This Thesis Is Designed As a Comparative Analysis Of

Masaryk University Faculty of Arts

Department of English and American Studies

English Language and Literature

Kristýna Kozubíková

Unsuccessful Female Rebels in William Faulkner’s Fiction Bachelor’s Diploma Thesis

Supervisor: Mgr. Kateřina Prajznerová, Ph. D.

2012

I declare that I have worked on this thesis independently, using only the primary and secondary sources listed in the bibliography.

…………………………………………….. Author’s signature

Acknowledgement I would like to thank my supervisor Mgr. Kateřina Prajznerová, M.A., Ph.D. for her advice and comments. I would also like to thank my family and friends for providing encouragement. Table of Contents

1. Introduction ...... 5

2. "A Rose for Emily" ...... 11

2.1. Emily Grierson and rebellion as a birth of one's identity ...... 11

3. The Sound and the Fury ...... 21

3. 1. Caddy Compson and rebellion as an escape toward empowerment ...... 21

4. Sanctuary ...... 28

4. 1. Temple Drake and rebellion as resentment against the society ...... 29

5. Conclusion ...... 36

Works Cited ...... 40

Resumé ...... 42

1. Introduction

This thesis is designed as a comparative analysis of three literary characters of unsuccessful female rebels in William Faulkner's fiction - Emily Grierson, the main character of the short story "A Rose for Emily," published in 1930 (Blotner 256), Caddy

Compson, one of the main characters of the novel The Sound and the Fury, which was published in 1929 (Blotner 247) and Temple Drake, one of the main characters of the novel Sanctuary, published in 1931 (Blotner 291).

In the thesis I will compare and contrast these three characters and their reasons and impulses to try to rebel against the society or against their families. I will analyze the process of their rebellions - what actions did they take in order to achieve what they thought was rightfully theirs even for a limited time -, if their way of thinking changed during or after their failed rebellions and also I will analyze the consequences of their actions and state how the aftermaths of their unsuccessful rebellions have affected the characters themselves and their families. I argue that to rebel against the oppression and oppressors is the only way for all the above-mentioned characters to achieve a better life and to finally become happy even if the happiness is only temporary. Their rebellion is a manifestation of disagreement and distaste for social values and expectations maintained either by the community itself or their families that do not correspond with the failed rebels' beliefs and their idea of happiness. I also claim that even though their reasons and means of rebellion differ, they all in their actions crossed the limits in which a rebellion can call itself a rebellion because their doings led to the death of other people. Emily in "A Rose for Emily" is the only "direct" killer out of the characters I have mentioned here. She poisons her lover Homer Barron because she has become frightened by the life her rebellion if successful could bring her. Caddy in the novel The

Sound and the Fury has an affair with Dalton Ames and as a result she becomes

5 pregnant with his child. Her brother Quentin, who is taking their family's honor more than seriously, commits suicide by drowning. Caddy is therefore an "indirect" killer as her display of rebelling is the reason why Quentin takes his life. The third character,

Temple Drake, falsely accuses Goodwin of a murder and this perjury leads to the death of the bootlegger. Moreover her actions are the direct cause of the death of the other men, Tommy and Red, both being murdered by Temple's abductor Popeye.

For the purposes of this thesis I use both print and electronic secondary sources which deal with the novels of William Faulkner and his short stories. Concerning the short story "A Rose for Emily," the most relevant source is Cleanth Brook's study First

Encounters. This book concentrates on Emily Gierson's social status, the difficult relationship with her father and the harsh treatment she had to endure right from her father which is the direct cause of her unsuccessful rebellion against society. Moreover,

Brooks discusses Emily's personality and the outcomes of her rebellion. Although he does not agree with her actions towards her lover Homer Barron, he admires her courage. With regard to The Sound and the Fury, the most relevant source I use here is

Olga W. Vickery's essay "The Sound and the Fury: A Study in Perspective." In the essay, Victory deals with Caddy's family situation. Vickery present Caddy's absent mother as a selfish person who in fact never loved her children with the exception of the son Jason, whose characteristics are very similar to the mother's. She also mentions the obsession with the family's honor to emphasize the burden that is laid on Caddy's shoulder. Vickery claims that Caddy is the only source of love for her idiot brother named Benjy as well as for her mentally unstable brother Quentin but Caddy herself is desperate to find love because none of the Compons is able to love her. With regard to the novel Sanctuary, the most relevant source is Caroline Garnier's essay "Temple

Drake's Rape and the Myth of Willing Victim." Here, Garnier analyzes the position of

6 women in the Sanctuary society, claiming that women are forced to be submissive to men in the novel's patriarchal society. She then studies the impact of the rape on

Temple's personality and her relationship with the abductor and rapist, Popeye. A very useful source for gathering factual data about the literary work of William Faulkner is

Faulkner: A Biography written by Joseph Blotner. The book not only presents readers with exact dates when Faulkner's novels were first published, but it also explains the circumstances under which the novels were written as well as what led the author to write them.

All of the above-mentioned books deal with the reasons which led the rebels to their unsuccessful attempts to improve their conditions. The surroundings prevent the rebels from developing freely but also from being truly happy with their lives. Although none of the rebels manage to achieve a permanent success, they realizes that rebellion is one of the few possibilities to change their unsuitable conditions for the better.

As to the topic of rebellion, the most useful source I work with is Albert Camus's essay The Rebel. In the book "Camus undertook the task of examining a variety of rebellious actions in order to glean from them a rule of action" (Bartlett, Chapter I) as well as examining the motivation of a rebel. The Rebel also deals with rebellions that

"failed to sustain their rebellious impulse, and instead degenerated into something else"

(Bartlett, Chapter I) and I will use these ideas to see if Faulkner's rebels have crossed the boundaries of a rebellion regardless of its ineffectiveness. Another very useful source I use in this thesis is Elizabeth Ann Bartlett's study Rebellious Feminism:

Camus's Ethic of Rebellion and Feminist Thought. For the purpose of this thesis I use especially the first chapter of Bartlett's book, "Rebellion and Feminism," where the author explains her view on Camus's book and adds her commentaries to the topic of rebellion.

Considering the structure of this thesis, I will first present a definition of a rebellion and of a rebel according to Camus's theory and add some of Bartlett's explanation and comments concerning The Rebel. The main body of this thesis is divided into three chapters, each one deals with one of the characters and her rebellion.

These three chapters include definition of the particular type of rebellion as well as an analysis of the particular female character and provides textual evidence from the primary as well as secondary sources. The conclusion then summarizes all the important findings that occur throughout this thesis.

Now I will present a definition of rebellion as I work with it in my analysis.

