "Trapping a S h e r i f f , "

provide the even more humorous retributions that Sut and

Wirt Staples take on She r i f f John Dolton. In Faulkner's

"Mule in the Yard" passage, the instance of Mr. Hait's

business ventures with I. 0. Snopes (the former drives

I. O.'s team of mules across the path of oncoming freight

t r a i n s in order to get the r a i l r o a d company's indemnity)

heightens the humor of the episode i t s e l f . When Mr. Halt's

miscalculations lead to his untimely death, Mrs. Hait

receives the money for both her husband and I. O.'s mules

by claiming that theonules were her husband's property.

By d r i v i n g his mules through her yard, I. 0. i s r e t a l i a t i n g

on what he finds a personal injury — that Mrs. Hait w i l l

not give him the assessed value of the mules — and Mrs.

Hait, for both I. O.'s odiousness and Mr. Hait's death,

s t i l l seeks revenge. Indeed, part of Mrs. Hait's e f f e c t i v e

r e t r i b u t i o n on I. 0. Snopes (shooting his mule) adds another

p a r a l l e l to Faulkner's symbolic opposition of horses and

mules and women, a symbolic theme which i s pervasive in his

f r o n t i e r m i l i e u .

98

The theme of a l t r u i s t i c r e t r i b u t i o n i t s e l f provides

precisely the type of story Faulkner enjoyed t e l l i n g — a

single story which necessitates at least one incident within

another. No one need doubt that Faulkner's temptation to

t e l l more than one story was indeed satiated by the use of

this theme. Flem's dishonesty, i t s e l f the subject of "Centaur

in Brass," provides the s u p e r f i c i a l reason for Gavin taking

Manfred De Spain to court. And Gowan's attack on De Spain's

EMF roadster i s motivated by De Spain's rash teasing of

Gavin, while the tire-puncture incident i t s e l f heightens the

De Spain-Stevens r i v a l r y and thus partly conduces to both

the "Rouncewell Panic," perhaps the most l i v e l y and t r u l y

laughable of Faulkner's bourgeois humor, and Gavin's f i s t

f i g h t with De Spain.

This l a s t incident also provides a good example of the

broken code as motivation for r e t r i b u t i o n . One of the reasons

for Gavin's attack on De Spain i s the mayor's and Eula's

amorous dancing, which c o n f l i c t s with Gavin's p r i n c i p l e that

"chastity and virtue in women s h a l l be defended whether they

exist or not." (T 76) Already we see that one aspect of t h i s

theme i s the necessity of value judgments. And value judg

ment involves both a code and an individual who follows that

code. In this incident both Gavin's code and his consistency

in following that code are humorous as they are signs of his

guixotic, abstracting nature and his bourgeois consciousness,

which i s perhaps the best, at least the most f u l l y r e a lized

99

one in Faulkner's canon.

But far more humorous (outside of Gavin's values and

often outside of Jefferson i t s e l f ) are the values of the

f r o n t i e r m i l i e u . And as f r o n t i e r humorists, both Harris and

Faulkner use the aspects of t h i s theme not only to predicate

riotous confusion but also to illuminate and f i n d humor in

the people who follow variations of t h i s code. As a device

for revealing strange values, the adherence to which i s apt

to make the character at the outset of the story seem r i d i c u

lous, the broken code i s certainly a superb theme. Although

somewhat more than usually cruel when he i n f l i c t s pain on

the slovenly, lazy son of a preacher, Sut uses the boy as

an object of one of his pranks because he broke the f r o n t i e r

code of a c t i v i t y per se. Another object of Sut's scorn i s

the c i t y - s l i c k e r , usually a Yankee. Perhaps generally r e f e r r i n g

to the stupid outsiders who sometimes annoy Sut while he t e l l s

his tales and in s p e c i f i c reference to the Yankee razor-grinder,

Sut praises the f r o n t i e r (in his terms, Knoxville) for taking

r e t r i b u t i o n on those who break the code. Part of the f r o n t i e r ' s

r e t r i b u t i o n , Sut says, i s : "sweepin out the inside of stuffed-

up f e l l e r s ' s kulls clean of a l l ole rusty, cobweb, bigoted

ideas." (SL 27) Rather than leave a job half done, the

frontiersman replaced these ideas, Sut says, with "somethin

new and active, ... one king idea sure...: .If I g i t s away

al i v e , durn i f ever I come here again." (SL 27)

Faulkner's most humorous use of t h i s theme in f r o n t i e r

humor may be in R a t l i f f ' s version of "Fool About a Horse™ in

100

The Hamlet. For, by explaining Ab fs motivation, R a t l i f f

illuminates the eldest Snopes's regional code.

...that Pat Stamper...had come in and got actual Ybknapatawpha County cash dollars to rattling....When a man swaps horse for horse, that's one thing and let the d e v i l protect him i f the d e v i l can. But when cash money star t s changing hands, that's something else. . . . i t ' s l i k e when a burglar breaks into your house and f l i n g s your things ever which way even i f he dont take nothing. It makes you twice as mad. (H 34-35)

And Ab's furious adherence to th i s code reduces him to the

figure of a v i r t u a l automaton. R a t l i f f explains the "pure

f a t e " which involves two chance facts — Pat Stamper's

camping in Jefferson on that day and Ab's having money —

plus Ab's motivation to revenge the broken code, "...the

entire honor and pride of the science and pastime of horse-

trading in Yoknapatawpha County depending on him [Ab] to

vindicate i t . " (H 35) Ab's ridiculousness in following t h i s

code and the tools of his trade, "a dimes worth of salt

peter...and a number ten f i s h hook," provide more than enough

detachment f o r an e f f e c t i v e comic reversal and this p a r t l y

through the theme of a l t r u i s t i c or s o c i a l r e t r i b u t i o n .

The theme of r e t r i b u t i o n for the broken code i s e f f e c t i v e

for both parody and s a t i r e . By describing Ab's motivation

in r i d i c u l o u s l y high flown English ("to vindicate the honor

and pride"), Faulkner, or rather R a t l i f f , r i d i c u l e s Ab him

sel f and to some extent parodies the simple motivation, as

well as the language of the backwoodsman in the t r a d i t i o n of

regional humor as exemplified by Harris's Sut Lovingood.

101

And Harris, by giving Sut such human emotions as fear and

sexual desire and making him follow a code at least somewhat

less mythical than that of man in the wilderness, may be 20

parodying the e a r l i e r r e g i o n a l i s t s . In f a c t , Bernard

DeVoto notes the wide range of ultimate effects derived

from the Southwestern humorists* curious mixtures of fact and

f i c t i o n . In t h e i r works, he finds, "fantasy and realism exist

side by side. In the same way, burlesque and extravaganza,

which are t h e o r e t i c a l l y derived from fantasy, are hardly to 21

be separated from s a t i r e , a derivative of realism." Both

Harris's Sut Lovingood and Faulkner*s t r i l o g y exhibit such

wide ranges of e f f e c t . In part t h i s range derives from the

fact that there are numerous f r o n t i e r milieus and thus almost

any statement might be considered some sort of d i s t o r t i o n of

one of these milieus. Harris and, to an even greater extent,

Faulkner, although his d i s t o r t i o n s are less consistently

humorous than his predecessor's, manifestly delight in t h i s

wide range of e f f e c t s .

Harris uses the theme of re t r i b u t i o n , both s o c i a l and

personal, as a vehicle for s a t i r e . The Yankees, lawyers,

s h e r i f f s , and lazy boys that Sut r e t a l i a t e s against represent

people and human t r a i t s that Harris scorned. In Sut Lovin

good Harris generally achieves a comic effect as well as

s a t i r i c propaganda. He presents his hatred for these people

in both the concrete d e t a i l s of t h e i r wrongs, as Sut describes

them — a tavern keeper served him food which he says "A

hungry dog wouldn*t have smelt...nor a experienced buzzard

102

even l i t onto i t . . . * * (SL 197) — and in the more subjective

value judgments of Sut — **He were a mighty mean Yankee

razor-grinder....** (SL 26) A post-war sketch which did not

appear in Sut Lovingood indicates how v i t r i o l i c Harris's 22

sa t i r e might be. In **Sut Lovengood, on the Puritan Yankee,tt

Sut merely r a i l s against the Northeners, and the only element

of humor in t h i s sketch i s Sut's down-to-earth language. And

in Sut Lovingood. whenever the reader recognizes Harris's

more direct d i a t r i b e s , as in Sut's t r i p with "old Abe Linkhorn**

— *»0ur f o o l - k i l l e r s have done t h e i r duty, and consequently

the South have seceded1* (SL 227) — Sut himself becomes some

what less humorous. In general, however, Harris, in his use

of r e t r i b u t i o n as a theme in Sut Lovingood. achieves both

comedy and s a t i r e . Where he does not use such a theme to

provide him with a story, he i s less humorous, and to the

modern reader, perhaps less e f f e c t i v e as a s a t i r i s t .

Faulkner also uses the theme of s o c i a l r e t r i b u t i o n for

s a t i r i c e f f e c t s . His **By the People1* passage in The Mansion

might well be considered s a t i r e on the Southern p o l i t i c i a n s

in general and perhaps on those of northern Mississ i p p i in

p a r t i c u l a r . And, l i k e Harris, in treating the p o l i t i c i a n s

of his age, Faulkner emphasizes Clarence Snopes's hypocrisy

— a favorite theme of Southern p o l i t i c a l s a t i r i s t s . In The

Town De Spain's laughable act of r e t r i b u t i o n on the "old

mossbacks,1* Mayor Adams and Colonel S a r t o r i s — that of hanging

the i r law which prohibited automobiles on the streets of

103

Jefferson on the walls of the courthouse — i s perhaps mildly

s a t i r i c . Further, in the "Spotted Horses" section of The

Hamlet. the peasants* desire to get something for nothing

which, i r o n i c a l l y , i s the same e v i l they think Flem g u i l t y

of, i s perhaps a s a t i r i c statement about the poor whites*

dog-eat-dog economics and the progress of Snopesism in

Frenchman's Bend. While Faulkner i s less consistently

s a t i r i c in his stories of s o c i a l r e t r i b u t i o n than Harris,

both writers do r e a l i z e the s a t i r i c p o s s i b i l i t i e s of the

theme•

Both authors are masters at combining the personal and

s o c i a l motivation of r e t r i b u t i o n . In "The Widow McCloud's

Mare," S t i l l y a r d s deserves Sut's retribu t i o n from both a

personal and s o c i a l point of view. Sut more than l i k e l y

takes as a personal injury his r i d i c u l o u s l y meager offer of

"a g i l l of whiskey** as payment for helping him. And he com

mits the s o c i a l sin of being a Yankee and a lawyer who got

r i c h p r a c t i c i n g on the "misfortunate devils™ with whom Sut

i d e n t i f i e s . Thus, Sut i s personally and s o c i a l l y motivated

to r e t a l i a t e . R a t l i f f ' s vision of Flem in H e l l i s also

predicated by more than one motivation. Flem's shady note

handling in the goat trade might be grounds for R a t l i f f ' s

personal r e t r i b u t i o n . And his desire to see Eula marry some

one who i s more deserving of her might be the basis for the

wronged fr i e n d motif. Further, his sense that Flem i s

economically ruthless might provide R a t l i f f with a l t r u i s t i c

grounds for his i n t e l l e c t u a l and a l l too f r u s t r a t i n g vision

104

of Flem amidst f i r e and brimstone. Of the two authors, Harris

consistently combines the dif f e r e n t a n a l y t i c a l types of r e t r i

bution far more than does Faulkner. This indicates perhaps

how much Harris's polemical journalism affected his thematic

considerations. The same fact also indicates that Faulkner

represents motivation for r e t r i b u t i o n in a more r e a l i s t i c way

than Harris. That Harris takes great pains to stack the cards

against Sut's adversaries becomes obvious when one considers

how often one meets a Yankee-cum-avaricious lawyer-cum-

Congressman who "proffers to tend the Capital grounds in

shares" in American l i t e r a t u r e .

But in t h e i r attitude towards r e t r i b u t i o n , especially

as a comic theme, Faulkner and Harris have a p a r a l l e l admira

ti o n for the necessary assertion of individualism in an act

of r e t r i b u t i o n . This i s not to say they admire violence or

violent r e t r i b u t i o n . Rather, Harris and Faulkner create a

comic effect by t h e i r use of the violence that r e t r i b u t i o n

provides; and moreover, both condone in comic passages the

ret r i b u t i o n consistent with t h e i r milieus. One f e e l s , as he

reads t h e i r works, that both authors have a romantic love

for, and a l i t e r a r y s k i l l in presenting, the l i f e of the

f r o n t i e r . Perhaps the essence of what both authors present

in t h e i r comic episodes i s the backwoodsman's perennial

assertion of his sturdy individualism. While we laugh with

him and .at him, we rarely can bring ourselves to steadily

d i s l i k e the mythical poor white.

