That Evening Sun

1026 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: William faulkner the old south

“That Evening Sun” is a short story written in 1931 by William Faulkner. Faulkner’s life in the South and family history has had a significant influence upon Faulkner’s writing style, in both content and its context, and his knowledge of southern culture and events in its history only add depth to his work. The events in “That Evening Sun”, like many of Faulkner’s stories, takes place in the fictional town of Jefferson. The story is narrated by Quentin Compson who was nine years old when the story takes place, but is now an adult recounting the events from fifteen years before. The story revolves around the Compson’s and their children’s relationship with the stories main character Nancy. Nancy is a Negro woman who is employed by Compson family. Nancy has got herself into a dilemma first by causing a disturbance by publicly demanding payment from the town banker and church deacon Mr. Stovall for sexual services and next by becoming pregnant with by him. Nancy’s pregnancy causes her husband Jesus to become angered; he then deserts her and leaves town. Nancy communicates to Mr. Compson, that she believes Jesus will soon return to kill her. The story relates to the reader the seriousness of Nancy’s situation and how and how it is taken without any seriousness by the Compsons’.

There are several literary terms which are significant to “That Evening Sun”. “That Evening Sun” is told from a third person point of view. The narrator of the story is Quentin Compson who is also a character in the story. He tells his story fifteen years after the events have passed looking back upon them as an adult. The setting of the story is in Jefferson, Virginia around 1902. The protagonist of the story is Nancy who is struggling with the fear that her ...

... middle of paper ...

...ed to the crucifixion of Christ where Peter denies him three times. When Nancy is taken to Jail and hangs herself, this can also be compared as a crucifixion. I am still at odds at whom or what is the heart of her suffering. One can also see how unaware the children are of the situation, only Quentin seems to know what Nancy is afraid of. Since it is Quentin who is narrating the story we do not know if his understanding happened at the time of the story or upon his retelling. Reading “That Evening Sun”, has inspired me to read The Sound and the Fury, which I believe has many of the same characters.

Works Cited

Faulkner, William. “That Evening Sun”. literaturesave2wordpress.com.N.p., N.d. Web. 04 February 2012.

Johnston, Kenneth G. “The Year of the Jubilee: Faulkner’s “That Evening Sun””www.jstor.org. Duke University Press. 1974. Web. 04 February 2012.

Show More
Related

  • Plot Development in Good Country People and A Rose for Emily

    1305 Words  | 3 Pages

    "William Faulkner: The Faded Rose of Emily." Mr. Renaissance. N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Mar. 2011 .

    Read More

  • William Faulkner's A Rose for Emily and Susan Glaspell's Trifles

    1240 Words  | 3 Pages

    Faulkner, William. "A Rose for Emily." Literature and Its Writers. 6th ed. Boston, New York:

    Read More

  • Disjointed Characters of Faulkner's Light in August

    1451 Words  | 3 Pages

    In the novel, A Light in August, William Faulkner introduces us to a wide range of characters of various backgrounds and personalities.  Common to all of them is the fact that each is type cast into a certain role in the novel and in society. Lena is the poor, white trash southern girl who serves to weave the story together. Hightower is the fanatic preacher who is the dark, shameful secret of Jefferson. Joanna Burden is the middle-aged maiden from the north who is often accused of being a “nigger-lover”. And Joe Christmas is the epitome of an outsider. None of them are conventional, everyday people. They are all in some way disjointed from society; they do not fit in with the crowd. That is what makes them intriguing and that is why Faulkner documents their story.

    Read More

  • A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner

    638 Words  | 2 Pages

    Faulkner, William. “A Rose for Emily.” The Norton Field Guide to Writing with Readings. 2nd

    Read More

  • William Faulkner's A Rose for Emily and Barn Burning

    1121 Words  | 3 Pages

    The. Barn Burning. Collected Stories of William Faulkner. New York: The New York Times.

    Read More

  • A Raisin in the Sun: The Duality of African-America, George Murchison and Joseph Asagai

    1367 Words  | 3 Pages

    James, Johson Weldon. Comp. Henry Louis. Gates and Nellie Y. McKay. The Norton Anthology of African American Literature. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2004. 832. Print.

    Read More

  • The Works of Phillis Wheatley

    809 Words  | 2 Pages

    Gates, Henry Louis Jr., and Nellie Y. McKay, eds. The Norton Anthology of African American Literature. New York: W.W. Norton, 1997. 164-167.