Albert Camus wrote in his book The Rebel that rebellion starts with the unwillingness to tolerate the oppression or the oppressor any more:

What is a rebel? A man who says no, but whose refusal does not imply a

renunciation. He is also a man who says yes, from the moment he makes his

first gesture of rebellion. ... What does he mean by saying "no"? He means,

for example, that "this has been going on too long," "up to this point yes,

beyond it no," "you are going too far," or, again, "there is a limit beyond

which you shall not go." In other words, his no affirms the existence of a

borderline. The same concept is to be found in the rebel's feeling that the

other person "is exaggerating," that he is exerting his authority beyond a

limit where he begins to infringe on the rights of others. (Camus 19)

The rebellion is "founded simultaneously on the categorical rejection of an intrusion"

(Camus 19) and based on one's belief that he or she has every right to resist the injustice and rebel against the source of the oppression. Camus writes that " r ebellion cannot exist without the feeling that, somewhere and somehow, one is right" (19). The purpose of a rebellion is to change and reform the conditions that no longer are suitable and

8 introduce "common good" (Camus 21) to the society. Camus adds that a rebel in general would not be satisfied with a slight change, he or she is in fact aiming for what Camus calls "all-or-nothing":

The rebel himself wants to be "all"— to identify himself completely with

this good of which he has suddenly become aware and by which he wants to

be personally recognized and acknowledged—or "nothing"; in other words,

to be completely destroyed by the force that dominates him. As a last resort,

he is willing to accept the final defeat, which is death, rather than be

deprived of the personal sacrament that he would call, for example, freedom.

Better to die on one's feet than to live on one's knees. (Camus 21, emphasis

mine)

For Camus, therefore, a rebellion has a rather positive effect on the society, because if one decides to rebel, he or she in fact realized that the society they are living in has some positive values and it is worth to fight for them. Elizabeth Ann Bartlett adds that

f or Camus , while "rebellion" does involve a negative activity of resisting

oppression, it also acts in a positive way to affirm human dignity, solidarity,

friendship, justice, liberation, and beauty. Camus's sense of rebellion is not

so simply defined because for him it represented complex of ideas that

delineate an ethic, a rule of action. (Bartlett, Chapter I)

Bartlett then paraphrases Camus to introduce four "core components - that is those things which must be preserved if rebellion is not to self- destruct" (Bartlett, Chapter I).

These following attributes are then helping to decide if rebellions have not "failed to sustain their rebellious impulse and had instead degenerated into something else, something destructive" (Bartlett, Chapter I) which would for example be totalitarianism, terror or second degree murder. The core components of rebellion are: "(1) rejection of

9 oppression and affirmation of dignity (2) solidarity (3) friendship and the primacy of concrete relationships (4) the valuing of immanence" (Bartlett, Chapter I).

But it must be clearly said that even rebellion has its limits. These strict limits must not be crossed otherwise rebellion looses its right to be called rebellion. One of the actions that cannot be a part of rebellion is a murder of other people because it is an inexcusable disrespect of "common good" (Camus 21), human rights and infringement of personal liberty. Bartlett expresses her agreement with Camus in this way as she comments on his opinions:

Camus argued that the very choice to live entails the recognition that life is

good, and once recognized as good, it is then recognized as good for all.

Thus, murder - by which he meant any action that leads to the death of other,

either directly or indirectly - cannot be accepted or legitimated in any way.

... It is murder which rebellion condemns. (Bartlett, Chapter I)

To sum up the definition of a rebellion I would use a quote from Elizabeth Ann

Bartlett's book which is again strongly influenced by Albert Camus's essay The Rebel:

Rebellion is that moment when the slave refuses enslavement, the battered

woman refuses abuse, the colonized refuses colonization - because a limit

has been crossed that causes them to recognize their fundamental worth.

Rebellion is a refusal to be treated with anything less than the full measure

of dignity and decency that one's humanity demands. (Bartlett, Chapter I)

In the following chapters I will discuss different reasons for rebellion and apply the rules of rebellion on three female characters which were created by William Faulkner.

They all were oppressed by the society or by their families and in order to find their true happiness, they had to try to rebel. As Albert Camus says in his book: "In order to exist, man must rebel" (Camus 27).

2. "A Rose for Emily"

This short story "was taken by Forum for the April 1930 issue" (Blotner 256) and it was William Faulkner's "first story to appear in a national magazine" (Blotner

256). By this time "he had already published three novels, but he had not published a single short story" (Brooks 7). "A Rose for Emily" is a "shocking story, for it tells that a woman about to be deserted by her lover poisons him and keeps his body in an upstairs bedroom" (Brooks 7). The plot is set in Faulkner's fictional Yoknapatawpha County, which he uses as a place for many of his stories, and the story is narrated by a nameless character. Critics though have disagreed about the genre of this story; Cleanth Brooks considers the story to be a "modern Southern Gothic" and Helen E. Nebeker claims that it is in fact a horror story due to the murder of Homer Barron by which Emily crossed the limits of her rebellion.

The main point of this chapter is to look at Emily's unsuccessful attempt to improve her situation by rebelling against the society and her father's values as well as to emphasize the fact that the rebellion gave birth to Emily's true identity because it allowed her to act according to her true beliefs and wishes.

2.1. Emily Grierson and rebellion as a birth of one's identity

"With rebellion, awareness is born," writes Albert Camus in his book The Rebel

(20). The awareness in this case means the birth of one's identity, the awareness who one really is or could be if his or her rebellion succeeded. A slave must fulfill his or her duties and obey the master in every way and therefore he or she does not and cannot make own decision based on one's own thinking. There always is somebody who

"outlines" the life of the slave, because the slave has "remained silent and has abandoned himself to the form of despair in which a condition is accepted even though

11 it is considered unjust" (Camus 19). But the moment slaves rebel against slavery, they are building their own identity. In another words, a slave is starting to be aware of him or herself:

Awareness, no matter how confused it may be, develops from every act of

rebellion: the sudden, dazzling perception that there is something in man

with which he can identify himself, even if only for a moment. Up to now

this identification was never really experienced. Before he rebelled, the slave

accepted all the demands made upon him. Very often he even took orders,

without reacting against them, which were far more conducive to

insurrection than the one at which he balks. He accepted them patiently,

though he may have protested inwardly, but in that he remained silent he

was more concerned with his own immediate interests than as yet aware of

his own rights. (Camus 20)

Rebellion starts immediately after the oppressed had realized injustice that he or she must have endured to this point and after he or she had realized that "common good"

(Camus 21) could also apply to him/ her. The rebel protests against the oppressor as such but also against the whole institution that allowed to oppress him or her:

The very moment the slave refuses to obey the humiliating orders of his

master, he simultaneously rejects the condition of slavery. The act of

rebellion carries him far beyond the point he had reached by simply refusing.

He exceeds the bounds that he fixed for his antagonist, and now demands to

be treated as an equal. (Camus 20)

The rebel is starting to change whether he or she is in fact aware of it. If one's rebellion should be successful, it is important for the rebel to "stand his or her ground". Up till now the rebel was told what to do and no exceptions were made, disobedience was

12 severely punished. Now, the slave must demonstrate his or her courage as well as determination to carry on in his or her action if the goals should be accomplished. The rebellion is then proclaimed "preferable to everything, even to life itself. It becomes ... the supreme good" (Camus 20). It indeed represents "a special mission" to the rebel and he or she is willing to risk everything in order to gain the long-desired dignity. For

Camus himself, this kind of rebellion where one fights to find the true identity is highly valuable because it makes the rebel aware of own abilities that might not have been fully exerted. He claims that "rebellion, though apparently negative, since it creates nothing, is profoundly positive in that it reveals the part of man which must always be defended" (Camus 25). But whether the rebellion is trying to win complete freedom for slaves or the abolishment of oppressive power, it cannot violate the "common good"

(Camus 21). If the borderline is crossed, " w e have, then, the right to say that any rebellion which claims the right to deny or destroy this solidarity loses simultaneously its right to be called rebellion and becomes in reality an acquiescence in murder"

(Camus 27).