105

While Harris uses his squabbles for comedy and s a t i r i c

purposes, Faulkner surpasses Harris's e f f o r t s by magnifying

t h i s e s s e n t i a l l y simple theme into a complex orchestration

of human response in a h a l f - r e a l , half-imaginary world. Part

of Faulkner's a r t i s t r y l i e s in his a b i l i t y not only to achieve

complex and varied effects from this theme, but in his a b i l i t y

to deal with many di f f e r e n t themes in imaginative and meaning

f u l ways. While the complexities of his treatments of the

themes of love and power are less conducive to humor than the

theme of r e t r i b u t i o n , they indicate the magnitude of the

a r t i s t r y in his t r i l o g y . Even in the complexities of laugh

able humor Faulkner surpasses his predecessors. Nowhere in

Sut Lovingood do we f i n d such an imaginative r e t r i b u t i o n as

R a t l i f f ' s damnation of Flem. And nowhere in Hooper's whole

book of Simon Sugg's economic feats do we f i n d anything as

complex as R a t l i f f ' s goat trade.

Just as Faulkner's use of the theme of re t r i b u t i o n i s

p a r a l l e l to Harris's use in provoking humorous situations,

some of his humorous plots and incidents within these plots

have p a r a l l e l s in Southwestern humor. One such p a r a l l e l i s

that between Sut's and R a t l i f f ' s attacks on figures of public

prominence, figures remarkably alike for t h e i r hypocrisy,

John Bullen and Clarence Snopes. Cleanth Brooks, in attempting

to r e c t i f y some c r i t i c a l confusion as to what relation Rat

l i f f ' s narration has to r e a l i t y , says:

106

Apparently, i t does not occur to them [the commentators] to allow for the broad embel-li s h i n g s of a tale which R a t l i f f devised and got c i r c u l a t i n g through the community and which was so good a story that i t caught on, and by turning Clarence into a laughing stock made old W i l l Varner withdraw his support.23

That this victory be played down as the t a l l e s t of t a l l tales

— that i s , a t a l l tale on an already mythical f r o n t i e r —

i s neither consistent with thematic development nor with the

a r t i s t i c freedom that Faulkner has developed with such s k i l l

throughout his t r i l o g y . R a t l i f f ' s and Sut's p a r a l l e l comic

v i c t o r i e s are wholly within the t r a d i t i o n of Southwestern

humor and s i m i l a r l y incorporate the confusion of man and

animals. The humorous passages of action in Sut Loving;ood

a r i s i n g from the same source are indeed innumerable; when they

are not in fact the incident of humor i t s e l f , they are implied

by Sut's language. In the t r i l o g y versions of "The Waifs** and

"Centaur in Brass** precisely the same sort of language implies

the confusion of man and beast. Moreover, as we have seen,

the "By the People," "Fool About a Horse,™ "Mule in the Yard,"

and "Spotted Horses" episodes focus on just such confusion

as a major source of humor. In thi s l a s t , the incident of

an animal -- a large f r o n t i e r animal — being inside a house

i s the same incident that makes for the laughable humor of

Harris's " S i c i l y Burns' Wedding.™

Yet another p a r a l l e l i s found in the two authors* a b i l i t y

to provoke humor through the use of comments on the guality

of food. Whether retribution or incredulous amazement motivates

107

the character, the effect i s the same — embarrassment to the

proprietor. At "Tripetown, ** where Sut was served food and

says, ttI t r i e d a b i t e , and i t flew outen my mouth l i k e there'd

been a steel mattress spring c o i l e d in my throat,™ (SL 196)

he waits u n t i l there i s a long l i n e of d i s s a t i s f i e d customers

behind him. He then gives the proprietor advice on making

better coffee. To improve on the coffee now being served,

Sut recommends, "just you — instead of makin outen ole boot-

l e t s — put i n about half of a ole wool hat chopped-fine, f i n e r

nor you chops your hash say, into pieces a inch square. It

w i l l help the taste pow'ful, and not set the smell back a b i t . "

(SL 197) S i m i l a r l y humorous i s Eck's question about the meat

at Flem's cafe; and Faulkner, l i k e Harris, emphasizes the num

ber of people present. Eck says, "not even p r i v a t e l y but

right out loud where half a dozen strangers••.heard him: 'Aint

we supposed to be s e l l i n g beef in these here hamburgers? I

don't know jest what this i s yet but i t aint no beef.'™ (T 33)

These few examples in addition to those c i t e d elsewhere in

th i s thesis, r e f l e c t the multifarious possible plot and i n c i -

dent p a r a l l e l s between Harris and Faulkner. H And similar 25

p a r a l l e l s to other Southwestern humorists help to substantiate

Faulkner's f a m i l i a r i t y with the genre. Many of these are,

l i k e the Ike-cow story, so far removed from (and generally

improved upon) the i r probable sources that the p a r a l l e l s can

hardly be recognized.

108

The very d i f f i c u l t y of ascertaining precisely which

incidents he did borrow and which he coined himself i s

testimony to Faulkner's a r t i s t r y in topping his predecessor's

yarns — the p r i n c i p l e from which the whole genre evolves.

Through the invention of similar l i t e r a r y milieus, the choice

and execution of a simple theme, and the use of similar plots

and incidents, Faulkner, l i k e Harris, creates a mythology.

Faulkner's and Harris's mythologies are those of the back

woods, "mythologies,** as Constance Rourke says, "which men

disbelieved in and s t i l l riotously enjoyed, heaping invention 26

on invention."

109

FOOTNOTES: CHAPTER IV

''"Howe, pp. 2 2 - 2 3 .

2W. J . Cash, The Mind of the South (New York, 1 9 6 1 ) , p. 1 0 .

3 I b i d . . pp. 1 0 - 1 1 .

^George E. Woodberry, America in Literature (New York, 1 9 0 3 ) , p. 1 5 9 , as guoted by B l a i r in Native American Humor. P. 7 5 -

5Cash, p. 81. 6 I b i d . , p. 72. 7 I b i d . , pp. 72 - 7 3 . g William Faulkner, Faulkner i n the University, p. 2 9 .

9Eby, p. 18. *^See The Lovingood Papers, ed. Ben Harris McClary,

1 9 6 2 - 1 9 6 3 . This p e r i o d i c a l i s in the process of publishing those "Sut** s t o r i e s which are not incorporated in Sut Lovingood. Because these stories are published in the i r o r i g i n a l form, the language guoted from them in thi s thesis w i l l show more grammatical and orthographical deviations than those guotes from Sut Lovingood. ed. Brom Weber (New York, 1 9 5 4 ) .

**Brooks, p. 1 0 .

12 Quoted from the Texas Monument. July 9 , 1851, by Mody

C. Boatright, Folk Laughter on the American Frontier (New York, 1 9 4 9 ) , P. 16.

l 3Brooks, p. 1 9 3 "

* 4Henry Watterson, ed.. Oddities of Southern L i f e and Character (New York, 1882), v i i .

15Howe, p. 7 .

l 6Brooks, pp. 1 8 9 - 1 9 0 .

1 7See p. 127 of Chapter V of this t h e s i s . ^ 1 ft A OEby, p. 1 7 .

1 9 I b i d . . p. 1 6 .

110

20 Harris's invention of Sut as a p l a y f u l scoundrel whose code i s distorted, but e s s e n t i a l l y r e a l , might be considered a parody both on the myths of the old South of the seaboard states and on the already s t y l i z e d exaggerated hunter-giant, such as Crockett. "Blown Up With Soda™ i s a good example. It i s unlikely that such riotous action would have been a part of the myth of the old cultured South or that e a r l i e r strong men would have been duped by merely a be a u t i f u l woman.

2 1De Voto, p. 241. 22

George Washington Harris, "Sut Lovengood, on the Puritan Yankee." The Sut Lovingood Papers. 1963, pp. 57-60.

2̂ -'Brooks, p. 235.

01 ^Brom Weber ci t e s yet another p a r a l l e l (which, although

not relevant to the t r i l o g y per se, again r e f l e c t s the connecti o n between the two authors) when he writes of "the b a s i c a l l y -i d e n t i c a l plot structure of Harris's uncollected "Well! Dad's Dead" and Faulkner's As I Lay Dying." (SL x i i i - x i v )

25 Faulkner's "Fool About a Horse™ episode does have

p a r a l l e l s with Longstreet's "Horse Swap" in both character motivation, that of wanting to beat the other man in a trade which i s viewed more as a sport than as a business, and in the comic rev e r s a l . A further s i m i l a r i t y i s the figure of the small boy in each story. But Faulkner, through his rep e t i t i o n of trading, the reappearance of the same horse throughout the trading, and through the symbolic relevance of horses and cream separators, manifestly excels Longstreet in the presentation of pure farce.

26 Constance Rourke, "Examining the Roots of American

Humor," American Scholar. IV (Spring, 1935), 251- John Cullen, perhaps unwittingly, reveals the importance of Faulkner's place in the continuation of t h i s l i t e r a r y genre when he speaks about the "Spotted Horses" section of The Hamlet. He says: "The invented d e t a i l s in t h i s story are absurd. Anyone would know better than to chain a s t r i n g of wild ponies to a barbed wire as the Texan did in the story. Much less, a man from Texas. Guts would have been strung about in short o rde r.

Some of Faulkner's writing i s fine reading to sell the Yankees." John B. Cullen in collaboration with Floyd C. Watkins, Old Times in the Faulkner Country (Chapel H i l l , 1961), pp. 63-64. My i t a l i c s .

0

I l l

V. Character

The complexities of Harris's and especially Faulkner's

milieus, themes, and structures culminate in the two authors'

characterizations. In t h i s chapter these f r o n t i e r characters

are divided into two a n a l y t i c a l groups: thematic and struc

t u r a l . In the introductory section I further group them in

re l a t i o n to the numerous stereotyped f r o n t i e r s .

The s i m i l a r i t y of the two authors* milieus, themes, and

structures perhaps suggest p a r a l l e l s in characterization.

Both authors* characters r e f l e c t unbelievable and inventive

aspects of mythology. And because Harris's and Faulkner's

mythologies are wholly or partly comic, t h e i r characters are

often types rather than i n d i v i d u a l s . 1 These typed characters

seem to be re a l people partly because they are contrasted

with f u l l y developed characters and partly because the l i t e r a r y

f r o n t i e r s themselves are s t y l i z e d .

This s t y l i z a t i o n i s not without h i s t o r i c a l precedent.

In fact, as early as 1782, Grevecoeur, in his essay, **What 2

i s an American,** divides America into three segments — the

costal (and in the North) i n d u s t r i a l i z e d c i t i e s , the near

f r o n t i e r , and the far f r o n t i e r . He finds American westward

expansion to result from the pioneers* conquest of the

wilderness which precedes the s e t t l i n g of the land. Further,

according to Crevecoeur, the men of these various Americas

112

d i f f e r considerably. For the far f r o n t i e r attracts those

men who are adventurers purely for the sake of adventure.

Almost t o t a l l y undisciplined, these men l i v e l i k e pigs --

better, l i k e wild boar — and r e l i s h a society without

i n s t i t u t i o n s . On the other hand, the s e t t l e r s of the near

f r o n t i e r b u i l d a more stable society, one suitable to the i r

agrarian economy which in i t s e l f implies t h e i r greater

interest in a community. Crevecoeur finds that t h e i r common

motivation plus th e i r heterogeneity tends to make them more

tolerant and thus more democratic than either t h e i r hyper-

i n d i v i d u a l i s t i c precursors or the urban population which was

to some extent already et h n i c a l l y grouped by 17#2. In r e l a

tion to the s t y l i z e d nineteenth century Souths, (rather than

the t o t a l America Crevecoeur outlined in the eighteenth

century) these three categories need very l i t t l e modifica

t i o n . C h a r a c t e r i s t i c a l l y less i n d u s t r i a l i z e d than the North,

the Southern seabord has always ref l e c t e d a more polished,

Europeanized, and a r i s t o c r a t i c culture than that of the

i n t e r i o r . The far f r o n t i e r of the South was reputedly even 3

more violent^ than i t s Northern counterpart. Thus, in r e l a

tion to America in general, the s t y l i z e d South contained the

uttermost extremes of Americans -- from the quasi-bestial

pioneers to the effete a r i s t o c r a t s .

The range in the genre of Southwestern humor encom

passes such a figure of the far f r o n t i e r as Hooper's Simon

Suggs and such an aris t o c r a t as Longstreet's V i r g i n i a n .

113

In Sut Lovingood. these contrasts are less v i v i d . But such

ruthless scoundrels as Bullen and the proprietor at Tripetown

certainly represent the dregs, i f not the core, of the far

f r o n t i e r already moved west; and were Harris's p o l i t i c a l

sympathies for the South less m i l i t a n t , the weak i n t e l l e c t u a l s

that interrupt Sut could as well be Southern as Northern.

That i s , one feels that Sut would hate t h e i r i l k whatever

the i r o r i g i n , as the ess e n t i a l c o n f l i c t between them i s one

between the frontiersman and the non-frontiersman. Faulkner's

t r i l o g y contains such f i g u r a t i v e beasts as Byron Snopes's

Indian children and such i n e f f e c t u a l a r istocrats as Mr.

Backus, whose l i f e in the t r i l o g y i s j u s t i f i a b l e only as a

further illumination of the similar figure, Gavin Stevens.

While Gavin i s not as inactive as Backus,^ t h e i r tendency to

contemplate rather than do i s similar and neither have a

place on the f r o n t i e r , far or near.

Even a cursory examination of Sut, R a t l i f f , and Flem in

terms of Crevecoeur's f r o n t i e r groups reveals the raconteurs*

s i m i l a r i t i e s and some of the origins of Flem's hatefulness.

