Sanity and Insanity in Faulkners The Sound and the Fury :: Faulkner Sound and the Fury Essays

Sanity and Insanity in Faulkners The just and the Fury   Quentin Compson, the oldest son of the Compson family in William Faulkners novel, The Sound and the Fury, personifies all the key elements of insanity. Taking place in the imaginary town of Jefferson, Mississippi, the once high class and wealthy Compson family is beginning their downfall. Employing a stream of consciousness technique narrated from four points of view, Benjy, the idiot child, Jason the cruel liar, cheat, and misogynist, Quentin the introvert, and the author narrating as a detached observer, Faulkner creates the situation of a completely dysfunctional family. Faulkner shows that failure to cope with the inbred changes in the passage of time will drive one out of his mind. Despite what many critics conceive, Quentin is indeed insane, as well as every new(prenominal) member of the Compson family, with the exception of Benjy.   Quentin is seriously mentally ill and does many stupid things to lead up to serious harm, his suicide. His inability to live normally in social club results in the drowning of himself. Quentin is an anachronism he is out of his time and place. His passion in upholding the purity of womanhood is ironic in his questionable incest with his sister. Incest, notwithstanding, simply trying to agree his father believe that such actions did occur is pure madness. Quentin is disgusted with life and feels that nothing drop help anyone. He says, Its not when you realise sic that nothing can help you- religion, pride, anything- Its when you realise sic that you dont need any aid (80). When Quentin uses the word aid, he is referring to the daily things in life that help make life bearable. Things like friends, family, compliments, and self-esteem. These atomic number 18 all types of aid. To think that no one needs any of these things to deal with the hardships in life is senseless. Certainly one must be lunatic to believe that nothing can h elp someone, that life is simply a free for all. As a Harvard student, Quentin should at least have some pride in his accomplishments. Certainly it was no accident for Faulkner to choose a suicidal man as the most psychopathic character for his novel.