Now I will apply this definition of a rebellion in which one realizes his or her true self to Emily Grierson. In the following lines I will compare her situation to the condition of slaves having to obey their master and state why she had to rebel against the society and her father even though her rebellion was not successful.

Emily Grierson does not possess "traditional" characteristics of a rebel. She according to the description below looks like a peaceful, sociable person but in fact she is a classic outsider that barely leaves the house and does not receive any visitors.

Emily was a small, fat woman ... . Her skeleton was small and spare;

perhaps that was why what would have been merely plumpness in another

was obesity in her. She looked bloated, like a body long submerged in

motionless water, and of pallid hue. Her eyes, lost in the fatty ridges of her

face, looked like two small pieces of coal pressed into a lump of dough ... .

(Faulkner, "A Rose for Emily" 121)

After her death, she is entitled by the nameless narrator of the story as "a fallen monument" of the town (Faulkner, "A Rose for Emily" 119). Moreover the narrator adds that " a live, Miss Emily had been a tradition, a duty, and a care" (Faulkner, "A

Rose for Emily" 119), but all the same he states that she was "sort of tragic and serene"

(Faulkner, "A Rose for Emily" 124). After her father's death, she was pitied by the community but due to her solitary life she was also a subject to speculation and gossiping. All of these characteristics are not very apt of a person who would be able to rebel against the oppression as the general image of a rebel differs significantly. A rebel despises traditions and protest against his or her duties because they are mainly the reason of oppression. Moreover, in the view of other people, a rebel is not tragic and serene and most people do not image that a woman would participate in a rebellion.

Elizabeth Ann Bartlett strongly opposes this statement claiming that a rebellion is not distinctively male activity and women have the same right to rebel to win their dignity

(Chapter I).

Emily's family was respected in the town as it seemed to the townspeople that the Griersons were inseparable part of their town. Faulkner writes that the family of

Miss Emily always regarded themselves as superior to the rest of the town:" People in our town believed that the Griersons held themselves a little too high for what they really were" ("A Rose for Emily" 123). However, nothing specific about the father's occupation is mentioned in the text, neither is there written where the father's money came from and what was the reason Emily's nameless father believed he had the right to act as a superior to the rest of the town. Nevertheless, Miss Emily was a real lady and

14 the community did not dispute this. " Emily carried her head high enough - even when we believed that she was fallen" (Faulkner, "A Rose for Emily" 125). Being a lady was more obligation and duty than honor, as the town was based on "autocratic pre-Civil

War hierarchy, to whom a lady is always a lady" (Nebeker) and Miss Emily was constantly watched by the community and she had retained this status due to the reputation her father had acquired.

The community in this case represents the power which exerts the pressure on

Emily, but the real oppressor here is in fact her father. The narrator speaks about the father's method of upbringing as something everybody in the town knew about.

Faulkner does not mention anything about Emily's mother thus it can be assumed that her father was the only one responsible for the raising of his daughter. Emily's father primary wanted her daughter to remember the family pride and insisted that Emily must act according to certain rules that for a girl were very severe. Even though the young

Emily was attractive, none of the beaus was acceptable for Emily's father for any reason. As it is said in the story, not only he wanted to bring his daughter as a lady, he wanted complete control over her life:

None of the young men were quite good enough for Miss Emily and such.

We had long thought of them as a tableau; Miss Emily a slender figure in

white in the background, her father a spraddled silhouette in the foreground,

his back to her and clutching a horsewhip, the two of them framed by the

back-flung front door. (Faulkner, "A Rose for Emily" 123)

Emily's situation is therefore very similar to the slave who must do as he or she is told by the master and cannot choose his or her own actions - except for the fact that oppressing power here is not slavery but fatherhood. Emily in fact does not "exist" before her father's death because she never had any freedom to develop individually.

Camus's notion of "common good" (21) was constantly violated in her case as Emily grew up with her father being constantly aware of her doings and with the reminder that he is the "master". The adherence to the family honor and rules of conduct resemble the rules of slaves which they had to respect if they did not want to be punished, as well as the father's behavior resembles the behavior of a slave owner who must show others how much power he has over his "property".

Although Emily's attitude towards this mistreating is not presented in the story, her identification with father was complete. She did not oppose him in any way and was completely submitted to him. When her father died, she refused to believe it because without him she would be lost:

The day after his death all the ladies prepared to call at he house and offer

condolence and aid, as is our custom. Miss Emily met them at the door,

dressed as usual and with no trace of grief on her face. She told them that

her father was not dead. She did that for three days, with the ministers

calling on her, and the doctors, trying to persuade her to let them dispose of

the body. Just as they were about to resort to law and force, she broke

down . (Faulkner, "A Rose for Emily" 123-124)

As a slave, whose owner had died, Emily finds herself without a "master". One might find this uplifting but the truth is that Emily is not "free". She is still imprisoned within the community because she feels the people from the town are watching her and her reactions even more closely than they used to. She feels the obligation to do as she was told by the late father and to maintain family's grandeur by behaving as a true lady. As she has now became the only one left from the family (except for very distant cousins from Alabama), the pressure is even worse. Regardless of what she feels, she continues

16 to maintain the legacy of her father and the town is becoming a prison for Emily, because it deprives her of her freedom to do what she feels like just as her father did.

There is another very important moment in the short story where the narrator mentions that Emily has her father's portrait hanged on the wall. It is unclear who hanged it there - whether it was the father himself, or if Emily decided to have it hanged there after Mister Grierson had died. Faulkner completely avoids this aspect, but what is clear is the purpose of the portrait. It might serve decorative purposes as well but mainly it is a symbol and a constant reminder of imposed values and patterns of behavior that

Emily adopted owing to her father. As it was already mentioned Emily's attitudes and opinions about the way her father has psychically abused her are omitted, and a wide space is left for guessing, it is still surprising that Emily keeps her father's portrait on the wall even though she does not need to. This might suggest that Emily in fact misses being told what to do and that a mere look at the portrait might help her decide.

Considering the fact that most slave owners had their own portrait hanged on the wall as well so that slave would be constantly reminded who is the master, this is certainly a very interesting parallel.

Emily more than ever longs for freedom which according to Camus is "the motivating principle of all revolutions" (76). And if it had not been for Homer Barron, she would probably not find the courage to reject the habits her father taught her to respect, because as Camus writes "rebellion cannot exist without a strange form of love"

(Camus 268). Love, adds Elizabeth Ann Bartlett, is "true to the origins of rebellion, it is love that gave it birth" (Bartlett, Chapter I). Emily allows "a foreman named Homer

Barron, a Yankee - a big, dark, read man, with a big voice and eyes lighter than his face" (Faulkner, "A Rose for Emily" 124), who she is love with, to come to her life.