R a t l i f f , l i k e Sut, stands for decency and f a i r play, notably

a facet of the near f r o n t i e r — the peace-loving and construc

t i v e American's re a l home. Flem, l i k e Simon Suggs, i s ruthless

as he begins his r i s e . But Flem Snopes commits the most

grievous of crimes in terms of f r o n t i e r ethics. He f i g u r a t i v e l y

moves from west to east, from, as Gavin says, "scratch

(scratch? scratch was euphemism indeed for where he started

114

from)..." (T 283) to a house that R a t l i f f says "might have

been the s o l i d a r i s t o c r a t i c symbol of Alexander Hamilton

....» (M 154) And Flem embodies the worst of a l l three

Americas: l i k e the most odious of pioneers, he i s ruthlessly

destructive as he conquers nature; l i k e the worst of the near

frontiersmen, he i s only interested in those i n s t i t u t i o n s ,

such as law, which further his advance; and, l i k e the worst

of urban people, he values the trappings of c i v i l i z e d man,

not the ideals of honesty and s o c i a l leadership which at th e i r

best they represent. Flem i s neither the masculine American

pushing westward, the honest s e t t l e r s t r i v i n g for a better

community, nor a cultured a r i s t o c r a t . Perhaps he represents

the worst aspects of both nineteenth and twentieth century

nouveaux riches without even the i n g r a t i a t i n g , comic element

of bad taste — for Flem*s sense of u t i l i t y per se leads him

to buy at least the appropriate veneer of respect, and thi s

at the lowest possible cash expense. In part, then, much of

Flem's hatefulness stems from his un-American aspects in terms

of the s t y l i z e d f r o n t i e r . S o c i a l prestige, the pursuit of

wealth and adventure are American goals; but to stop when one

succeeds, to gloat with s a t i s f a c t i o n i s the antithesis of a l l

the best American c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s . In these terms, Flem Snopes

has no prototype in nineteenth century f r o n t i e r humor.

S t i l l , both Harris and Faulkner do create characters who

roughly correspond to the three Americas Crevecoeur saw in

the eighteenth century. While the insights that derive from

placing these characters on the various f r o n t i e r s reveal the

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two authors* keen s e n s i t i v i t i e s to basic American stereo

types, the s i m i l a r i t i e s between Harris's and Faulkner's

f r o n t i e r characters are substantiated when these characters

are a n a l y t i c a l l y grouped.

Both authors create thematic and str u c t u r a l characters,^

and both use p a r a l l e l techniques of characterization. Their

thematic characters are often caricatures; but the major

st r u c t u r a l characters, such as Sut and R a t l i f f , and Gavin

and Charles, are real characters. The minor s t r u c t u r a l

characters such as George in Sut Lovingood, and Het and Harker

* n The Town, are useful for t h e i r language alone, which, while

i t does reveal t h e i r various p e r s o n a l i t i e s , does not make

them important characters. These characters ex i s t , then,

c h i e f l y for the language they use, and in George's case, to

ask Sut the questions which lead him into his narrations.

The major s t r u c t u r a l characters are obviously also thematic

characters, but i t i s the i r s t r u c t u r a l importance that reveals

them as complete p e r s o n a l i t i e s -- at least in contrast to the

thematic characters.

For these thematic characters are often caricatures, and

while Faulkner's caricatures may appear to be real people at

times and no less than demigods at other times, the two authors

use similar methods in characterizing these figures. Commonly,

Harris and Faulkner emphasize the few physical or mental as

pects of these caricatures and thereby indicate the p a r t i c u l a r

aspects of good or e v i l they intend these figures to personify.

116

In Sut Lovingood. a l l of S u t ' s enemies are c a t e g o r i c a l l y

e v i l , w h i l e i n the t r i l o g y , n e i t h e r t h e Snopeses, nor the

a n t i - S n o p e s e s are e n t i r e l y good or e v i l . In g r o u p i n g h i s

c h a r a c t e r s i n t h i s way, F a u l k n e r a c h i e v e s a more r e a l i s t i c

and more complex r e p r e s e n t a t i o n of the f o r c e s i n h i s b a s i c

c o n f l i c t s . The Snopeses have t h e i r Eck; and the a n t i - S n o p e s e s

have Henry A r m s t i d . No such r e a l i s m c o m p l i c a t e s Sut L o v i n

good.

But t h i s i s not t h e o n l y way i n which F a u l k n e r ' s t h e m a t i c

c h a r a c t e r s are more r e a l i s t i c than H a r r i s ' s , f o r F a u l k n e r tends

t o t r e a t them not as c a r i c a t u r e s , but as r e a l p e o p l e . And

the c o m p l e x i t i e s of t h e s e c h a r a c t e r s are f u r t h e r e d by F a u l k n e r ' s

s h i f t i n g p o i n t s of view, comparing them t o v a r i o u s s t a n d a r d s ,

and t r e a t i n g them i n d i f f e r e n t l a n g u a g e s . Thus, as they i n t e r

a ct they may g a i n o r l o s e c e r t a i n g u a l i t i e s as d i f f e r e n t n a r r a t o r s

d e s c r i b e them and as they come i n c o n t a c t w i t h o t h e r t h e m a t i c

c h a r a c t e r s ; and w h i l e H a r r i s ' s s i m i l a r f i g u r e s remain b l a c k

or w h i t e , F a u l k n e r ' s seem t o be g r e y - t o n e d , and t h i s , l i k e

t h a t of h i s m i l i e u , an o s c i l l a t i n g grey at t h a t .

Because of h i s w i d e r t h e m a t i c range, the sh e e r l e n g t h

of the work, and F a u l k n e r ' s a b i l i t y t o i n t e g r a t e the a c t i o n s

of an immense and v a r i e d group of pe o p l e i n h i s c h r o n i c l e ,

t h e r e are many c h a r a c t e r s who have no p r o t o t y p e s i n Sut L o v i n

good even though they may resemble o t h e r c h a r a c t e r s of f r o n t i e r

a u t h o r s o r i n c o r p o r a t e elements of f r o n t i e r humor. Such g r o -

tesgu e f i g u r e s as I k e , Mink, Goodyhay and many of the b o u r g e o i s

117

characters, such as the Mallisons and Linda, have few

p a r a l l e l s in Harris's work. S t i l l , for a l l the exceptions,

many of Faulkner's thematic and st r u c t u r a l characters do

resemble figures in Sut Lovingood.

II

Both authors create thematic characters who are paragons

of f r o n t i e r masculinity. Eula's two lovers, Hoake McCarron

and Major De Spain, have a p a r a l l e l in Sut Lovingood's friend,

Wirt Staples. McCarron and De Spain both represent v i r i l i t y

and masculinity in conjunction with Eula's f e r t i l i t y . How

ever, they are no more masculine than Sut's a l l y against

S h e r i f f Dalton, Wirt Staples, himself married to a woman

"purty as a hen canary, 1* (SL 1 5 2 ) who, as Sut describes him,

might well be Eula's match.

[Wirt's] britches were buttoned tight round his loins and stuffed 'bout half into his boots. His shi r t bagged out above and were as white as milk; his sleeves were r o l l e d up to his arm-pits and his c o l l a r as wide open as a gate. The muscles on his arms moved about l i k e rabbits under the skin, and onto his hips and thighs they played l i k e the swell on the r i v e r . His skin were clear red and white, and his eyes a deep, sparklin, wicked blue, while a smile f l u t t e r e d l i k e a hummin-bird round his mouth a l l the while. When the State F a i r offers a premium for men li k e they now does for jackasses, I means to enter Wirt Staples, and I ' l l g i t i t , i f there's f i v e thousand en t r i e s . (SL 1 4 5 )

No less a c r i t i c than F. 0. Matthieson substantiates the fact

that Wirt i s tru l y a character of immense proportions when he

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says that *»Wirt i s the common man in his f u l l stature. 1* Less

common, but as much a '•premium** man as Wirt, Hoake McCarron,

who enters Frenchman's Bend, R a t l i f f says, **like a cattymount

into a sheep pen.... Like a wild buck from the woods jumping

the patch fence and already trampling them l o c a l carrots and

sguashes... .** (M 1 1 7 ) And De Spain i s described as being a

match for Eula. While Jefferson was not yet against Flem

Snopes nor **in favor of adultery, sin,** (T 15) as Charles

puts i t , they were in favor of what Gavin c a l l s "the d i v i n i t y

of simple unadulterated uninhibited immortal lust** (T 15)

which Manfred and Eula represent. Besides being **the Jefferson

Richard Lion-heart of the twentieth centiry,** (T 13) then,

Manfred i s l i k e McCarron and Wirt Staples in his masculinity

and v i r i l i t y . A l l are type characters, and, while Faulknerts

characters are gentlemen, i t i s t h e i r v i r i l i t y that Faulkner

emphasizes for thematic reasons. Their possible prototype.

Wirt Staples, represents almost a f r o n t i e r deity to Sut. He

is common man, witty, happy-go-lucky, and, as one c r i t i c finds 7

him, in every sense a f r o n t i e r **hero.**

Both McCarron and De Spain meet their match in Faulkner's

bucolic goddess, Eula Varner, whose prototype may well have

been Harris's S i c i l y Burns. In fact, Eby notes the same

p a r a l l e l : Eula Varner i s not the swooning female of the sentimental Southern novel...She i s instead a raw physical female...The emphasis on corporeal substance rather than ethereal

119

intangibles was also c h a r a c t e r i s t i c of desc r i p t i o n s of the female of the e a r l i e r humorists. George W. Harris's characterization of S i c i l y Burns...delighted his masculine audience.®

Sut describes S i c i l y as being "gal a l l over, from the point

of her toe-nails to the end of the longest hair on the highest

knob of her head — gal a l l the time, everywhere, and one of

the excitingest kind." (SL 3&) Described in various languages,

Eula's "corporeal substance" i s s i m i l a r l y e x c i t i n g . "Her

entire appearance suggested some symbology out of the old

Dionysic times — honey in sunlight and bursting grapes...."

(H 9 5 ) And, "even at ages nine and ten and eleven there was

too much of breast, too much of buttock; too much of mammalian

meat...." (H 1 0 0 )

Both Harris and Faulkner f i n d these female caricatures

useful as objects for humorous description, for t h e i r a b i l i t y

to predicate events (such as "Blown Up With Soda," " S i c i l y

Bums* Wedding," and R a t l i f f ' s damnation of Flem in The Hamlet).

and as f o i l s for the male characters — Sut in Harris's work,

and almost every male from Charles Mallison to W i l l Varner

himself in Faulkner's t r i l o g y . Indeed, Faulkner's treatment

of Eula i s f a r more complex both in terms of the multifarious

languages used in connection with her as well as in terms of

thematic development. From Charles Mallison's description,

"Too much of maybe just glory...," (T 6) to W i l l Varner's

earthy terminology, "confounded running b i t c h . . . , " (H 1 4 5 ) ,

the thought or the presence of Eula demands descriptions

120

which, besides r e v e a l i n g Eula's c h a r a c t e r ^ r e f l e c t the

c h a r a c t e r who d e s c r i b e s her. And of thematic s i g n i f i c a n c e

i s the f a c t t h a t Flem i s the one male i n the t r i l o g y who

says a b s o l u t e l y n o t h i n g about he r .

Faulkner's c h a r a c t e r i z a t i o n s of Flem and E u l a i n The

Hamlet r e v e a l a c l o s e p a r a l l e l to H a r r i s ' s technigues of

c h a r a c t e r i z a t i o n . For both authors create c a r i c a t u r e s

through emphasis and exaggeration and thus. S i c i l y Burns,

E u l a , and Flem m a n i f e s t l y l a c k t o t a l p e r s o n a l i t i e s . In f a c t ,

by comparison to Flem (personal aggrandizement i n c a r n a t e )

and E u l a (a demigoddess of f e r t i l i t y ) , even S i c i l y seems

somewhat human. But Faulkner t r e a t s h i s c a r i c a t u r e s d i f f e r e n t l y

than does H a r r i s . Perhaps the most obvious change i n Faulkner's

c a r i c a t u r e s can be seen i n The Town. As Cle a n t h Brooks ex

p l a i n s , "By d a r i n g to b r i n g h i s r u s t i c Helen...and h i s

c o u n t r i f i e d Faustus out of the brooding c o u n t r y s i d e i n t o a

s m a l l town, Fa u l k n e r immediately r i s k s trimming them down to 9

size.™ And s i g n i f i c a n t l y , i t i s i n The Town that we become

aware of the humanity of both f i g u r e s . Thus, p a r t l y f o r

c r e d i b i l i t y and p a r t l y f o r thematic development, Faulkner

s h i f t s and t r e a t s Flem and E u l a as human bein g s .

Eula's t r a n s f o r m a t i o n i n The Town i s not very s u c c e s s f u l

because here, as a would-be r e a l person she i s both a more

c r e d i b l e and a more p u z z l i n g c h a r a c t e r . Brooks f i n d s that

"Faulkner, i n h i s anxiety t o have Eula's b e h a v i o r b a f f l e and

shock Gavin Stevens, [may have] succeeded only too w e l l and

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produced a character whose behavior b a f f l e s and shocks the

reader t o o . n ^ Certainly, without the aura of goddess about

her, she becomes a less humorous figure. And when we see

Flem as a human being in The Town. 1 1 he becomes p i t i f u l as

well as odious. But i t i s precisely the f l u c t u a t i n g nature

of Faulkner's treatment of Flem that creates tension in The

Town and even more e f f e c t i v e l y in The Mansion.

