The mysterious aura that surrounds Abner’s character in “Barn Burning” saturates the entire story in gloomy abstruseness. His motives, his actions, and even his exact visage are never fully explained by William Faulkner. Instead, he chose to leave a subtle trail of clues for the reader to interpret as they see fit.
Abner is introduced in an indirect manner from the very beginning of the story From Sarty’s position in the room, he can barely see his father, who does not even turn to acknowledge the presence of his son, sitting “stiff in his black Sunday coat”. This moment immediately establishes the nature of Abner; cold, dark, and difficult to read. The pattern of only ever depicting Abner with vague, indistinct, shadowy details continues throughout the story. The most powerful examples of such influential imagery comes when Sarty is following his father during the night, knowing that he will be unfairly punished. The lack of light gives Abner a ghoulish, deathly quality “without face or depth-a shape black, flat, and bloodless.” Faulkner reinforces the steel brutality and immorality Abner exhibits by using various descriptions of him as being “cut from tin” and “clocklike.” The combination of hollowness and metallic bitterness rivet Abner together to form a baneful, ominous, machine of a man; a vengeful, calculating sociopath.
Such ruthless, dangerous characteristics are reasons for concern and interest for the reader. They are placed into the position of a criminal detective, to search through the text to reach an understanding of Abner. Only a deeply rooted grudge could grow such animosity in a person.
No comments:
Post a Comment