Homer is "the Northern Outsider, gross, arrogant and dynamic" (Nebeker) and he

17 would surely not appeal to Emily's father if he was still alive and could assume his traditional posture at the door. Here, thanks to her rebellion, Emily is starting to build her own identity because being able to choose who to be with and ignore her father's voice in her head, might be a way for Emily to finally be happy. But as Camus puts it, a rebel risks everything - Emily not only breaks her father's rules, but she also risks her status of a lady as the community does not understand her intentions: "At first we were glad that Miss Emily would have an interest, because the ladies all said, "Of course a

Grierson would not thing seriously of a Northerner, a day laborer." But there were still others, older people, who said that even grief could not cause a real lady to forget noblesse oblige" (Faulkner, "A Rose for Emily" 124).

Miss Emily Grierson finally starts to behave according to what she feels instead of doing what she is told to do as it had been her whole life and rebels against her father's oppression. She is now aware of her own identity, of the true self that she had to ignore when her father was alive. She is aware of what she is able to do and by this her rebellion fulfills Camus's proposed "common good" (Camus 21) than he saw as a purpose of rebellion. Thus, without knowing what Emily will do and how her rebellion will turn, her actions might be considered as heroic acts. Cleanth Brooks in his book

First Encounters expresses undisguised admiration to the rebel:

Miss Emily's mania is a manifestation - warped through it be - of her pride,

her independence, her iron will. She has not crumpled up under the pressure

exerted upon her. She has not given in. She has insisted on choosing a lover

in spite of criticism of the town. She has refused to be jilted. She will not be

either held up to scorn or pitied. She demands that the situation be settled on

her own terms. (13)

Her determination, a quality which she acquired thanks to her decision to rebel and to fight for the happiness, is apparent from the part where she buys the poison meant for her lover Homer:

"I want some poison," she said to the druggist. ...

"Yes, Miss Emily. What kind? For rats and such? I'd recom "

"I want the best you have. I don't care what kind."

The druggist named several. "They'll kill anything up to an elephant. But

what you want is "

"Arsenic," Miss Emily said. "Is that a good one?"

"Is...arsenic? Yes ma'am. But what you want "

"I want arsenic." (Faulkner, "A Rose for Emily" 125)

But as it was already mentioned, Emily's rebellion crossed the limits of what Camus considers to be a "justifiable rebellion". Her direct murder of Homer Barron is not excusable. Brooks does not approve her wrongdoings either: "What she does in order to get her own way is, of course, terrible. But there is an element of the heroic about it too, and the town evidently recognizes it as such" (13). All Emily apparently wanted was to marry Homer by which her rebellion would be complete. But it is known that Barron

"liked men, and it was known that he drank with the younger men in the Elks' Club - that he was not a marrying man" (Faulkner, "A Rose for Emily" 126).

Because Homer's "preferences" are known publicly, the towns-people assume

Emily wants to kill herself by ingesting poison as a true lady of honor would do this rather than let herself humiliate by someone who was not worth it. But she instead shows she is courageous and her behavior is not expected as it might seem: "Miss Emily is crazy, but she is no coward. She is the true aristocrat" (Brooks 13). Even the main

19 character herself might be surprised to find strength to endure such a terrible thing as to murder the only person she might ever loved.

Faulkner writes the story without letting Miss Emily speak her mind or to justify her actions. It is my belief that the refusal to marry Emily was not the only thing that caused Homer to perish. It was caused by the omnipresent soul of Mister Grierson which in fact never left the house Emily lived in. There is this portrait on the wall that remains hanged even though Emily's life would have been easier had she removed it, but the strong personality of Emily's father could never vanish from his daughter's thinking: "Then we knew that this was expected too; as if that quality of her father which had thwarted her woman's life so many times had been too virulent and too furious to die" (Faulkner, "A Rose for Emily" 127).

Emily Grierson then fails in her rebellion. She started very promisingly; her rebellion helped her in realizing her true identity and showed her way to be happy. In rebellion, she was "born" again. By opposing her father's voice in her head she has became her true herself. Her rebellion intended to take over her life "is a movement of live and creation" (Bartlett, Chapter I) but with negative ending. Even though she certainly was not a coward, she started to doubt whether she had the strength to carry out her rebellion to the full extent and as a result she ended her rebellion early. Not only did she commit murder, but also she did not succeed in her attempt to change her life for the better - she did not even change it at all. Emily was given the opportunity to try but she has failed to take advantage of it. By killing Homer regardless what were her true reasons she has reestablished her fathers voice in her head and she has made a commitment to listen to it permanently.

3. The Sound and the Fury

Published on October 7, 1929 (Blotner 247), The Sound and the Fury was the fourth novel of William Faulkner that was available to his readers, however most of the readers consider this novel to be Faulkner's "first great novel" (Fujie 117). It tells the story of Compson family, former Southern aristocrats, who are having troubles maintaining their good reputation. The book is divided into four sections, first three being told by members of Compson family and the fourth by their black servant, Dilsey.

When choosing the title, Faulkner found inspiration in William Shakespeare's play

Macbeth, namely in the "great speech in which the Scottish king cries out that life itself is a "tale/ Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, / Signifying nothing" (Brooks 44).

This title refers to the section being told by Caddy's idiotic brother Benjy whose narration is "the most incoherent of the four sequences" (Brooks 45). It is interesting to notice that even though the central character of the novel is Caddy, she was not given space for her own narration to justify her actions and Faulkner let her three brothers to tell her story instead.

The main point of this chapter is to look at Caddy Compson's unsuccessful attempt to confront her mother's values and escape from the home deprived of love toward empowerment. I will discuss the burden that is laid on her and the consequences of her failed rebellion that caused the death of her brother Quentin.

3. 1. Caddy Compson and rebellion as an escape toward empowerment

As Camus writes, only creatures who refuse to be what they are, are people. We have the right to choose according to our needs and wishes and we also have the right to plan our own future. But in case these rights are not guaranteed, we have the very right to rebel against the oppressive power. "Rebellion is legitimate," continues Camus, "even

21 if rebels differed about the reasons" (25). He adds that submission to an oppressor almost equals giving up a right to live: "To keep quiet is to allow yourself to believe that you have no opinions, that you want nothing, and in certain cases it amounts to really wanting nothing" (Camus 19-20).

Camus then continues to say that rebellion is highly valued form of a protest, because " no possible form of wisdom today can claim to give more. Rebellion indefatigably confronts evil from which it can only derive a new impetus" (267). The

"evil" comes often from society as a whole, rather than from a single person. Each community has its own laws, habits and expectations that say what a person should do in order to conform. A rebel then views these as a burden that prevents him or her to be the true his/her true self. In order to make one's life bearable, one must confront this oppression and rebel against it.

But rebellion is not necessarily a destructive and violent force. It can create more than it can damage. Rebellion brings new visions, awareness of one's identity and satisfaction with one's life. In most cases, it damages what is old, often illogical and immoral. To rebel it means to escape toward meaningful values that really matter.

Though it must be clearly stated, that a rebel does not escape from something, he or she escapes to something. Thorough change of inconvenient social values and expectations is almost impossible and as Camus puts it, "we can act only in our own time, among the people who surround us" (12), therefore rebels must decide what values in this world will they fight for and do whether it takes to incorporate them into their lives. But even the great advocate of rebellion, Albert Camus himself, admits that " r ebellion is not realistic" (23). There is a high possibility that rebellion will fail because this kind of rebellion is very dependant on the "support" of place where the rebel lives. If the community not willing to accept any changes in the "good old" traditions and the rebel

22 does not find any followers, than he or she is, however devoted to the cause, condemned to fail.