Generally, as Mink's character in The Mansion (where,

as Howe puts i t . Mink becomes "a creature with a kind of 12

bottom-dog d i g n i t y " ) would indicate, Faulkner's characters

are far less laughable than his caricatures. But his a b i l i t y

to s h i f t his figures from caricatures to believable, humanly

motivated people r e f l e c t some s i g n i f i c a n t differences between

Faulkner and Harris — the most important of which i s Faulkner's

greater sense of humanity.

To Harris, caricature remains abstractions of, for

example, laziness and stinginess. But to Faulkner a l l of his figures — caricatures and characters alike -- are real

13 people. While for comic e f f e c t , Faulkner i s rarely more

and often less a r e a l i s t than Harris, in matters of characteriza

tion, he i s i n f i n i t e l y more complex. For, viewing his figures

as real people, Faulkner undoubtedly delights in finding stan

dards by which these figures seem human, delights in just

such incongruities as the hateful, avaricious innocence of

Flem Snopes when he realizes he must educate himself in the

ways of banking. But while, as real people, they add meaningful

122

depth and tension to Faulkner's t r i l o g y — a depth and

tension that Sut Lovingood generally lacks — i t i s in t h e i r

roles as caricatures that Faulkner's thematic figures resemble

the people we laugh at in the work of Harris and other South

western humorists.

Furthermore, Flem Snopes* 4 does have an obvious proto

type in Hooper's Simon Suggs. Having said "Flem Snopes i s

cut from the same cloth as Simon Suggs,1**5 one c r i t i c des

cribes t h e i r s i m i l a r i t i e s :

The unscrupulous rise to power of Flem Snopes r e c a l l s the s i m i l a r r i s e of Simon Suggs. Suggs* motto, **it i s good to be s h i f t y in a new country,** would have served as well for Flem. Both men through a smooth even-tempered f a c i l i t y are able toumanipulate the strings in unstable societi e s where neither law nor conscience are strong curbs (both, i t should be noted, begin as clerks in general stores).16

But while these are not the only p a r a l l e l s , for Flem i s , l i k e

Simon, machine-like and perhaps pathologically seIf-centered,

Faulkner's treatment of Flem resembles Harris's treatment of

Sut's enemies more than Hooper's treatment of Simon. For

Simon i s capable of being humorous himself; Flem i s not. And

Simon Suggs i s a far greater human being than Flem in The

Hamlet -- for we see Simon's mind at work whereas we only

see the results of Flera's scheming. In t h i s , Flem resembles

the proprietors, preachers, Yankee razor-grinders and lawyers

that are objects of Sut's hatred. While there i s no single

figure in Sut Lovingood that i s Flem's prototype, Faulkner's

caricature does personify many of the e v i l s that are charac

t e r i s t i c of Sut's enemies, for Flem's g u a l i t i e s in The Hamlet

123

— his avariciousness, stinginess, sobriety, and mechanical

i n s e n s i t i v i t y — are a l l q u a l i t i e s to be found in Sut's

ant agoni st s •

Both Harris and Faulkner knew that personifications

must remain at a distance to be humorous. And thus, the

reason that such a caricature as S t i l l y a r d s i s a success as

a comic type i s that we never r e a l l y see him as anything

more than a human likeness in torturous contortions on top

of Widow McClowd's mare. Faulkner's treatment of the lesser

Snopeses would indicate his similar knowledge of comic tech

nique but Flem Snopes i s not r e a l l y humorous; in fact, he i s

so much an abstraction that he lacks those rudiments of human

nature that are necessary and in fact are the basis of comic 17

characterization. As a pe r s o n i f i c a t i o n , he can predicate

many humorous situations through others' reactions to him and

through the v i r t u a l helplessness he i n s t i l l s in other people.

But Flem, as a l i v i n g being, does not e x i s t . Indeed, the

success of The Hamlet partly l i e s in the fact that Flem, li k e

Eula, i s an abstraction.

Flem's l a r g e r - t h a n - l i f e aspects derive from Faulkner's

distance from him. In merely attempting to locate Flem, we

often f i n d , l i k e R a t l i f f , no more than "the straw bag, the

minute t i e , the constant jaw...." (H 151) And as a c a r i c a

ture, Flem i s magnificently handled. In fact, one way in

which he becomes l a r g e r - t h a n - l i f e i s through the reader's

f r u s t r a t i o n at Flem's lack of substance. Flem has a sort

124

of c o l l e c t i v e character -- that i s , because he i s not a person

and i s the bellwether of the Snopeses, he seems g u i l t y of

condoning i f not causing events (such as Lump's peep show)

with which he i s not even connected. Perhaps Irving Howe

describes this phenomenon as he explains the structure of

The Hamlet. He finds that *»the s p i r a l l i n g [of Faulkner's

narrative method and events], the c i r c l i n g , the meandering,

a l l have a way of coming back, with a comic exasperation

and f i n a l i t y to the steady growth of Flem's power.^ Thus,

as a sort of demi-god of e v i l and avariciousness, Flem i s

indeed l a r g e r - t h a n - l i f e , and this through Faulkner's extremely

detached treatment that surpasses Harris's p a r a l l e l distance

from his caricatures. And Flem might as easily represent

the sum of the t r a i t s of Sut's adversaries as that of his

own family's t r a i t s .

Of lesser importance i n d i v i d u a l l y are Flem's cousins —

thematic characters a l l . En masse, they constitute one of

the most hateful families in the annals of American l i t e r a t u r e .

...The Snopeses are i n v i n c i b l e l i a r s and thieves because they recognize almost none of the rules of decency or f a i r play. They cheat each other, the Varners, the whole community, even the shrewd R a t l i f f . And they do i t so impersonally, imperturbably that t h e i r victims are l e f t stupefied or in helpless and abject rage. There seems to be no way of stopping them u n t i l , l i k e rodents, they have destroyed or eaten up everything in sight.19

It i s the creation of the Snopes family that t e s t i f i e s the

truth of Cullen's remark that Faulkner knew "the cussedness 20

to be found in humanity everywhere....1*

125

As a group they represent many of mankind's most detest

able vices. But they rarely embody more than one or two

s p e c i f i c e v i l s , and, thus, they seem at least somewhat credible

in an only h a l f - c r e d i b l e f r o n t i e r . That i s , a Snopes who

inh e r i t e d a l l the Snopes's e v i l t r a i t s would manifestly

deserve Montgomery Ward's notion of the ideal of every Snopes

— to have "the whole world recognize him as THE son of a

bitch* 8 son of a bitch .** (M 87) That none of the Snopeses

deserve this t i t l e indicates the r e l a t i v e nature of th e i r

e v i l aspects. Even these lesser Snopeses appear somewhat

human in contrast to Flem. Many of them have very close

p a r a l l e l s in Sut Lovingood. Unlike Harris*s v i l l a i n s , how

ever, they often have very human weaknesses. That Faulkner's

family contains such anti-Snopes figures as Eck and Wallstreet

Panic and such grotesque figures as Ike and Mink r e f l e c t s ,

as in the other aspects of his t r i l o g y , a f a r greater range

than Harris's. But the p a r a l l e l s in s p e c i f i c characters are

numerous, and Faulkner, while he creates a family with more

variety and greater deviations than Sut's enemies, p a r a l l e l s

Harris in technigue and the s p i r i t of caricature.

Both authors describe these caricatures in terms of

f r o n t i e r animals. While Sut's passages of action often con

tain numerous animal references, Faulkner i s generally more 2

consistent in assigning animal-like g u a l i t i e s to the Snopeses. Greet finds that these g u a l i t i e s "reveal the essential vacuous-

22 ness of those to whom they apply.** Of these, excepting. M...

126

his cousin Flem, perhaps Lump i s the most vacuous of the

Snopes clan. He i s very much l i k e the devious, cheating

proprietors in Sut Lovingood and becomes, through his

fawning admiration for Flem, one of the most hateful of the

Snopeses as he looks at the judge "with the l i d l e s s intensity

of a r a t . . . . " (H 329) Lump himself finds the huge omniverous

St. Elmo Snopes who "appeared to have gone to sleep chewing

'worse than a r a t . 1 " (H 323) S i m i l a r l y , in Sut Lovingood.

Old Skissim's middle boy's "eatin beat the eatin of a r a t . . .

[and his family] waked him to eat, and then had to wake him

again to make him quit e a t i n . " (SL 17-18) But S t i l l y a r d s ,

who "looked l i k e a cross atween a black snake and a fireman's

ladder" (SL 69) i s far less dangerous than Mink who, as Rat

l i f f says, "seems to be a d i f f e r e n t kind of Snopes l i k e a

cotton-mouth i s a d i f f e r e n t kind of snake." (H 92)

Further, the s i m i l a r i t i e s between Clarence Snopes and

Harris's caricatures of Parson John Bullen and Sheri f f Dolton

are numerous. Faulkner's figure i s both h y p o c r i t i c a l and an

unprincipled p o l i t i c a n . Clarence's unprincipled power i s

no more frightening than a stick of dynamite, "just as you

dont mind a s t i c k of dynamite u n t i l somebody fuses i t . "

(M 297) And his brother, Doris, resembles Clarence "not only

in size and shape but [in] the same mentality of a c h i l d and

the moral p r i n c i p l e s of a wolverine.™ (M 295) S i m i l a r l y ,

Sut's campmeeting g i r l f r i e n d begs Bullen "not to t e l l on her.

[But] he et her cookin, he promised her he'd keep dark — and

127

then went straight and tole her man.1* And Sut comments on

his actions: "Weren't that real low-down wolf-mean?** (SL 82)

While other Snopeses, by t h e i r actions or c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s ,

are similar to Harris's J and his contemporaries* figures,

these do give an indication of the close p a r a l l e l between

Faulkner's and Harris's methods of dealing with thematic

caricatures as well as the manifest s i m i l a r i t i e s in s p e c i f i c

characters. This i s not to say that Faulkner deliberately

builds on Harris's Aesopian caricatures. Rather, i t r e f l e c t s

both authors* keen s e n s i t i v i t i e s to the power of f r o n t i e r

simile as a descriptive tool — a s e n s i t i v i t y which, in Faulk

ner's case, may well have been engendered by his reading of

Harris.

Furthermore, both authors* frontiersmen embody exaggera

tions of f r o n t i e r q u a l i t i e s . Brom Weber finds that f r o n t i e r

humorists,

...grossly and sardonically exaggerate the g u a l i t i e s which enabled a man to triumph over circumstances: coarseness, endurance, decision, b r u t a l i t y , shrewdness, t r i c k i n e s s , speed, strength. Weakness, sentimentality, stupidity, regret, thoughtfulness, and r e s p e c t a b i l i t y were handicaps for survival in a new country, therefore c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s of the ludicrously inept and worthy only of contempt and r i d i c u l e .

(SL x x i i )

While major characters such as Simon Suggs, Sut Lovingood, and 25

to some extent V. K. R a t l i f f , and Flem Snopes embody these

g u a l i t i e s , Faulkner's minor frontiersmen seem somewhat less

f a n t a s t i c than his predecessors* f o r he renders his characters

more real by incorporating within a single character the

128

strengths and the weaknesses of the frontiersman. One such

character i s W i l l Varner. While he has the obvious f r o n t i e r

assets of v i r i l i t y and p r a c t i c a l i t y , he i s humorous because

he has no speed or youth.

[He] cheerfully...declined to accept any such theory as female chastity other than as a myth to hoodwink young husbands with..., was engaged in a l i a i s o n with the...wife of one of his own tenants. He was too old, he t o l d her baldly and p l a i n l y , to be tomcatting around at night....

(H 141-142) But the two authors' frontierswomen present more comic

incongruities. Their f r o n t i e r attitudes, l i k e the f r o n t i e r s

men's, c o n f l i c t with those prevalent in the rest of America;

and because they are women, these characters flout our con

cepts of femininity as well. While f r o n t i e r humor i s normally

masculine, both Harris and Faulkner are well aware of the

comic incongruities of the independent frontierswoman. For

instance, Mrs. Hait and Mrs. Yardley strongly resemble each

other; and both authors, in portraying the independent nature of these women, emphasize t h e i r masculine outlook and expres-

26 sion. Another comic woman in Sut Lovingood i s the "widder

McKildrin" whose only daughter has a c h i l d f i v e months after

her marriage. Perhaps even more humorous to the nineteenth

century audience than to more modern s e n s i b i l i t i e s i s her

duping her astonished son-in-law through a copious allowance

of " s w e l l - s k u l l " whiskey and her story of the "rare-ripe

garden-seed's" power on growing things. A p a r a l l e l deviation

from the typed outrage of the wronged g i r l ' s mother i s Mrs.

129

Varner who, in her only real appearance in the t r i l o g y ,

reacts to Eula's pregnancy and Jody's y e l l i n g with even

more f r o n t i e r incongruity than Mrs. Yardley when she says,

" I ' l l f i x both of them. Turning up pregnant and y e l l i n g and

cursing here in the house when I am tryi n g to take a nap.™

(H 144)

In matters of characterization, then, Faulkner p a r a l l e l s

Harris both in his creation of sim i l a r characters and in his

methods of creation. While Faulkner's characters perhaps

encompass a wider range between comic caricature and complex

human beings, the twentieth century author's greater a r t i s t r y

i n r e l a t i n g character to character makes even the simplest of

caricatures appear somewhat more real than those of Harris.

