Sutpen As A Friend Theme

In every time era power and popularity is everything, and when all you do is obsess over it, you will crack. Wash worked all his life to become important, driving himself crazy enough to kill the man he has envied for a greater part of his life, and to murder the only family he had left. In a time era where slaves are poor, uneducated, and the lowest of the social class, just being white makes you better than them. Wash Jones has the state of mind that because he is white and has Sutpen as a friend, he is of higher authority. William Fulkner strategically placed the characters, conflict, and theme when writing this short story. The way he incorporated the character’s conflict in the theme helps portray how greatly feelings affect characters.

Also Wash calls Sutpen his burden, as if he is better than him, or that Sutpen needs him. In reality, Wash did not go to the war because Sutpen needed him to “watch the plantation” but he really wanted to suck up to have the glory feeling of being in Sutpens place. Throughout the short story Wash thought very highly of himself, disregarding his social status. In many occasions he would show his self-thought higher social ranking over people. When the slaves asked why he did not go to war, he would say he needed to take care of them, showing his dominance over them, when in fact he was uneducated and poor just like them. Even when people did not ask why he did not go to war, he still boasted about his so called “job,” acting as if it was very important business that everyone should

There are far more important things in life than having the highest social status. Wash sees himself as better than the slaves even though he is in the same boat as them. This racism has changed quite a bit since the civil war. Today it does not only happen with blacks and whites but with many other ethnicities. Whites are still seen to be stereotypically more successful, but without diversity we would not have made the progress we have made so far. We aspire to be like everyone else, to be popular. Wash wanted to be Sutpen, he wanted his life. In today’s society people always want to be someone else, and while we are wanting to be someone else, someone else is wanting to be us. In every time era power and popularity is everything, and when all you do is obsess over it, you will crack. We try so hard to be perfect, but in the end it will become harder to be someone other than