In the following lines I will apply this definition of a rebellion in which one escapes toward meaningful values to Caddy Compson. I will provide a description of the place where Caddy grew up claiming that she could have never been happy there and well as state that she had every right to face her mother's expectations and values even though at the end she failed in changing anything to the better.

Candace Compson, called Caddy for short, is the only daughter in the family.

Being the only daughter, she is also the only Compson who has a character and who has according to Olga Vickery not deviated from humanity (The Novels of William

Faulkner: A Critical Interpretation 47). William Faulkner himself stated that he liked this character of Caddy very much, because she reminded him of his daughter who died in an infant age. "To me Caddy was the beautiful one, she was my heart's darling"

(quoted in Williams 62) said Faulkner. He admitted that he even fell in love with her.

Caddy is in fact very likeable character; she is intelligent, perceptive and very sympathetic to other people, especially to her mentally retarded brother Benjy. Her mother is Caddy's complete opposite as she is "weak, whining, self-pitying woman"

(Brooks 43) and does not care about her children, maybe with the exception of Jason, and she "has somehow withheld her love from the children" (Brooks 53). The marriage of Caddy's parents is lacking any emotions, as they barely speak to each other. The father, "a disgusting caricature of the cultivated gentleman" (Brooks 49), drinks too much and lacks any interest in the children as well. The eldest brother Quentin is over- sensual, concerned with family pride and lacks self-confidence. Jason on the other hand is a very bad person - even William Faulkner himself admits that he had created immoral and corrupted character. Jason looks on his brother Benjy as a disgrace of the

23 family and as a nuisance he has to tolerate. His only concern is to obtain as much money as possible whatever it takes. Each of the brother's narrations concerns Caddy but each of them views their sister in a very different way. "For Benjy she is the smell of trees; for Quentin, honor; and for Jason, money or at least the means of obtaining it"

(Vickery, "The Sound and the Fury: A Study in Perspective" 1018).

This family provides very stressful atmosphere for Caddy who is the only one who seems to enjoy life. Needless to say that she is also the only Compson who is capable of loving. In a sense, Benjy loves Caddy, and she truly loves him, but this is not the kind of love Caddy is looking for. The feelings of other characters to Caddy are very cold and had not it been for the family's black servant Dilsey, Caddy would have been growing up in a household absolutely deprived of love. Later, when Caddy had left,

" Dilsey is the only one who challenges Jason's word in the household, who defends

Caddy, Miss Quentin and Benjy ... from his anger" (Vickery, "The Sound and the

Fury: A Study in Perspective", 47). One of the few phrases she constantly repeats in the story, "'Tain't no luck on this place" (Faulkner, The Sound and the Fury 33), perfectly characterizes the home Caddy is so desperate to leave and live the life that would make her truly happy.

Caddy's rebellion has a very slow development which is considerably influenced by her growing up. At first she does not really know what she wants or to be precise how to achieve the goals she dreams of. But with the starting point of her rebellion she realizes what her options are. Camus says that beginning to understand one's needs is absolutely normal as with every rebellion " t here is always a period of soul-searching"

(26). Caddy realizes that a life as her mother would imagine for the daughter is not suitable for her. The mother's rigid behavior and defending the family honor to absurdity is what makes Mrs. Compson an unpleasant character. Cleanth Brooks adds

24 that "Mrs. Compson, for example, had put on mourning when she learned that Caddy had allowed a boy to kiss her. Certainly that is neurotic behavior" (62). The whole household of Compsons is an oppressive and abusive place and Caddy has to refuse the authority of her parents (especially mother) and her brothers as no one from them would understand and respect Caddy's needs and wishes.

When Caddy starts to use a perfume and wear different dresses appropriate to her teenage age (and this part could also be marked as the very beginning on her rebellion), she meets problems from a person she would have never guessed, namely from her idiotic brother Benjy:

Benji, Caddy said, Benjy. She put her arms around me again, but I went

away. 'What is it, Benjy,' she said. 'Is it this hat!' She took her hat off and

came again, and I went away.

'Benjy,' she said, 'What is it Benjy. What has Caddy done.'

'He don't like that prissy dress.' Jason said. 'You think you're grown up,

don't you. You think you're better than anybody else, don't you. Prissy.'

(Faulkner, The Sound and the Fury 43)

Caddy is indeed very different from her mother as she wants to wear nice lively dresses, but her mother wears only black dressing gowns (Vickery, "The Sound and the Fury: A

Study in Perspective" 1019). Benjy protests against her "fashion rebellion" because the perfume overlays Caddy's natural scent which so important to Benjy as his retarded mind allows him to recognize her by this scent: "Caddy smelled like trees," (Faulkner,

The Sound and the Fury 45) says he many times in the novel. Though idiotic, I believe that Benjy starts to comprehend that he is losing his sister who intends to escape the gloomy house and that "You've got you Caddy" (Faulkner, The Sound and the Fury 28) will not hold true any more.

But Caddy's rebellion cannot be stopped. "Looking for warmth, joy, life itself,

Caddy looses her virginity to a handsome young man, a stranger in town named Dalton

Ames" (Brooks 53). Though for her it is not simply "loosing virginity", it is a true romance and unconditioned love which she so long wished for and at that point she reassures herself that only the refusal of her mother's code of conduct and rebelling against her would bring her happiness. Knowing what the family's reaction will be, she does not care, because she has her future planned: marry Dalton and leave the "house of horror" and in that way " b eauty will be lived and no longer only imagined" (Camus

220). However, nothing of this sort happens. Caddy's happiness falls into pieces before she could accomplish the goals of her rebellion and escape to the life she deserves.

Cleanth Brooks claims that "Quentin is crushed by Caddy's fall" (54) but I believe that her actions were nothing of a wrongdoing, as Caddy had every right to escape from her mother's drastic commands in order to live with dignity and real values. Moreover,

Camus writes that rebel does not take other people's opinions into consideration and

" f rom the moment that he strikes, the rebel cuts the world in two" (Camus 245) which also applies to Caddy as her whole family is shaken the her daring. Quentin, who is too much preoccupied with sister's honor, confronts Dalton who later abandons his lover even thought Caddy is pregnant with his child. Brooks continues to analyze the situation between the lovers and Quentin:

It has been argued that if Quentin had not interfered, Caddy would have

married Dalton Ames and her life would not have been ruined. But Quentin

has surely judged this situation correctly. Dalton means it when he says that

women are all bitches. He is not the marrying kind. In any case, neither in

his eyes nor in Caddy's has Quentin provided any real interference. Had

Dalton wanted to marry her, he could have taken her off with him at any

time. Quentin did not break up a true-love affair . (Brooks 56-7)

Here, Caddy's rebellion has come to an end as she completely failed to fulfill the purpose of her rebellion - to find a kindred spirit. Not having returned Caddy's feelings,

Dalton vanishes and never cares what happens to his child. Quentin did not come to terms with Caddy's "sexual freedom" (Millgate 33) and it is her rebellion what "forced" him to commit suicide by drowning. In his narration he expresses a complete resignation to live: "It's not when you realize that nothing can help you - religion, pride, anything - it's when you realize that you don't need any help" (Faulkner, The Sound and the Fury 76). To not judge Caddy unfairly, if she knew how strong Quentin's reaction would be to her rebellion, she would probably choose another way to escape from the oppressing household, but Camus claims that if a rebel condemns a murder, he or she must condemn a suicide as well. Therefore, should Caddy's rebellion have been "pure"

(without taking the result into consideration), Quentin's suicide should have been prevented. However, Quentin was not the only one who applied Caddy's "sin" to him/herself. Mrs. Compson is constantly nagging about the ill-fortune she has to endure: " W hat have I done to have been given children like these Benjamin was punishment enough and now for her to have no more regard for me her own mother I've suffered for her dreamed and planned and sacrificed" (Faulkner, The Sound and the

Fury 95). It is certainly surprising to realize that Mrs. Compson compares Benjy and

Caddy with each other. Benjy is an idiot, he cannot speak and thinks as a child, but

Caddy is perfectly healthy and sane girl who just wanted what is to be happy and present "common good" (Camus 21) to her life which I do not personally find despicable at all.