That i s , Flem's inhumanity tends to make his cousins seem

more human than they are. Only when one considers that by

comparison to Flem and his cousins a figure wuch as W i l l

Varner in The Ham1et seems a sympathetic human being, does

one discover Faulkner's a r t i s t r y in creating and sustaining

as immense a group of thematic characters as the t r i l o g y

cont ains.

I l l

Much of the humor in Sut Lovingood derives d i r e c t l y

from Harris's structural-thematic character who, because of

his narrations, seems a real person. Faulkner uses a similar

130

device, but consistent to his greater complexity and greater

a r t i s t r y , he creates not one, but three structural characters,

Gavin Stevens, Charles Mallison, and V. K. R a t l i f f . Gavin

and Charles are indeed the sources, even the subjects of much

of the bourgeois humor in the t r i l o g y . S i g n i f i c a n t l y , neither

appear in The Hamiet because the Heidelburg Ph.D. and middle-

class c h i l d are not in fact very closely connected with the

f r o n t i e r humor of the t r i l o g y .

One of the salient aspects of the box-like structure i s

that the narrator's character can be revealed through his

language; but, except for r e t e l l i n g "what R a t l i f f s a i d " and

for providing him with an interested audience, neither Gavin

nor Charles are consistently c o l o r f u l in this f r o n t i e r t r a d i

t i o n . But in characterizing them through t h e i r language,

Faulkner takes care to give himself range. For, i t i s the

nature of small boys to assimilate others' languages and at

any moment Charles Mallison may s h i f t from Gavin's romantic,

Latinate, heroic style to R a t l i f f ' s earthy speech. S i m i l a r l y ,

Gavin, for a l l his learning, likes R a t l i f f ' s c o u n t r i f i e d

speech and finds i t useful in his p o l i t i c a l appeal as county

attorney. Thus, while Charles does t e l l some episodes, the

f r o n t i e r humor in them i s nearly always in someone else's

language; and Gavin's flowing verbosity may f i n d i t s way into

either Charles or V. K. R a t l i f f ' s speech. The use of these

three narrators heightens the possible language incongruities

and therefore, unlike Harris's presentation of just two

131

r e a l i t i e s (those of Sut and George), Faulkner presents

numerous r e a l i t i e s : "Just as,** Faulkner said in his Univer

s i t y of V i r g i n i a lectures, **when you examine a monument you

w i l l walk around i t , you are not s a t i s f i e d to look at i t from 27

just one side.**

Faulkner explained Gavin Stevens*s point of view as

being that **of someone who had made of himself a?>.more or less

a r t i f i c i a l man through his desire to practice what he had

been t o l d was a good vir t u e , apart from his b e l i e f in virtues,

what he had been t o l d , trained by his respect for education 28

in the old c l a s s i c a l sense.** Gavin i s obviously no f r o n t i e r s

man. His learnedness i s perhaps p a r a l l e l e d in Sut Lovingood

only by an i t i n e r a n t encyclopedia salesman, who, for correcting

Sut on his guotation of the marriage ceremony, i s answered,

**You go to h e l l , mistofer,** (SL 124) and receives the following

tirade for using the word "repose" for "sleep.™ ™5fou must talk

English to me or not g i t yourself understood. I weren't

educated at no Injun or nigger school." (SL I 3 6 ) Gavin's

romanticism, his eagerness to see others in his own image,

and the guixotic but i n e f f e c t u a l battles that rage within his

own mind separate him from the t r a d i t i o n a l l y r e a l i s t i c approach

common to Faulkner's and Harris's p o r t r a i t s of frontiersmen.

And one might hypothesize that Gavin Stevens, in the world of

Frenchman's Bend, would be egually as welcome as Harris's

encyclopedia salesman. While Gavin's connection with the best

of Southwestern humor i s somewhat tenuous, his conscious

132

p l a y i n g w i t h words, h i s l i t e r a r y t r a i n i n g and h i s l a w y e r ' s

l o v e f o r L a t i n a t e language g i v e s him some p a r a l l e l s t o

B a l d w i n , whose F l u s h Times i n Alabama r e v e a l s a s i m i l a r 29

s e n s i b i l i t y . And Gavin's l e a r n e d n e s s i s a superb f o i l f o r

b o th R a t l i f f and C h a r l e s .

F a u l k n e r s a i d t h a t C h a r l e s ' s m e n t a l i t y "was the m i r r o r

which o b l i t e r a t e d a l l e xcept t r u t h , because the m i r r o r d i d n ' t 30

know the o t h e r f a c t o r s e x i s t e d . * * However, more o r l e s s

s urrounded as he i s by R a t l i f f and G a v i n , C h a r l e s r a r e l y

appears t o have a d i s t i n c t p e r s o n a l i t y . He p r e s e n t s a

c r e d i b l e and u s e f u l l i n k between Gavin and R a t l i f f d u r i n g the

y e a r s t h a t Gavin i s away. Both Gavin and R a t l i f f seem t o

t h i n k t h a t , as a c h i l d , C h a r l e s s h o u l d l e a r n about Snopesism;

t h e r e f o r e , as a prompter f o r the s t o r i e s they t e l l , C h a r l e s

i s used by F a u l k n e r as H a r r i s uses George. But C h a r l e s i s

c a p a b l e , i f o n l y through h i s c l o s e a s s o c i a t i o n w i t h R a t l i f f ,

of r e t e l l i n g s t o r i e s of f r o n t i e r humor and u s i n g a few v i v i d

f r o n t i e r images of h i s own. For i n s t a n c e , h i s d e s c r i p t i o n

of Montgomery Ward Snopes i s one of the most humorous f r o n t i e r

images i n the t r i l o g y . When Montgomery Ward r e t u r n e d t o

J e f f e r s o n t o open h i s "ATELIER MONTY," "he wasn't i n u n i f o r m

C h a r l e s e x p l a i n s , "but i n a b l a c k s u i t and a b l a c k o v e r

coat w i t h o u t any s l e e v e s and a b l a c k t h i n g on h i s head k i n d

of d r o o p i n g over one s i d e l i k e an empty cow's b l a d d e r made

out of b l a c k v e l v e t , and a l o n g limp-ended bow t i e . . . . "

(T 120) However, C h a r l e s i s g e n e r a l l y a s o r t of i n n o c e n t

133

n o n e n t i t y i n The Town. F a u l k n e r uses him as a s t r u c t u r a l

c h a r a c t e r whose yo u t h and t r a i n i n g , at l e a s t i n t h e o r y , make

him capable of a wide range of languages. And as an e r r a n d

boy f o r Gavin and a l i s t e n e r f o r R a t l i f f , he i s i n a p o s i t i o n

t o g i v e a b a l a n c e d and at time a p e n e t r a t i n g n a r r a t i o n of

e v e n t . 3 1

One c r i t i c does d e s c r i b e C h a r l e s as "a p r e c o c i o u s c r i t i c 32

of t h e s o c i e t y t h a t r e j e c t s E u l a and a c c e p t s Flem.**-' Cer

t a i n l y , h i s a s i d e s are o f t e n both t r u t h f u l and humorous -'- a

s u p e r b l y v i v i d example of which i s C h a r l e s ' s p a r e n t h e t i c a l

c h a r a c t e r i z a t i o n of Flem: **...the o l d f i s h - b l o o d e d son of

a b i t c h who had a v o c a b u l a r y of two words, one b e i n g No and

the o t h e r F o r e c l o s e . . . . * * (M 215-216) However, C h a r l e s ' s

u l t i m a t e v a l u e i s t h a t of a v e h i c l e , not a s t r o n g p e r s o n a l i t y ;

and many of the d e f i c i e n c i e s of The Town are p r e d i c a t e d , I

t h i n k , by the r e a l i s t i c a l l y i n c r e d i b l e range of languages

C h a r l e s u s e s . I f F a u l k n e r uses C h a r l e s more as a d e v i c e than

as a p e r s o n i n The Town, he m a n i f e s t l y c o r r e c t s t h i s d e f e c t

i n The Mansion. In t h i s n o v e l C h a r l e s becomes an i n d i v i d u a l .

In b o t h The Town and The Mansion C h a r l e s ' s growth r e

f l e c t s the passage of t i m e ; and because C h a r l e s grows at

l e a s t t o c h r o n o l o g i c a l m a t u r i t y d u r i n g modern t i m e s , i t i s

through him t h a t F a u l k n e r r e v e a l s h i s own disenchantment

w i t h the y o u t h f u l c r a s s c o c k s u r e n e s s of the contemporary

b o u r g e o i s i e . W h i l e C h a r l e s ' s sophomoric wisdom i s perhaps 3 3

one of F a u l k n e r ' s most a r t f u l i n d i c t m e n t s ofsimodern l i f e ,

C h a r l e s , as a r e a l i s t i c human b e i n g , seems l e s s a f i g u r e of

134

any of the three f r o n t i e r s . As a representative of bourgeois

American youth, he lacks both Gavin's sense of form and

R a t l i f f ' s humanity. Both as an innocent c h i l d and as a rather

crass modern youth, Charles tends to heighten Gavin's and

R a t l i f f ' s stature as r e a l i s t i c human beings.

This l a s t s t r u c t u r a l character, Vladimir K r i l l y t c h

R a t l i f f , i s undoubtedly Faulkner's greatest achievement in

characterizing a complex human being in the t r i l o g y . 3 4 Of

significance to his o r i g i n a l concept of the t r i l o g y both as

f r o n t i e r humor and in terms of character i s Faulkner's l e t t e r

to Malcolm Cowley. Cowley guotes Faulkner: "I wrote them

[the s tories after "Spotted Horses," such as "The Hound" and

"Lizards in Jamshyd's Courtyard™] mainly...because 'Spotted

Horses* had created a character I f e l l in love with: the 35

i t i n e r a n t sewing-machine agent...."^ Like Harris's Sut

Lovingood, R a t l i f f perhaps seems even more human than he i s

by comparison to other characters. As Charles Allen comments,

"Faulkner's most e f f e c t i v e use of f o i l t a c t i c s i s the master

f u l h i g h l i g h t i n g of R a t l i f f ' s humanity. By opposing him to

the inhumanity of everyone else...Faulkner makes them a l l

R a t l i f f ' s f o i l s . " And John Arthos e n t h u s i a s t i c a l l y comments

on the success of t h i s characterization: The great achievement of the work i s the characterization of Ratliff..,.The picture of the stooped man in the blue cotton s h i r t , s i t t i n g on the porch of the store, whittling, seeing everything while appearing to see nothing, matching wits with a l l , i s memorable to the point that i t i s exactly as i f one saw him there. For art of th i s kind there can be no useful comment.37

135

S t i l l , while Faulkner's a r t i s t r y in portraying R a t l i f f i s

perhaps superior to the a r t i s t r y of Harris's p o r t r a i t of

Sut and while R a t l i f f i s manifestly a more r e a l i s t i c and

more complex human being, the two characters have much in

common•

To some extent both are typed characters. In other

words, to Faulkner and Harris, R a t l i f f and Sut represent

easily abstracted p r i n c i p l e s . But because these are the

p r i n c i p l e s of the near f r o n t i e r , the combination (perhaps

p e c u l i a r l y American) of s o c i a l and i n d i v i d u a l i s t i c ideals,

R a t l i f f and Sut can embody these p r i n c i p l e s unostentatiously

and s t i l l seem human beings. Indeed, R a t l i f f and Sut repre

sent the reader's own ideals to such an extent that i t i s

d i f f i c u l t to think of them as anything but human. Both

characters are i n t e l l i g e n t , r e a l i s t i c , and p r a c t i c a l —

pr e c i s e l y as the reader hopes himself to be. Allen finds

R a t l i f f to represent "the whole pantheon of American values,"

and Faulkner's own evaluation of Sut ("He had no i l l u s i o n s

about himself, did the best he could; at certain times he was

a coward and knew i t and wasn't ashamed; he never blamed his

misfortunes on anyone and never cursed God for them.™^ )

p a r t i a l l y reveals Sut as representing a similar "pantheon of

American values." Of Sut's values, Weber says,

...out of the seeming chaos and meanness of Sut's personality and actions there gradually arises a superstructure revealing that a morality and a philosophy have been in existence always; that they contain, i r o n i c a l l y enough, numerous t r a d i t i o n a l and wholesome values. (SL xxv)

136

Thus, Sut and R a t l i f f are t o some e x t e n t t y p e d c h a r a c t e r s —

almost demigods of the near f r o n t i e r .

As such, Sut Lovingood i s a t o t a l f r o n t i e r s m a n . H i s

c h a r a c t e r c o n t a i n s t o some degree a l l of Weber's p o s i t i v e

f r o n t i e r g u a l i t i e s . 4 ^ In a c c o r d w i t h h i s p r e d i l e c t i o n t o

i n c o r p o r a t e f r o n t i e r s t r e n g t h s and weaknesses i n h i s c h a r a c

t e r s , F a u l k n e r h e i g h t e n s the r e a l i s m and humanity of R a t l i f f

by making him f a l l i b l e and human i n h i s l a p s e s i n t o d e j e c t i o n ,

d i s i l l u s i o n m e n t , and b i t t e r i r o n y when, f o r i n s t a n c e , e x a s p e r a t e d

w i t h the ha m l e t ' s t o t a l l a c k of m e a n i n g f u l a c t i o n , he s a y s ,

"What i s i t t h e f e l l o w s a y s ? o f f w i t h the o l d and on w i t h

the new; the o l d j o b at the o l d s t a n d , maybe a new f e l l o w

d o i n g the j o b b i n g but i t ' s t h e same o l d s t e r n g e t t i n g reamed

o u t ? " (H 1 6 4 ) 4 1 And perhaps even the f a c t t h a t R a t l i f f i s

not immune t o s i c k n e s s f u r t h e r s h i s t i e s w i t h humanity.

