A Study of Joe Christmas in Faulkner's Light in August

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Recommended: Racism and ethnicity novels

A Study of Joe Christmas in Light in August

Joe Christmas's eating disorder and antipathy to women's sexuality (or to the feminine) in Light in August also can be traced back to the primal scene in the dietitian's room. However, the primal scene is not the final piece of the puzzle in the novel. The primal scene is already given as a working condition for a further analysis of Joe's psychology. Readers are first invited to interrelate the scene and Joe's behavior in the rest of the novel.1 Yet drawing one-to-one relations between the primal scene and Joe's symptomatic behavior merely repeats Freud's theory for its own sake. The mechanic connection of the dots does not solve the most crucial problem of the novel, Joe's racial identity. The primal scene, like a dream, asks for a further inspection of its undersurface - something distorted or untold. It also urges to expand the Freudian perception of the unconscious. The unconscious is not just a personal trashcan of one's own repressed sexual energy. As Joe Christmas's case proves, the unconscious is always already cultural and social. The unconscious is multiple and full of others. Focusing on the primal scene, this essay shall explore Joe Christmas's psychology and the problematics of his racial identity.

The above excerpt is provided to allow the student a better understanding of the focus of the paper. The complete paper begins below:

We witness Freud's reductive glee; we literally see multiplicity leave the wolves to take the shape of goats that have absolutely nothing to do with the story. Seven wolves that are only kid-goats. Six wolves: the seventh goat (the Wolf-Man himself) is hiding in the clock. Five wolves: h...

... middle of paper ...

...ginally published as Mille Plateaux, volume 2 of Capitalisme et Schizophrénie by Minuit in 1980 in France.

Faulkner, William. Light in August. New York: Vintage, 1990. Originally published in 1932.

Karl, Frederick R. William Faulkner: American Writer. New York: Ballantine Books, 1989.

Notes

1 Joe's symptoms of anorexia nervosa, his dislike to objects, which remind of women's genitalia, and his disgust at anything or anyone with feminine faculties are closely interconnected to the primal scene.

2 It is interesting that psychic determinism in Joe's case opposes to Gavin Stevens's theory of black blood and white blood. While the former attributes Joe's symptoms to "nurture," Stevens's essentializing blood theory attributes to "nature." The conflict between "nature" and "nurture" has become an important American theme.

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