    Read More

  • Commentary of Sun and Shadow by Ray Bradbury

    1049 Words  | 3 Pages

    As members of a first-world nation, we are disrespectfully quick to point out the flaws and downfalls of impecunious societies and use the societies like mere scenery, even though we walk together on this earth. In “Sun and Shadow," Ray Bradbury manipulates Ricardo to convey to the reader the impertinence from outsiders and the responses from Ricardo and his fellow townspeople. A photographer is encountered doing a photo shoot on Ricardo’s property, and Ricardo becomes unhappy with his presence and angrily tells him to leave. After Ricardo’s increasingly sharp comments and attitudes augment, the photographer becomes satirical and facetious, poking fun at the lifestyle in which Ricardo lives. The short-tempered townsman reveals his defiance through actions projected towards the photographer. Through the use of characterization, Bradbury defines the fine societal line between Ricardo, the penurious dweller of the village, the inconsiderate photographer, and the sympathetic townspeople.

    Read More

  • Barn Burning by William Faulkner

    887 Words  | 2 Pages

    Faulkner, William. Barn Burning. First Vintage International ed. N.p.: Random House, 1950. Print. The Country.

    Read More

  • Comparing William Faulkner's Short Stories, A Rose for Emily and Dry September

    1905 Words  | 4 Pages

    Brooks, Cleanth. "William Faulkner: Visions of Good and Evil." Faulkner, New Perspectives. Ed. Richard H. Brodhead. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey : Prentice-Hall, 1983.

    Read More

  • Neo-Slave Narratives and Octavia Butler

    546 Words  | 2 Pages

    Gates Jr., Henry Louis, and Nellie Y. McKay. The Norton Anthology of African American Literature. 2nd ed. New York: W.W. Norton and Company , Inc. , 2004. Print.

    Read More

  • Comparing the Setting of Barn Burning to that of A Rose for Emily

    1347 Words  | 3 Pages

    In many of Faulkner’s stories, he tells about an imaginary county in Mississippi named Yoknapatawpha. He uses this county as the setting for his story “Barn Burning” and it is also thought that the town of Jefferson from “A Rose for Emily” is located in Yoknapatawpha County. The story of a boy’s struggle between being loyal to his family or to his community makes “Barn Burning” exciting and dramatic, but a sense of awkwardness and unpleasantness arrives from the story of how the fictional town of Jefferson discovers that its long time resident, Emily Grierson, has been sleeping with the corpse of her long-dead friend with whom she has had a relationship with.

    Read More

  • The Importance of Literary Elements in Barn Burning

    1470 Words  | 3 Pages

    Understanding literary elements such as patterns, reader/writer relationships, and character choice are critical in appreciating William Faulkner's Barn Burning. Some literary elements are small and almost inconsequential while others are large and all-encompassing: the mother's broken clock, a small and seemingly insignificant object, is used so carefully, extracting the maximum effect; the subtle, but more frequent use of dialectal words which contain darker, secondary meanings; the way blood is used throughout the story in many different ways, including several direct references in the familial sense; how Faulkner chooses to write about poor, common people (in fact to the extreme) and how this relates to the opinions of Wordsworth and Aristotle; and finally, the relationship between the reader and writer, Faulkner's choice of narrator and point of view, and how this is works successfully.

    Read More

  • Faulkner's Light in August - Style

    830 Words  | 2 Pages

    Faulkner's style may give you trouble at first because of (1) his use of long, convoluted, and sometimes ungrammatical sentences, such as the one just quoted; (2) his repetitiveness (for example, the word "bleak" in the sentence just quoted); and (3) his use of oxymorons, that is, combinations of contradictory or incongruous words (for example, "frictionsmooth," "slow and ponderous gallop," "cheerful, testy voice"). People who dislike Faulkner see this style as careless. Yet Faulkner rewrote and revised Light in August many times to get the final book exactly the way he wanted it. His style is a product of thoughtful deliberation, not of haste. Editors sometimes misunderstood Faulkner's intentions and made what they thought were minor changes. Recently scholars have prepared an edition of Light in August that restores the author's original text as exactly as possible. This Book Note is based on that Library of America edition (1985), edited by Noel Polk and Joseph Blotner.

    Read More

  • Light In August Analysis

    2457 Words  | 5 Pages

    Light in August is a novel about human dilemmas par excellence in which Faulkner tries to account for the importance of childhood experiences in determining the character of individuals as adults. He also emphasizes the role played by society in defining the traits of it members as a result of the views and attitudes it imposes on them.

    Read More

More about That Evening Sun

Open Document