To a g r e a t e x t e n t Sut i s s i m i l a r l y f a l l i b l e and e m o t i o n a l

i n a v e r y human way, but R a t l i f f ' s humanity i s f a r g r e a t e r

and farumore s u c c e s s f u l than S u t ' s . C e r t a i n l y , the r e a d e r

has a b e t t e r sense of R a t l i f f as a man than he does of S u t .

While t h i s sense d e r i v e s from F a u l k n e r ' s more s u c c e s s f u l

g r a d a t i o n of f o i l s and the f a c t t h a t R a t l i f f , u n l i k e S u t ,

does not c o n s t a n t l y t e l l h i s own s t o r i e s , R a t l i f f ' s c h a r a c t e r

i s f u r t h e r enhanced by t h e g r e a t e r i r o n i c t r u t h of h i s f a i l u r e .

And w h i l e S u t ' s d e f e a t i n "Blown up w i t h Soda™ i s s h o r t - l i v e d

and humorous, R a t l i f f ' s d e f e a t at Flem's hands i s perhaps the

s t r o k e t h a t b e s t v i v i f i e s R a t l i f f i n the t r i l o g y because, un

l i k e S u t , R a t l i f f must l i v e w i t h i t throughout the t r i l o g y

137

and i t i s a l o s s of more importance than S u t ' s u n r e q u i t e d

puppy l o v e . That R a t l i f f i s r a t i o n a l man's r e p r e s e n t a t i v e

i n the b a t t l e a g a i n s t Snopesism suggests the grave i m p l i c a

t i o n s of h i s d e f e a t . W h i l e Eby f i n d s t h a t »the r e a l

p r o t a g o n i s t [ i n The Hamlet1 i s not R a t l i f f , Flem o r any o t h e r

human c h a r a c t e r but Frenchman's Bend i t s e l f , * * R a t l i f f ' s

f a l l tends t o l i n k him w i t h the most human c h a r a c t e r s of The

Hamlet. Longley s a y s : "The major i r o n y of the Frenchman's

P l a c e e p i s o d e i s t h a t i t p r e c i s e l y r e p e a t s the p a t t e r n of the

s p o t t e d h o r s e s , w i t h e x a c t l y the same k i n d of temptation.**

Moreover, R a t l i f f ' s r a t i o n a l i t y i n the f a c e of h i s d e f e a t

makes him t r u l y a h e r o i c f i g u r e and r e f l e c t s F a u l k n e r ' s

a r t i s t i c g e n i u s i n f u s i n g the adm i r a b l e endurance and p a t i e n c e

of man w i t h h i s i n h e r e n t w e a k n e s s e s . 4 4 A l l e n f i n d s t h a t **the

statement...made i n ' S p o t t e d Horses* i s the c o m p a s s i o n a t e l y

proud and f i e r c e l y s a r d o n i c c o n v i c t i o n t h a t man endures —

even i n s p i t e of h i s s t u b b o r n a d d i c t i o n t o f r a i l t y and e v i l . * * 4 5

R a t l i f f ' s p e r s i s t e n t r a t i o n a l i t y t h r ough The Town and The Man

s i o n c e r t a i n l y s u g g e s t s t h a t "man not merely endures; he w i l l

p r e v a i l . 1 * 4 ^ In t h i s way, R a t l i f f i s c e r t a i n l y a f i g u r e of

g r e a t e r l i t e r a r y , i n d e e d human s i g n i f i c a n c e than Sut Lovingood.

T h i s i s not t o say t h a t R a t l i f f i s not a S u t - l i k e c h a r a c t e r ;

r a t h e r i t i s t o a s s e r t R a t l i f f ' s m a n i f e s t success i n r e p r e s e n t i n g

a moral t r u t h of g r e a t e r magnitude than does S u t . R a t l i f f ,

however, i n a c t i o n and a t t i t u d e s , r e f l e c t s t he i n t i m a c y of

F a u l k n e r ' s a c g u a i n t a n c e w i t h Sut L o v i n g o o d .

138

Sut and R a t l i f f are both active frontiersmen. Both

actively fight i n j u s t i c e and have a similar awareness of

forces larger than themselves. Their acts of retribu t i o n

on such figures as John Bullen and Clarence Snopes reveal

the two raconteurs* similar clearheadedness — minds which

penetrate the t i t l e s of "Reverend** and "Senator.** As

frontiersmen, Sut and R a t l i f f are p r a c t i c a l and r a t i o n a l .

Of the two, Sut i s obviously far more active and much less

r e a l i s t i c , i f more consistently humorous. Sut*s actions

d i r e c t l y reveal his f r o n t i e r morality. He t i r e l e s s l y wages

war on cheats. The battles he fights almost always result

in physical action, although often his imaginative and

psychological t a c t i c s predicate this action and his long

legs deli v e r him safe from harm at precisely the distance

required to v i v i d l y recount that action. In his decisive,

imaginative r e t r i b u t i o n s , Sut Lovingood i s a character of

heroic proportions. But, as Allen remarks, " R a t l i f f ' s measure

of heroism can be gauged not so much by his p a r t i c u l a r actions

as by his unostentatious morality. By implication he stands

for...the morality and truth and ju s t i c e of Gavin Stevens."

But R a t l i f f ' s motivation for choosing his p a r t i c u l a r morality

is more akin to Sut Lovingood*s than Gavin Stevens. Sut, as

a man of the near f r o n t i e r , has an aura of masculine p r a c t i

c a l i t y about him. In fact, in the "Preface" to Sut Lovingood,

speaking about those readers whose concern for t h e i r reputa

tions w i l l motivate them to read the work secretly, Sut i s

1 3 9

g u i d e d by h i s p r a c t i c a l sense. He speaks of the f u t i l i t y

of a t t e m p t i n g t o reason w i t h t h e s e p e o p l e . He s a y s :

They has been p r e a c h e d t o and p r a y e d f o r now n i g h onto two thousand y e a r s , and I won't d a r t weeds where t h i r t y - t w o pound shot bounces back. (SL x x x i i ) 4 S

Thus, Sut g e n e r a l l y f o l l o w s what might have been the maxim

of J a c k s o n i a n democracy, a " l i v e and l e t l i v e 1 * m o r a l i t y u n t i l

he e n c o u n t e r s t h o s e g r o s s and w r a n k l i n g i n j u s t i c e s t h a t he

f i g h t s so a r d e n t l y .

F a u l k n e r says t h a t R a t l i f f , i n The Town, " p r a c t i c e d

v i r t u e from s i m p l e i n s t i n c t , from — w e l l , more than t h a t ,

because -- f o r a p r a c t i c a l r e a s o n , because i t was b e t t e r .

There was l e s s c o n f u s i o n i f a l l people d i d n ' t t e l l l i e s t o

one a n o t h e r , and d i d n ' t p r e t e n d . " ^ 9 C e r t a i n l y , R a t l i f f ' s

m o r a l i t y i s a p r a c t i c a l one i n comparison t o t h a t of Gavin

S t e v e n s ' s . Thus, both R a t l i f f and Sut are r e a l i s t i c a l l y

m o t i v a t e d f o r the s o c i a l s t a b i l i t y n e c e s s a r y t o the near

f r o n t i e r . And t h e i r s i m i l a r , r e a l i s t i c views of the f a n t a s t i c

f r o n t i e r i s the most i m p o r t a n t aspect of our b e l i e v i n g i n

them. The r e a d e r t r u s t s R a t l i f f because he, l i k e S u t , "had

no i l l u s i o n s about h i m s e l f , " and few, i f any i l l u s i o n s about

o t h e r s .

No s m a l l p a r t of t h e i r comic e f f e c t d e r i v e s from t h i s

t r u s t . I t i s t o a g r e a t e x t e n t the source of our detachment

from the comic a c t i o n of t h e i r n a r r a t i o n s , f o r our f e e l i n g

s a f e w i t h them, and even f o r ( i n R a t l i f f ' s c ase) our r e l a t i v e

detachment from a l l the o t h e r f r o n t i e r f i g u r e s i n the t r i l o g y .

140

As raconteurs (or, as I c a l l them e a r l i e r , s t r uctural

characters), R a t l i f f and Sut are the major source of the

f r o n t i e r humor in the two works. Their importance as racon

teurs cannot be over-emphasized. The box-like structure

used by Harris and Faulkner i s a sword with a double edge.

The s t o r y - t e l l e r i s only as successful as his story, because

the story r e f l e c t s the character of the raconteur. Thus,

that both characters are generally consistent to t h e i r stories

suggests Harris's and Faulkner's superb a r t i s t r y in using this

device. Moreover, i t implies the two authors* steadfast views

of these characters.

Because they are raconteurs, Sut and R a t l i f f are closer

to the reader than the thematic characters. R a t l i f f , as

Faulkner's most able raconteur of f r o n t i e r humor and most

consistently sympathetic figure in the t r i l o g y , then, has a

counterpart in Sut. Faulkner's sense of c r e d i b i l i t y 5 ^ and

his earnest desire to write a ••chronicle" and not merely a

c o l l e c t i o n of humorous stories substantiates the fact that

R a t l i f f i s less prominent in The Town and The Mansion than

i n The Hamlet. That the reader awaits R a t l i f f ' s shrewd

evaluation of events even in the l a t e r novels where he

appears only occasionally indicates the extent to which we

align ourselves with his r a t i o n a l i t y . Sut's narratives

prove him to be equally r a t i o n a l , i f more exuberant.

The cardinal p a r a l l e l in the two raconteurs' si m i l a r

appeal i s t h e i r expression. John J. H e f l i n finds "Sut,

himself, i s very prominent as the t e l l e r of the story, his

H i

manner immensely i m p o r t a n t . " And T. Y. Greet s a y s , "The

manner of [ R a t l i f f ' s ] speech as much as i t s m a t t e r l e n d s t o 5 h i s r e p o r t s and comments the v e r a c i t y which g i v e s them v a l u e . "

R a t l i f f ' s and S u t ' s f r o n t i e r speech makes them seem at once

bumpkins and p o e t s . T h e i r appeal d e r i v e s from the f a c t t h a t

they are not p o e t i c enough t o r u i n t h e i l l u s i o n of t h e i r

c o u n t r y h e r i t a g e and they are not s t u p i d enough t o s l i p i n t o

the g r a t i n g aphorisms of an I . 0. Snopes. To f i n d i n t e l l i

gence such as S u t ' s and R a t l i f f ' s on a g e n e r a l l y u n i n t e l l i

gent f r o n t i e r i s a r e v e l a t i o n . And both as r a c o n t e u r s and

c h a r a c t e r s , they are l i k e t h e i r h i s t o r i c a l p r e d e c e s s o r s , the

y a r n - s p i n n e r s , who, Weber sa y s , c o n s i s t e n t l y ™underscore[d]

the p r o x i m i t y of t h e homely and h e r o i c , " (SL x x i i i ) perhaps

the f u s i o n of which g r a t i f i e s a d e s i r e which, i f not i n d i g e n o u s

t o A m e r i c a n s , i s one u n d e n i a b l y American i n s p i r i t .

And, u l t i m a t e l y , R a t l i f f resembles Sut (as F a u l k n e r

resembles H a r r i s ) i n the s p i r i t — the m a s c u l i n e , e a r t h y , and

r e a l i s t i c s p i r i t — of f r o n t i e r humor. However s i m i l a r t h e i r

i n d i v i d u a l t r a i t s , t h e i r o u t l o o k r e p r e s e n t s t h a t of a young

and o p t i m i s t i c f r o n t i e r s m a n — s i m u l t a n e o u s l y i n d i v i d u a l and

s o c i a l . The nomadic m i s c h i e f - m a k e r and the i t i n e r a n t sewing

machine salesman e p i t o m i z e the common man at h i s b e s t .

S u t ' s f a n c i f u l d e s c r i p t i o n s of h i s h e r o i c deeds are

p o e t i c . R a t l i f f ' s s i m i l a r language and h i s a d m i t t e d p r e d i l e c

t i o n t o t e l l the s t o r y of E u l a and McCarron not as he t h i n k s 53

i t o c c u r r e d , but as he p r e f e r s i t t o have happened, J s u b s t a n

t i a t e s t h e i r s i m i l a r i t i e s as r a c o n t e u r s .

142

Perhaps the g r e a t e s t s i m i l a r i t y between these two

r a c o n t e u r s l i e s i n the r e a d e r ' s i n s t a n t a n e o u s acceptance

of them. For t h e i r sense of humor, t h e i r sense of i r o n y ,

and the r e a d e r ' s sense of t h e i r honesty and i n t e g r i t y a l l

conduce t o t h e i r s i m i l a r a p p e a l as c h a r a c t e r s and t h e i r

s u c c e s s as r a c o n t e u r s . They, t h e m s e l v e s , are i n i m i t a b l e .

