Loyalty In Barn Burning

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Although there are a various themes that exist within William Faulkner’s Barn Burning, nevertheless the primary theme that I will focus on is loyalty to family, to include loyalty over what is morally appropriate. Abner Snopes was a strict and controlling husband, father and he hung onto his war heroics to impose his will on his family and the unjust of social and economic inequality (Dermot, 2014). Although, the majority of his family has come to understand that is what is expected of them to remain devoted to family, however the youngest boy Sartoris has concerns about doing what is morally correct, regardless. His struggles are evident right from the beginning when ask to testify against his father about burning Mr. Harris’s barn. “He aims …show more content…

Therefore, the young boy is validating his loyalty to his father even though morally he knows his father burned down the barn. In the same manner, the mother shows similar traits of her devotion to her husband over all things bad the husband has done. The clock inlaid with the mother-of-pearl, which would not run, stopped at some fourteen minutes past two o’clock of a dead and forgotten day and time, which had been his mother’s dowry (Faulkner, 1980, p. 2). Yet, she remains by his side in similar fashion, despite how all Abner’s immoral deeds distress the family. One could argue that she is fearful and that is why she will not leave his side, but Abner inflicts fear into the entire family, which in turns demands loyalty on the bases of fear in its …show more content…

When asked by his father, and not answering promptly when asked by Abner if he would have spoken the truth “You were fixing to tell them. You would have told him”. He did not answer. His father struck him with the flat of his hand on the side of the head (Faulkner, 1980, p. 3) and again out of fear he does not say what really is on his mind, later, twenty years later, he was to tell himself, “if I had said the wanted only truth, justice, he would have hit me again” (Faulkner, 1980, p. 3). Not only is Sartoris lesson stern, but of powerful words of allegiance to blood, in that of family first mentality. You got to learn to stick to your own blood, or you ain’t going to have any blood to stick to you (Faulkner, 1980, p.

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