Caddy then tries to redeem what she have caused by her unsuccessful rebellion, and marries another man, Herbert, not telling him about Dalton's baby. Their marriage breaks up as soon as he learns about Caddy's secret. By marrying a respectable man she wanted to please her mother and in a sense apologize for she had caused. This shows that Caddy is really a likeable character but with a difficult life story. It is hard to believe that Faulkner loved Caddy since he prepared the most saddest story for her from the three characters of novels this work is dealing with. Because she put everything into her rebellion so that her life would make sense, and lost her fight, she will be suffering to the rest of her days. Not wanted to live at the Compson household, feeling responsible of what happened to brother Quentin, she cannot see her daughter (named after the deceased brother) because Jason would not let her and only use her to get more money. Not a single person joined Caddy in her fight against the outdated demands on the members of Compson family or on women as such, and therefore she had a very little chance to succeed.

4. Sanctuary

First published on February 9, 1931 (Blotner 291), this shocking novel dealing with rape of a young virgin Mississippian girl from a respectable family had a "lasting popular success (it remained in print during the late 1930s and early 1940s, even when all of Faulkner's other works did not)" (Stringer 27). Faulkner claimed that he wrote the story because he was in a need of money: "I made a thorough and methodical study of everything on the list of best-sellers. When I thought I knew what the public wanted, I decided to give them a little more than they had been getting; stronger and rawer - more brutal. Guts and genitals" (Blotner 234). This "most horrific idea he could think of"

(Garnier 164) brought Faulkner success even in Hollywood where his story was adopted for a film under the title The Story of Temple Drake (Blotner 316). Though successful

28 by the readers, critics have agreed that Sanctuary is not William Faulkner's major novel

it in fact according to Michael Wainwright "violently dislocates the Faulknerian aesthetic" (150).

The main point of this chapter is to look at Temple Drake's failed rebellion and her unsuccessful attempt to improve her situation by rebelling against the oppressive power of patriarchal society as well as to provide definition of a rebel who confronts the society because of his or her disagreement with its values. I will assert that a failed rebel can easily become and nihilist and I will apply the definition of nihilism to the Temple's behavior.

4. 1. Temple Drake and rebellion as resentment against the society

Elizabeth Ann Bartlett writes that Camus in his book tries "to find a way to act in the world that does not rely on the abstract ideals and absolute truths constructed by

"men" ... that have been used to justify the destruction of lives and civilizations in the name of that "Truth" (Chapter II). In another words, both Camus and Bartlett have agreed that rebellion is a "search for personal truths by which to live" (Barlett, Chapter

II). By "truth" they do not mean the truth in its literal sense, what they mean is that one should find a value system according which he or she would act and therefore become satisfied with his or her own life.

But not every society is open to changes in social statuses and values. Rebellion is then one of the few options which could improve the circumstances, but it does not guarantee success. A rebel, who has failed in his or her own rebellion, is very prone to skepticism that what was done was worthless. This rebel, who as it was said in general rebels in the belief of better life, then can easily become a nihilist. This change does not

29 occur overnight, it is in fact a gradual change based on one's observation of society and inability to improve one's current situation.

One of the early thinkers of nihilism, Friedrich Nietzsche, describes nihilism as follows: "What does nihilism mean? That the highest values devaluate themselves. The aim is lacking; "why?" finds no answer" (Woodward, Chapter I). Nihilism is therefore

"understood as the problem of the meaningfulness of life" (Woodward, Chapter I).

Camus then specifies what does it mean to be a nihilist:

Nietzsche diagnosed in himself, and in others, the inability to believe and

the disappearance of the primitive foundation of all faith - namely the belief

in life. The "Can one live as a rebel?" became with him "Can one live,

believing in nothing?" His reply is in the affirmative. Yes, if one creates a

system out of absence of faith, if one accepts the final consequences of

nihilism, and if, on emerging into the desert and putting one's confidence in

what is going to come, one feels, with the same primitive instinct, both pain

and joy. (Camus 75)

But it must be stated that even a nihilist can be a deeply religious person; what he or she refuses is the way the society is organized: "A nihilist is not someone who believes in nothing, but someone who does not believe in what he sees" (Camus 61). What nihilism refuses is morality. Camus adds that morality for Nietzsche "is only a special type of immorality. "It's virtue", Nietzsche says, "which has need of justification". And again:

"It is for moral reasons that good will, one day, cease to be done"" (Camus 59).

Nihilism is not a failed rebellion; in fact it is a "special" kind of a rebellion which destroys first and creates afterwards. Albert Camus writes: "According to

Nietzsche, he who wants to be a creator of good and evil, must first of all destroy all

30 values ... . To raise a new sanctuary, a n old sanctuary must be destroyed, that is the law" (57, emphasis mine).

Now I will apply this definition of a rebel whose primal concern is to target oppressive power of the society to the situation of Temple Drake. In the following lines

I will state that she resents the values of her family in and that her behavior is the proof of her resentment against the society.

It has been argued by David Williams that Temple is not the central character of

Sanctuary. He quotes Michael Millgate who claims that Faulkner while rewriting the story had to reduce the role of Horace Benbow, the lawyer, so that Temple could be mentioned in the novel more times (130). In fact she and Ruby, the Goodwin's wife, are the only women who are given more space in the novel. Temple's mother is not mentioned here, the whole upbringing is done by her father, and she is growing up surrounded by her four brothers who certainly are not acting towards her as brothers as it can be seen in this particular sentence: "Buddy--that's Hubert, my youngest brother-- said that if he ever caught me with a drunk man, he'd beat hell out of me" (Faulkner,

Sanctuary). It can be said that Temple in fact does not have one father and four brothers, she has five fathers instead. They all are giving her orders and Temple must obey no matter what her feelings are. Caroline Garnier writes: "In Sanctuary's patriarchal family, men control their daughters' and sisters' sexuality by choosing - and if necessary, murdering - their suitors, and women who misbehave are locked up, sent away, put on probation, or even beaten by their male "protectors" (166). Temple resents his kind of society where she has almost no rights and where she is constantly reminded that she is

"only" a woman.