But the memorable p o r t r a i t s of the two r a c o n t e u r s — Sut

Lovingood, " r e s t i n g by a f i n e c o o l s p r i n g at noon, w i t h an

i n v i t i n g l y c l e a n gourd h a n g i n g on a bush over the w a t e r , . . .

at f u l l l e n g t h on the g r a s s l o o k i n g i n t e n t l y at the g o u r d , "

(SL 104) and V. K. R a t l i f f , h i s " b l a n d a f f a b l e ready f a c e

and h i s neat t i e l e s s b l u e s h i r t one of the s g u a t t i n g group

at a c r o s s r o a d s s t o r e . . . " (H 13) — remind us of t h e i r k i n

s h i p i n s p i r i t . Sut Lovingood and V. K. R a t l i f f v i v i f y and

s u b s t a n t i a t e De Vote's g e n e r a l i z a t i o n : "To the eyes of any

one...who reads American l i t e r a t u r e , . . . t h e American i s

u n i v e r s a l l y a s t o r y t e l l e r . " 5 4 And w h i l e F a u l k n e r i s i n

every r e s p e c t a r t i s t i c a l l y s u p e r i o r t o H a r r i s , i n R a t l i f f ' s

n a r r a t i o n s , h i s c h a r a c t e r , the p e o p l e , the l a n d , and the

language do become the s t o r i e s as i n the most p r i s t i n e --

Sut Lovingood — f r o n t i e r humor.

143

FOOTNOTES: CHAPTER V

A l l a r d y c e N i c o l l f i n d s t h a t most comic w r i t e r s " w i l l t r y t o suggest t h a t a c e r t a i n f i g u r e i s i t s e l f r e p r e s e n t a t i v e of a c l a s s . The fundamental assumption of comedy i s t h a t i t does not d e a l w i t h i s o l a t e d i n d i v i d u a l i t i e s . * * ( A l l a r d y c e N i c o l l , An I n t r o d u c t i o n t o Dramatic Theory (London, 1923), P. 134.)

2 H e c t o r S t . John De Cr e v e c o e u r , "What i s an American,™

L e t t e r s From an American Farmer (London, 1951)/ PP- 39-68. 3 S e e C h a p t e r IV, p. 81 of t h i s t h e s i s . That Texas i n

p a r t i c u l a r a t t r a c t e d the most d e s p e r a t e men i n the c o u n t r y was a common n i n e t e e n t h c e n t u r y myth.

^Backus, C h a r l e s s a y s , would be " . . . s i t t i n g a l l day l o n g out t h e r e on t h a t f r o n t g a l l e r y w i t h a g l a s s of whi s k e y -and-water i n one hand and Horace o r V i r g i l i n the o t h e r — a c o m b i n a t i o n which U n c l e Gavin s a i d would have i n s u l a t e d from t h e r e a l i t y of r u r a l n o r t h M i s s i s s i p p i h a r d e r heads than h i s — ..." (T 178)

5 The term t h e m a t i c c h a r a c t e r i n d i c a t e s a c h a r a c t e r who

embodies t h e m a t i c elements, but i s not a r a c o n t e u r . Two examples are Flem and E u l a . A s t r u c t u r a l c h a r a c t e r , l i k e R a t l i f f , i s a r a c o n t e u r and may a l s o embody t h e m a t i c elements o r , l i k e such a c h a r a c t e r as o l d Het, he may be p u r e l y s t r u c t u r a l . The r e a d e r l e a r n s about t h e m a t i c c h a r a c t e r s by what they do and t h u s , whether n a r r a t e d by s t r u c t u r a l c h a r a c t e r s o r an o m n i s c i e n t n a r r a t o r , t h e i r p o r t r a i t s are c h a r a c t e r i s t i c a l l y o b j e c t i v e o r i n the t h i r d p e r s o n . S t r u c t u r a l c h a r a c t e r s may or may not be p o r t r a y e d by o t h e r n a r r a t o r s * comments, but these s t r u c t u r a l c h a r a c t e r s r e v e a l t hemselves through t h e i r own n a r r a t i v e s and thus are p r e s e n t e d s u b j e c t i v e l y or i n the f i r s t p e r s o n .

^F. 0 . M a t t h i e s s e n , American R e n a i s s a n c e : A r t and E x p r e s s i o n i n the Age of Emerson and Whitman(New Y o r k , I 9 6 0 ) , p. 643.

7 I b i d . , p. 643. 8 E b y , pp. 18-19. 9 7 B r o o k s , p. 193. I b i d . , pp. 211-212.

H4

See Chapter 17, pp. 262-295 of The Town where, perhaps i r o n i c a l l y , i t i s Gavin S t e v e n s , one of the most ardent a n t i -Snopes f i g u r e s , who r e c o n s t r u c t s Flem's a c t i v i t i e s as v i c e -p r e s i d e n t of the bank. Here, Flem's innocence and l a c k of e d u c a t i o n makes him at l e a s t a somewhat s y m p a t h e t i c underdog.

1 2Howe, p. 112. 13 ^Asked i f he thought of the c h a r a c t e r s " . . . i n The Town

as p e o p l e and not as sym b o l s , " F a u l k n e r answered, "Yes. Yes;, t o me th e y are p e o p l e . . . . " ( F a u l k n e r i n the U n i v e r s i t y , p. 108.) And i n r e f e r e n c e t o the Snopeses: "Those c h a r a c t e r s t o me are q u i t e r e a l and q u i t e c o n s t a n t . " ( i b i d . . p. 78.)

1 / fThroughout t h i s d i s c u s s i o n (pp. 122-125 of t h i s t h e s i s ) I r e f e r t o Flem Snopes, the c a r i c a t u r e and f i g u r e of S o u t h western humor, as he i s p r e s e n t e d i n The Hamlet.

1 5 E b y , p. 14.

^ I b i d . , p. 18. 17

See F o o t n o t e 1 of t h i s c h a p t e r . Flem, because he i s a f r o n t i e r d e i t y i n The Hamlet, becomes an " i s o l a t e d " i n d i v i d u a l i t y .

1 8Howe, p. 245• 1 9 W i l l i a m Van O'Connor, The Tangled F i r e of W i l l i a m

F a u l k n e r ( M i n n e a p o l i s , 1954), P« 118. 2 0 C u l l e n , p. 117. 21

Campbell and F o s t e r ' s " r o l l c a l l , " a l t h o u g h not a comp l e t e one, s e r v e s t o v a l i d a t e F a u l k n e r ' s c o n s i s t e n c y :

1. Flem Snopes ( f r o g l i k e ) 2. I . 0. Snopes, the p l a t i t u d i n a r i a n (weasel) 3. L a n c e l o t (Lump) Snopes ( r a t l i k e ) 4. Ike H. Snopes, t h e i d i o t ( b o v i n e ) 5. "Mink™ Snopes, th e murderer 6. S t . Elmo Snopes -- omnivorous, huge, f l e s h y ,

b e a s t l i k e (Campbell and F o s t e r , pp. IO4-IO5.)

22 T. Y. G r e e t , "The Theme and S t r u c t u r e of F a u l k n e r ' s

The Hamlet." i n W i l l i a m F a u l k n e r : Three Decades of C r i t i c i s m , p. 336.

23 -'See Chapter IV, p. 107 of t h i s t h e s i s . Eck's comment

on the q u a l i t y of f o o d i n Flem's r e s t a u r a n t r e v e a l s him t o be more l i k e Sut than any of the Snopeses.

145 2L.

Ab d o e s , i n h i s i n n o c e n t , s t u p i d g r e e d a n d b r a v a d o , h a v e many p a r a l l e l s w i t h L o n g s t r e e t ' s " B l o s s o m , ™ who c l a i m s t o b e " a l e e t l e . j i s t a l e e t l e . o f t h e b e s t man a t a h o r s e -swap t h a t e v e r t r o d s h o e l e a t h e r . 1 * ( G e o r g i a S c e n e s , p . 23.) Ab s i m i l a r l y t e l l s h i s w i f e , " Y o u b e t t e r t h a n k t h e L o r d t h a t when He g i v e me a e y e f o r h o r s e f l e s h He g i v e me a l i t t l e j u d g m e n t a n d g u m p t i o n w i t h i t . " (H 3 l )

25 F a u l k n e r o n c e c o r r e l a t e d t h e s c o u n d r e l t o t h e i n d i v i d u a l .

He s a i d , " . . . a s c o u n d r e l , t o b e a g o o d o n e , must be an i n d i v i d u a l i s t , t h a t o n l y an i n d i v i d u a l i s t c a n be a f i r s t r a t e s c o u n d r e l . " F a u l k n e r t h e n a d m i t t e d ( i n t h e w o r d s o f a q u e s t i o n e r ) t o h a v e "some g r u d g i n g a d m i r a t i o n f o r F l e m S n o p e s , who p r e t t y w e l l s t i c k s t o h i s c h a r a c t e r , " ( i n F a u l k n e r ' s w o r d s ) " . . . u n t i l h e was b i t t e n by t h e b u g t o be r e s p e c t a b l e , a n d t h e n he l e t me down.™ ( F a u l k n e r i n t h e U n i v e r s i t y , p . 33•)

26 E x a m p l e s o f t h e i r m a s c u l i n e l a n g u a g e a p p e a r i n C h a p t e r

I I I , p p . 62-63 ° f t h i s t h e s i s . I n f a c t , t h e i n d e p e n d e n t woman o f t h e f r o n t i e r h a s l o n g b e e n a s o u r c e o f c o m e d y . T h e i n d e p e n d e n t M r s . H a i t h a s a m a n i f e s t p a r a l l e l i n L o n g s t r e e t ' s woman i n " T a k i n g t h e C e n s u s ™ who b r i n g s h e r c h i c k e n s i n t h e h o u s e f o r t h e " c h i c k e n - m a n ™ t o s e e . O t h e r s u c h i n d e p e n d e n t S o u t h e r n women i n F a u l k n e r ' s c a n o n a r e J e n n y D u P r e , R o s a M i l l a r d a n d e v e n E m i l y G r i e r s o n .

27 ' F a u l k n e r i n t h e U n i v e r s i t y , p p . I 3 9 - I 4 O .

2 8 I b i d . . p . 140. 2 9

B o t h G a v i n a n d B a l d w i n c o n s c i o u s l y t o y w i t h l a n g u a g e a n d , t o m o d e r n t a s t e s , a r e s t u f f i l y e r u d i t e . S e e T 43 a n d C h a p t e r I I , p . 17 o f t h i s t h e s i s .

30 F a u l k n e r i n t h e U n i v e r s i t y , p . I4O.

31 •* R e f e r t o C h a p t e r I I I , p . 43 o f t h i s t h e s i s w h e r e

C h a r l e s f i n d s G a v i n t o be " c r a n k - s i d e d . ™ F u r t h e r , C h a r l e s s a y s o f G a v i n ' s p r a i s e f o r t h e l a d i e s who c a l l e d on M r s . S n o p e s , " I t w o u l d be t h e m o s t o u t r a g e o u s p r a i s e , p r a i s e s o o u t r a g e o u s t h a t e v e n Gowan a t j u s t t h i r t e e n y e a r s o l d c o u l d t e l l t h a t . " (T 31)

3 2 V i c k e r y , p . I83. 3 3 - ^ C h a r l e s ' i m a g i n e d w i r e t o R a t l i f f m a g n i f i c e n t l y r e

f l e c t s t h i s y o u t h ' s s e l f - i n f a t u a t i o n a n d n a r r o w v i s i o n . T h e l a n g u a g e i s p e c u l i a r l y m o d e r n b u t p e r h a p s t h e t o n e o f c o c k -s u r e n e s s i s common t o o v e r c o n f i d e n t y o u t h i n g e n e r a l . C h a r l e s t h i n k s : " A r e t h e y [ G a v i n a n d L i n d a ] b e d d e d f o r m a l l y y e t o r n o t ? I mean is. i t r o s a y e t o r s t i l l j u s t s u b , assuming t h a t y o u a s s u m e t h e same a s s u m p t i o n t h e y t e a c h u s up h e r e at H a r v a r d t h a t once y o u g e t t h e clotheB o f f t h o s e t a l l up-and-down women y o u f i n d o u t t h e y a i n t a l l t h a t up-and-down a t a l l . " (M 205)

146

One of the most f l a g r a n t m i s r e a d i n g s of F a u l k n e r i s committed by I r v i n g Howe, u s u a l l y a sound and c a r e f u l c r i t i c , when he comments on t h i s passage. Howe sa y s , " N o t h i n g i n the t e x t , so f a r as I can see, p r o v i d e s any ground f o r supp o s i n g t h a t F a u l k n e r t a k e s a c a u s t i c view of t h i s sophomoric wisdom, o r t h a t he wishes us t o see M a l l i s o n i n any but a s y m p a t h e t i c l i g h t . " (Howe, p. 288.)

3 4 F a u l k n e r * s c r i t i c s are u n i f i e d on at l e a s t one aspect of h i s t r i l o g y — the s u c c e s s of R a t l i f f as a c h a r a c t e r . While many of the c r i t i c a l comments about him r e f e r t o R a t l i f f i n The Hamlet, they have an e q u a l r e l e v a n c e t o him throughout the t r i l o g y . A l t h o u g h he i s l e s s prominent i n The Town and The Mansion. R a t l i f f i s a c o n s i s t e n t c h a r a c t e r i n the t r i l o g y .

