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William Faulkner's As I Lay Dying

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Recommended: Analysis of As I Lay Dying

This novel is about is a family will so many unfortunate events going on in their lives. All they want to do is be there for their very ill mother and make sure her death is peaceful. The family had many things going on in their personal lives and they are putting it before their mother. In my opinion William Faulkner wanted to tell the story of a reality family trying to deal and work through death. “Faulkner’s own compassion became brilliant, powerful, and unabashedly moving” (Sundquist). In this novel the Bundren children made a promise to their mother to lay her to rest peacefully. As they go through this tough journey the reader finds out a lot of issues this dysfunctional family has.
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner is a novel written in first person. The reason for having point of views from every character is to make the story seem more informative and show each …show more content…

Having point of views for all characters will give you every side of the situation that has happened. If you have these details it will allow you to know exactly what is going on. Now that the reader has the entire story instead of having half the story you can understand it completely. You can see the tragedies through the characters’ eyes and go through and can sort of live their life for a little while. When I was reading this story I felt like I was stepping into each character’s shoes and being able to experience the ordeal in this book and I was also able to be up close and personal. Reading things from a different perspective will not bore the reader and the reader can use their imagination and create the scenery and how people are acting in this time in their head and they can really jump into the story. Some disadvantages with many point of view stories are some readers might get confused and restless because there are so many sides to the story we have to keep up

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There are many advantages and disadvantages for portraying history in this way for the representation of the Battle of Gettysburg and the civil war. Advantages of this type of presentation of information in a historical fiction novel include the fact that the first person viewpoints allowed the reader to feel empathy towards the characters. This empathy is felt by the reader because the reader has the ability to spend so much time connecting to the narrator’s life and to get into their head. The readers are allowed to “enter” the head of the protagonists and all emotions that the characters feel are instantly felt by the reader because of that connection. The first person viewpoints also allow readers to understand the logic and motivations of the characters in the story.

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The author showing what the characters in a story are thinking can help them determine what point of view the author is writing

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Faulkner composites a family that is far away from perfect, instead the family members each face a tribulation that connects to the death their mother. With the supporting passages Faulkner demonstrates how the novel, As I Lay Dying fulfill his own vision of the writer’s duty, which is to express the problems by appealing to pathos, introducing relatable problems, and discussing family dynamics. Faulkner fulfills the writer’s duty by introducing problems the writers can relate to. Faulkner inspires readers to write about, “problems of the human heart... with itself which can make good writing...because that is only worth the sweat agony” (Faulkner 14-15).

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Since Beah told his story from the first person point of view, the reader was able to see, feel, and try to relate to what he was going through during this horrible time in his life. Next, Beah chose to put certain information into his

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The family's treacherous journey to Jefferson is filled with danger and excitement, yet Faulkner gives many doses of humor throughout the novel. The characters employ themselves in outrageous acts of irony, from Addie's rejection of her most devoted son, to Anse's concern with his false teeth instead of Addie's death, to Vardaman's calling his mother a fish. This irony would not have been evident if it were not for Faulkner's use of multiple narrators. Faulkner was enchanted by Freudian theories of psychology when he wrote this novel, and recounting the story through various perspectives allows the reader to understand each character's reaction. This enhanced the dark humor throughout the novel because the reader can see into each family member's thoughts on her death.

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In the novel, As I lay dying by William Faulkner, the Bundren family go through a mental journey of loss and death of their mother later to go on a physical journey to bury their mother. To the conclusion of any novel, many have an opinion on what is much happy or not a happy ending. In the case of the ending to As I lay dying, include no real burial of how the mother wanted, which was the point of the physical journey in the first place, secrets comes out, one of the five the siblings gets taken away, and many are left with unfinished business, was not a happy at all for most of the characters. The novel is narrated by 15 characters that are not all part of the Bundren family but in some way connected.

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Frederick Douglass uses point of view to show the love that one embodies. Point of view is used to show the love his mother had for him even from being separated. In the story, Douglass talks about being separated from his mother and father as a child. He barely had seen his mother to really know her and was able to only at night.

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It is always important to remember that with every story there comes more than one side to the story. William Faulkner presents this thought in a challenging way in his novel As I Lay Dying. He does this by having each of his fifteen characters in the novel narrate from their own perspective. This allows the reader to connect with the characters on multiple levels from what others say about them to what they have to say about themselves. There are only three chapters that are dedicated to the narration of Anse Bundren.

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Narrative point of view can express a different perspective to the reader by presenting experience, voice, and setting. Perspective is a particular way or attitude of considering events, by whatever character’s point of view the narrator takes. A character’s background and experiences in their life is a key to help the reader relate to the character. Culture may provide more insight about the circumstances, and can change a reader’s perspective, as well as the voice of the narrator - sophisticated or naive.

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It sets up a reader for thier future and what is to come: grief. The story shows how our relationships to others vary from person to person. People are caring and selfish, sympathetic and indifferent, hopeful and completely discouraged. Like any story, the readers gain their own lessons, but still explore the universal themes of loneliness, companionship, love, loss, and death. It shows us that grief can overtake us, as well as looking for an unapproachable

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The use of first-person point of view, gave a better understanding of the thoughts coming from the janitor and how he analyzed 14-A’s mental condition throughout the story and used it against her. By using that point of view, the reader is able to dig into the janitor’s reasoning for wanting to mistreat 14-A as he had done. The janitor’s point of view has no limitations due to him being the main character and his being able to speak to the elderly lady in the story. Hinshaw uses the first-person point of view to reveal what is going on in the story, instead of not letting the readers know what is going inside of the main character’s mind. Not only is the point of view in the story important, but as a matter as fact so is the

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By having this story in first person point of view, it gives the readers an insight to how the narrator really feels about certain characters. It also allows the readers to view background information from the narrator, which allows the story to come together as a whole and be more

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Point of view can really have an effect on your beliefs, thoughts, and how you view the world. Just like this quote, “You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view... Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.” (Lee, Pg.39) explains the effect of perspective outstandingly. “...It is a sin to kill a mockingbird.

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The importance of being able to see a situation from another person's point of view is crucial because it help you apprehend others. You can see a situation from another's point of view by  implementating many things. This is important because then we have affinity for others . An example of why it is important to be able to see a situation from another's point of view is that having empathy helps us associate with one another.

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