Moreover, all men in her family are successful and respectable: ""I've got four brothers. Two are lawyers and one's a newspaper man. The other's still in school. At

Yale. My father's a judge. Judge Drake of Jackson"" (Faulkner, Sanctuary). Temple is on the other a misbehaving daughter who rather than studying prefers dating boys. Her father is not proud of her because she manages to disturb his idea of serenity constantly:

"She thought of her father sitting on the veranda, in a linen suit, a palm leaf fan in his hand, watching the negro mow the lawn" (Faulkner, Sanctuary). Temple is aware of the fact that her behavior does not appeal to her father, however I believe that she is acting that way on purpose. It is the very beginning of her rebellion. Garnier explains Temple's reasons for rejecting her familial sanctuary: " S he is perpetually crushed by Sanctuary's all-male institutions of family, gentlemanliness, prostitution, civil protection, medicine, and law" (166).

In the novel, Temple is depicted as a bad character who later takes advantage of her power given to her by the court. But the society in Sanctuary is corrupted to a large extent and its corruption is the reason why Temple resents the whole value system of the society (and particularly of her family) and rebels against it even though she is not successful in changing the unsuitable values. She as a woman must be subordinated to men who are trying to maintain their reputation as gentlemen but are acting in a very different way. "In the patriarchal society of the novel, the all-male institutions are supposed to "protect" the "weak sex" (Garnier 165), but the converse is true. Temple's date, Gowan, is perpetually drunk and his saying about a gentleman having to protect his girl sounds similarly trained as Temple's boasting about her successful brothers.

Caroline Garnier comments that " b ehind patriarchal principles such as "we got to protect our girls", the novel's male characters represent more of a threat than a protection" (168), because "none of the novel's male characters intend to protect Temple from harm" (169). Moreover, Garnier talks about the reluctance of some men to rescue

Temple from her captivity, particularly of Horace Benbow, who is one of the few honest characters of the novel:

Over five weeks Temple is sequestered at another illegal institutional

sanctuary, Reba's whore-house, looking for her and rescuing her is not an

apparent priority for the men in her community any more than it is for the

men in her own family. Even the men who know where Temple is held

captive do nothing to rescue her: ... Horace even makes sure Temple stays

in the whorehouse, verifying from time to time that she has not left, because

he "may need her," he says, to testify at a trial - not to testify against the man

who raped and abducted her, of course, but to defend Goodwin, the alleged

murderer and well-known bootlegger who participated in her abduction.

(Garnier 169)

This behavior when one says this and does the complete opposite is the cause of

Temple's misbehavior and her attitude towards the society. She acts immorally, lacks an aim in her life, believes in nothing and resents her surroundings. Her "absolute negation", as Camus would put it, then turns into an "absolute rebellion" based on the hatred of what she is going through. It could be said that resentment is not a sufficient reason to rebel, but Camus strongly objects to this statement: "Does this imply that no rebellion is motivated by resentment? No, and we know it only too well in this age of malice. But we must consider the idea of rebellion in its widest sense on pain of betraying it; and in its widest sense rebellion goes far beyond resentment" (Camus 25).

Temple's rebellion is based on the abhorrence of the whole system she lives in and on the almost uncontrolled power of men in the society, but in "its widest sense" it is an unsuccessful attempt to change the conditions of women in the society. In her failure to change anything at all she becomes a true nihilist.

But the process of becoming a nihilist is a gradual in Temple's case as it is with other unsuccessful rebels. From the first moments when Temple enters the house of bootleggers she does not view the men as a threat but as a mean to finally start off her rebellion. Just by talking to them she is probably breaking all the promises she had given to her father and possibly to her brothers about choosing her company conscientiously. Lack of fear of the men can be seen in the part where she is taking off her shoes on the way to the bootleggers' house:

The man in overalls was barefoot also. He walked ahead of Temple and

Gowan, the shotgun swinging in his hand, his splay feet apparently effortless

in the sand into which Temple sank almost to the ankle at each step. From

time to time he looked over his shoulder at them, at Gowan's bloody face and

splotched clothes, at Temple struggling and lurching on her high heels.

"Putty hard walkin', aint it?" he said. "Ef she'll take off them high heel

shoes, she'll git along better."

"Will I?" Temple said. She stopped and stood on alternate legs, holding

to Gowan, and removed her slippers. The man watched her, looking at the

slippers. ...

When the sand ceased Temple sat down and put her slippers on. She

found the man watching her lifted thigh and she jerked her skirt down and

sprang up. "Well," she said, "go on. Dont you know the way?" (Faulkner,

Sanctuary).

Temple's behavior is a sign of her determination to finally fulfill the rebellion. Talking to a man who is "barefoot", has "shotgun swinging in his hand" and is looking at

Temple's body closely is either very brave or reckless, but from my point of view

Temple resents the society more than she is afraid of her new company, who, as she

34 reassures herself, are "just like other people" (Faulkner, Sanctuary). Even though she knows this is a lie, she does not listen to Ruby's advice (which is more like a command than an advice) to leave the place and she stays. David Williams states that with the progress of the story, Temple's motivation is more and more obscure: "We are never told why she does not simply leave the Old Frenchman place before her rape and the related murder of Tommy" (128) but I believe that she decided to stay because she thought she could use these men as "tools" in her rebellion against her father and brothers. Temple employs her body and her sexuality to attract the bootlegger's attention but the effect of this behavior was different to what she had expected.

But the rape itself is not the breaking point when Temple, who used to enjoy life to the fullest, becomes a nihilist, even though according to Dorothy Stringer the rape is the central incident of the novel (30). The breaking point there is when she is held at brothel as a slave sex and is forced to have sex with Red, as Popeye - the "master" - is impotent. Here she learns that her rebellion has ended permanently and that she has failed completely. She has destroyed, but not created anything new which would indicate that she was not destroyed as well. Camus adds that " l icence to destroy supposes that you yourself can be destroyed. Thus you must struggle and dominate. The law of this world is nothing but the law of strength" (37). Michael Millgate writes that at this point of the story, Temple's "corruption is total and she is so hopelessly corrupted that she wilfully sees Goodwin convicted and lynched" (42). It is true that the rebellion of Temple Drake has come to its inglorious end and even though she remained alive (unlike the bootleggers), she is the only loser. Here, the Camus's "all-or-nothing" attitude of a rebel is again the motivating force of a rebellion. Temple risked everything

- and she lost everything. Camus claims that "rebellion, without claiming to solve everything, can at least confront its problems" (269), but her "personal rebellion" did

35 not helped her personally, nor did it have any impact on the society that would guarantee an improvement in the rights of Southern women. Caroline Garnier defends the rebel because according to her Temple did not have any chance of winning (165).

Even though this is certainly true - if Temple in fact wanted to change the position of women in the patriarchal society, she "bit off more than she could chew" - she had every right to rebel against the oppression as her personal liberty was not respected by men in Temple's community. But even here she fails. By being the reason why three men are condemned to death she broke the unwritten laws of rebellion which say that freedom of other people cannot be crossed. In fact Temple herself did to these people what she did not want to be done to her.

Though it can be argued that Temple did not know that her actions would lead to a murder of Tommy and Red (who were murdered by "the master", Popeye), her false testimony at the court, which resulted in Goodwin's death by lynching, is what made her a killer - although an indirect killer because she did not participate in the actual killing.