3 5 ^ C o w l e y , p. 366. F a u l k n e r ' s p r e d i l e c t i o n t o t h i n k i n

terms of c h a r a c t e r i s s u b s t a n t i a t e d a g a i n : "My book [perhaps S a n c t u a r y o r The U n v a n g u i s h e d l had c r e a t e d Snopes and h i s c l a n , who produced s t o r i e s i n t h e i r saga which are t o f a l l i n l a t e r volumes."

3 6 C h a r l e s A l l e n , " W i l l i a m F a u l k n e r : Comedy and the Purpose of Humor." A r i z o n a Q u a r t e r l y . XVI (i960), 67. A l though Mr. A l l e n r e f e r s s p e c i f i c a l l y t o The Hamlet. I t h i n k h i s statement a p p l i e s t o R a t l i f f i n the whole t r i l o g y , p a r t i c u l a r l y i n a study which f o c u s e s on the f r o n t i e r humor of the t r i l o g y .

37 ^ John A r t h o s , " R i t u a l and Humor i n the W r i t i n g s of

W i l l i a m F a u l k n e r , A c c e n t . IX (Autumn, 194&), 27. He a l s o n o t e s the r e l a t i o n s h i p of R a t l i f f t o F a u l k n e r ' s o t h e r c h a r a c t e r s , In The Hamlet, " f o r the f i r s t time [ i n a n o v e l ] F a u l k n e r s e t s up a r a t i o n a l man as the c e n t r a l f i g u r e i n a s t o r y . The g a i n i s enormous, c o n s i d e r i n g the c h a r a c t e r s and p i c t u r e s have l o s t n e i t h e r i n t e n s i t y or v i v i d n e s s . " ( A r t h o s , p. 27.)

3 8 A l l e n , p. 65-3 9 S t e i n , p. 79- Without c o m m i t t i n g the l o g i c a l e r r o r

of a s s e r t i n g t h e i r a b s o l u t e s i m i l a r i t y , I t h i n k i t i s i n t e r e s t i n g t o note t h a t F a u l k n e r ' s c h a r a c t e r i z a t i o n of Sut a p p l i e s e g u a l l y w e l l t o R a t l i f f .

4°See Ch a p t e r V, p. 127 of t h i s t h e s i s . 4 * R a t l i f f * s b i t t e r d i a t r i b e a g a i n s t Snopesism i n c l u d e s

h i s s a t i r i c use of aphorisms, I . 0. Snopes's prominent t r a i t . But the v i l l a g e r s * bewilderment at R a t l i f f ' s b i t t e r n e s s emphasizes b o t h h i s humanity and h i s n o r m a l l y steady a f f a b i l i t y . " B i g e a r s have l i t t l e p i t c h e r s , the w o r l d b e a t s a t r a c k t o the r i c h man's hog-pen but i t a i n ' t every f a m i l y

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has a new lawyer, not to mention a prophet. Waste not want not, except that a f u l l waist dont need no prophet to prophesy a p r o f i t and just whose.1* Now they were a l l watching him — the smooth, impenetrable face with something about the eyes and the lines beside the mouth which they could not read." (H I64)

4 2Eby, p. 20. 4 3Longley, p. 74«

^ ^ R a t l i f f acknowledges his defeat through understatement, a commonplace of f r o n t i e r humor. "Bet you one of them I beat you [Bookwright]." (H 366) Longley praises Faulkner's a r t i s t r y in this passage. "It i s easy to imagine what might follow this r e a l i z a t i o n in the hands of a less g i f t e d writer: despair, rage, c r i e s of anguish. In Faulkner's hands the reaction i s reduced to simple comment." (Longley, p. 76.) Further, R a t l i f f ' s reaction heightens rather than subdues the tension of the closing pages of The Hamlet.

4 5 A l l e n , p. 67.

^ W i l l i a m Faulkner, "Stockholm Address," in William Faulkner: Three Decades of C r i t i c i s m , p. 348.

4 7 A l l e n , p. 64. LB

Sut's answer to those who "have a wholesome fear of the d e v i l , " and thus w i l l f i n d Sut's stories improper i s both p r a c t i c a l and sane: " . . . i f you i s feared of smut, you needn't climb the chimney." (SL xxxii)

I Q

Faulkner in the University, p. 140. 50

Vickery finds that The Town lacks the economic d i r e c t ness of The Hamlet; therefore (because Jefferson offers him no medium in which to battle the Snopes) R a t l i f f becomes a reporter in the two l a t e r novels of the t r i l o g y . (See Vickery, p. I 8 3 . )

^ 1John J. H e f l i n , J r . , George Washington Harris ("Sut Lovingood"): A Biographical and C r i t i c a l Study. Vanderbilt University Masters Thesis (Nashville, 1934)/ P- 53.

5 2 G r e e t , p. 335-53 •'See The Mansion, p. 119 f f . Through his narrative

R a t l i f f comments that he i s t e l l i n g the story as he thinks i t should have taken place. For example, after giving a general and abbreviated account, R a t l i f f comments, "Except I dont think that was exactly i t . I dont think I prefer i t

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to happened that way, I think I prefer i t to happened a l l at once." (M 119) **My conjecture i s jest as good as yourn, maybe better since ITm a interested party, being as I got what the f e l l e r c a l l s a theorem to prove.* (M 122)

De Voto, p. 92.

149

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Works by F a u l k n e r :

F a u l k n e r , W i l l i a m . C o l l e c t e d S t o r i e s of W i l l i a m F a u l k n e r . New Yo r k , 1950.

. The Hamlet. New York? V i n t a g e E d i t i o n .

. The Mansion. New York, 1959.

. M o s q u i t o e s . New York; D e l l , 1962.

'. The P o r t a b l e F a u l k n e r , e d i t e d w i t h i n t r o -r ' , -duct i o n by Malcolm Cowley. New Yo r k , 1946.

. The R e i v e r s . New Y o r k , 1962.

. "Stockholm A d d r e s s , " W i l l i a m F a u l k n e r : Three Decades of C r i t i c i s m , eds. F r e d e r i c k J . Hoffman and Olga W. V i c k e r y . New Yo r k , 1963.

. The Town. New Y o r k : V i n t a g e E d i t i o n , 1961.

Works of S o u t h w e s t e r n Humor:

B a l d w i n , Joseph G. The F l u s h Times of Alabama and M i s s i s s i p p i : A S e r i e s of S k e t c h e s . New Y o r k , 1854.

B l a i r , W a l t e r , ed. " I n t r o d u c t i o n . " N a t i v e American Humor. San F r a n c i s c o , I960.

B o a t r i g h t , Mody C , ed. " I n t r o d u c t i o n . " F o l k L aughter on the American F r o n t i e r . New Yo r k , 1949.

H a r r i s , George Washington. Sut Lovingood. e d i t e d w i t h an i n t r o d u c t i o n by Brora Weber. New York, 1954«

. The Lovingood P a p e r s , ed. Ben H a r r i s M c C l a r y . K n o x v i l l e : U n i v e r s i t y of Tennessee P r e s s , 1962-1963-

[Hooper, Johnson J o n e s ] . A d v e n t u r e s of C a p t a i n Simon Suggs. L a t e of the T a l l a p o o s a V o l u n t e e r s ; t o g e t h e r w i t h " T a k i n g the Census." and o t h e r Alabama S k e t c h e s . P h i l a d e l p h i a , I848.

[ L o n g s t r e e t , Augustus B a l d w i n ] . G e o r g i a Scenes. New Yo r k , 1897.

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Meine, F r a n k l i n J . , ed. T a l l T a l e s of the Southwest. New York, 1930.

Thorpe, Thomas Bangs. " B i g Bear of A r k a n s a s , " T a l l T a l e s of the Southwest, ed. F r a n k l i n J . Meine. New York, 1930, pp. 9-[21].

W a t t e r s o n , Henry, ed. " I n t r o d u c t i o n . " O d d i t i e s of So u t h e r n L i f e and C h a r a c t e r . New York, 1882.

Secondary Works:

A l l e n , C h a r l e s A. " W i l l i a m F a u l k n e r : Comedy and the Purpose of Humor," A r i z o n a Q u a r t e r l y . XVI (i960), 59-69.

A r t h o s , John. " R i t u a l and Humor i n the W r i t i n g s of. W i l l i a m F a u l k n e r . " A c c e n t . IX (Autumn, 1948), 17-30.

B r o o k s , C l e a n t h , W i l l i a m F a u l k n e r : The Yoknapatawpha County.. New Haven, 1963.

Campbe l l , H a r r y and R u e l F o s t e r , W i l l i a m F a u l k n e r : A C r i t i c a l A p p r a i s a l . Norman: U n i v e r s i t y of Oklahoma P r e s s , 1951.

Cash, W. J . The Mind of the S o u t h . New York, 1961.

Cohen, Hennig. "Mark Twain's Sut Lovingood,™ The Lov i n g o o d Papers (1962), [19]-24-

C o l l i n s , C a r v e l . " F a u l k n e r and C e r t a i n E a r l i e r S o u t h e r n F i c t i o n . " C o l l e g e E n g l i s h . XVI (November, 1954), 92-97.

C u l l e n , John B., i n c o l l a b o r a t i o n w i t h F l o y d W a t k i n s . O l d Times i n t h e F a u l k n e r C o u n t r y . Chapel H i l l : U n i v e r s i t y of N orth C a r o l i n a P r e s s , 1961.

De Cr e v e c o e u r , H e c t o r S t . John. L e t t e r s from an American Farmer. London, 1951.

De Voto, B e r n a r d . Mark Twain's A m e r i c a . New York, 1933. Eby, C e c i l D. " F a u l k n e r a n d C e r t a i n E a r l i e r S o u t h e r n F i c t i o n , "

Sh en an do ah'.. XI (1959), 13"21. G a l b r a i t h , Margaret E d i t h . F a u l k n e r ' s T r i l o g y : Technique as

Approach t o Theme. Vancouver: U n i v e r s i t y of B r i t i s h Columb i a M a s t ers T h e s i s , 1962.

G r e e t , T. Y. "The Theme and S t r u c t u r e of F a u l k n e r ' s The Hamlet." W i l l i a m F a u l k n e r : Three Decades of C r i t i c i s m , eds. F r e d e r i c k J..Hoffman and Olga W. V i c k e r y . New York, 1963, PP. 330-347..

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Gwynn, F r e d e r i c k L. and Joseph L. B l o t n e r , eds. F a u l k n e r i n the U n i v e r s i t y : C l a s s Conferences at the U n i v e r s i t y of V i r g i n i a 1 9 5 7 - 1 9 5 8 . C h a r l o t t e s v i l l e : U n i v e r s i t y of V i r g i n i a P r e s s , 1 9 5 9 .

H e f l i n , John J . , J r . George Washington H a r r i s ("Sut Lovingood* 1) : A B i o g r a p h i c a l and C r i t i c a l S t u d y . N a s h v i l l e : V a n d e r b i l t U n i v e r s i t y M a s t e r s T h e s i s , 1934*

Hoffman, F r e d e r i c k J . and O l g a W. V i c k e r y , eds. W i l l i a m F a u l k n e r : Three Decades of C r i t i c i s m . New Y o r k , I963.

Howe, I r v i n g . W i l l i a m F a u l k n e r : A C r i t i c a l S t u d y . New Y o r k , 1 9 6 2 .

L o n g l e y , John L e w i s , J r . The T r a g i c Mask: A Study of F a u l k n e r * s Heroes. Chapel H i l l : U n i v e r s i t y of N o r t h

C a r o l i n a P r e s s , 1 9 6 3 .

M a t t h i e s s e n , F. 0 . American R e n a i s s a n c e : A r t and E x p r e s s i o n i n the Age of Emerson and Whitman. New Y o r k , I 9 6 0 .

M c l l w a i n e , S h i e l d s . The S o u t h e r n Poor White. 'Norman: U n i v e r s i t y of Oklahoma P r e s s , 1 9 3 9 -

Mencken, H. L. The American Language. New York, 1 9 3 7 -

N i c o l l , A l l a r d y c e . An I n t r o d u c t i o n t o Dramatic Theory. London, 1 9 2 3 .

0»Conner, W i l l i a m Van. T a n g l e d F i r e of W i l l i a m F a u l k n e r . M i n n e a p d l i s : U n i v e r s i t y of M i n n e s o t a P r e s s , 1954*

P a t t e e , F r e d L e w i s . A H i s t o r y of American L i t e r a t u r e S i n c e 1 8 7 0 . New Y o r k , 1 9 1 5 -

Robb, Mary Cooper. W i l l i a m F a u l k n e r : An E s t i m a t e of h i s C o n t r i b u t i o n t o the American N o v e l . P i t t s b u r g h : U n i v e r s i t y of P i t t s b u r g h P r e s s , 1 9 6 3 .

Rourke, Constance. American Humor: A Study of the N a t i o n a l C h a r a c t e r . New York, 1 9 5 3 -

. "Examining the Roots of American Humor," American S c h o l a r . IV ( S p r i n g , 1 9 3 5 ) , 2 4 9 - 2 5 4 -

S t e i n , J e a n . " W i l l i a m F a u l k n e r : An I n t e r v i e w . " W i l l i a m F a u l k n e r : Three Decades of C r i t i c i s m , eds. F r e d e r i c k J . Hoffman and O l g a W. V i c k e r y . New Y o r k , 1 9 6 3 , pp. 6 7 -82.

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Thompson, Lawrance. William Faulkner: An Introduction and Interpretation. New York, 1963.

Vickery, Olga. The Novels of William Faulkner: A C r i t i c a l Interpretation. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1959-

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