Millgate in this case speaks about Temple's corruption based on her indifference to a life of Goodwin, but Caroline Garnier claims that Temple's actions were absolutely sane: "It is no accident that she points to the white, sane, paternal Goodwin rather than the "black", impotent, childlike, and insane Popeye. In naming Goodwin, Temple names the patriarch" (168). Goodwin, a "real man" as Ruby calls him, is for Temple the embodiment of patriarchal society she abhors so deeply. As her rebellion has failed, the death of the imaginary patriarch is her only satisfaction.

5. Conclusion

In conclusion, each of the rebels that are investigated in this thesis rebels against a different source of oppression that comes from their own families or from the society.

Although the process of their rebellions as well as the means of fulfilling the protests differ, they have at least one feature in common - all the rebels crossed the limits of a morally acceptable rebellion. Emily Grierson is presented as a true aristocrat who knows exactly what kind of behavior is expected from a lady of such social status. But these "privileges" are in fact the source of the oppression as well as the harsh upbringing she had to endure. Emily decides to rebel because she sees the rejection of her father's values as the only way to include happiness into her life. I argue that Emily in her rebellion finds her true self as well as new personal characteristics she was unaware of. Refusing to recognize the father's authority any more, she finds a lover of whom Mr. Grierson would not approve. However the lover, Homer Barron, is not willing to marry her and the couple is constantly gossiped about by the community.

Emily starts to doubt whether she has the strength to fulfill her rebellion and poisons

Homer even though she truly loved him. By Homer's murder Emily has crossed the borderline of a rebellion that forbids to intervene into other people's personal freedom.

Caddy Compson lives in a household where nobody is capable of expressing any real emotions and where too much attention is paid to the maintaining of the family's honor. The honor is preferred to personal happiness and to one's needs. By rebelling,

Caddy tries to escape to the values that would make her life brighter and worth living.

She loses her virginity to a man with whom she wants to run away but Dalton Ames has a different opinion about their affair. He disappears from Caddy's life, leaving her pregnant with his child. Caddy's family is shattered by the fact that she has tarnished their reputation. I believe that Caddy's rebellion was legitimate because her family did not accept Caddy's right to be happy and therefore rejecting the oppression was the only way to search for the good to her life. However, Caddy's unsuccessful attempt at finding

37 happiness was the direct cause of Quentin's suicide and she should probably have chosen another way of rebelling.

Temple Drake is the daughter of a respectable judge and has four no less successful brothers. However, she herself misbehaves and prefers enjoying life to studying. The society she lives in does not allow women to disobey men as few of the female characters in the novel are severely punished for not respecting orders from their male counterparts. Temple abhors this kind of society and the power the men in the community and in her family have over her. She expresses disagreement with the men's domination by her behavior and not respecting her father's authority. Temple sees an opportunity to rebel when she first enters the house of the bootleggers, but instead of being helped to change her current situation, she is abducted and held as a sex slave.

Temple becomes a nihilist, having lost any willingness to enjoy life. Her rebellion is then the cause of three men's death, but only one of them is killed by a lynching gang because Temple pointed to him as the rapist even though he did not rape her. Her unsuccessful rebellion is only acceptable when one thinks of what she wanted to change by her protest - she wanted to change the situation of women in the patriarchal society and maybe even raise awareness of the men domination.

To sum up, all of these three female characters decided to rebel because their surroundings did not respect their freedom and their right to strive for the "common good" (Camus 21) into their lives. Each of the rebels decided to use a different means to obtain the freedom they wanted. Having found no solidarity, no supporters and even no followers, their rebellions were condemned to failure. At the end they all have broken the "rules" of rebellion as all of them were, either indirect or direct, killers. And even though they all failed completely in their rebellion, they still can be called rebels

38 because they have found that even though their societies do not meet their needs, there are still some positive values which cannot be given and therefore they must be won.

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Resumé

This thesis is designed as a comparative analysis of three unsuccessful female rebels in William Faulkner's literary works - Emily Grierson of the short story "A Rose for Emily", Caddy Compson in the novel The Sound and the Fury, and Temple Drake in the novel Sanctuary. This thesis compares and contrasts their reasons for rebelling as well as the outcomes of their unsuccessful rebellions. The main argument of this thesis is that all the main characters of the above-mentioned writings can be happy and lead a meaningful life only by rebelling against the society and their families. Emily Grierson in "A Rose for Emily" is oppressed by her father and his values and is not allowed to act freely. While rebelling against the oppressive power, even though her rebellion is not successful, she finds her true self. Caddy Compson of The Sound and the Fury views her mother's values as unsuitable burden and rebels against the mother's expectations.

She fails completely in changing her situation for the better and her unsuccessful rebellion is also the reason why her brother, who is preoccupied with the family's honor, commits suicide. Temple Drake of Sanctuary resents the patriarchal society she lives in because, as a woman, must obey men without resistance. Her misbehavior is her way of rebelling, but she fails completely in her goal to change her situation.

Considering the structure of the thesis, the introduction acquaints readers with the definition of a rebellion according to Albert Camus and Elizabeth Ann Bartlett. The first chapter deals with the rebellion in which one finds his or her true self and applies this finding to Emily Grierson. The second chapter presents the definition of a rebellion as an escape to the real values and compare this notion with Caddy Compson's situation.

The third chapter concentrates on the rebellion based on resentment against the society and applies this definition to Temple Drake. The conclusion then summarizes all the important findings that occur throughout the thesis.

Tato práce je koncipována jako studie tří neúspěšných rebelek z pera Williama

Faulknera - Emily Grierson z povídky "A Rose for Emily", Caddy Compson z románu

The Sound and the Fury a Temple Drake z románu Sancuary. Tato práce porovnává důvody, které jsou důvodem jejich rebelie, stejně tak jako následky. Hlavním myšlenka spočívá v tvrzení, že rebelie je pro postavy ze zmíněných děl jedinou možností k dosažení štěstí. Emily Gierson v "A Rose for Emily" je utlačována svým otcem a jeho hodnotami a nemůže se tak svobodně vyvíjet. Díky své rebelii vůči utlačovateli nachází sama sebe i přesto, že její rebelie není úspěšná. Caddy Compson v The Sound and the

Fury vnímá hodnoty své matky jako nevyhovující břemeno a rebeluje proti jejím očekáváním. Ve svém snažení změnit věci k lepšímu zcela selhává a její neúspěšná rebelie je též důvodem, proč její bratr, který se přehnaně zaobírá rodinnou ctí, páchá sebevraždu. Temple Drake v Sanctuary opovrhuje patriarchální společností, ve které

žije, protože jako žena musí muže bez zaváhání poslouchat. Rebeluje svým chováním, nicméně svého cíle změnit svou situaci nedosáhne.

Úvod této práce seznamuje čtenáře s definicí rebelie podle Alberta Camuse a

Elizabeth Ann Bartlett. První kapitola se zabývá rebelii, ve které rebel nachází své pravé já a aplikuje tyto poznatky na Emily Grierson. Druhá kapitola přináší definici rebelie jako úniku k pravým hodnotám a porovnává tuto definici se situací Caddy Compson.

Třetí kapitola se zaměřuje na rebelii, která je založena na rebelově odporu ke společnosti a aplikuje tyto poznatky na Temple Drake. Závěr práce pak shrnuje všechny důležité poznatky, které se vyskytly v textu práce.