The Effects of Bad Parenting in As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner

How does a child feel when their parents conceive destructive values and manipulative connotations? To any child a parent is the person that they look up to and in most cases look for encouragement. However, some parents tend to value destruction and their own self-gain more than the life of their child. Both William Faulkner’s “As I Lay Dying” and Toni Morrison’s “The Bluest Eye” demonstrating a principle that when parents are bound to their twisted, manipulative, and even immoral values that their children will ultimately be the ones to pay the price as they either embrace the similar hollow values themselves or set out to fulfill their own desires through often times self-destructive means.

In “As I Lay Dying” by William Faulkner Addie Bundren seems to portray hollow values that destroy her family. For example Darl narrates, “He kneels and squints along the edge of them, then he lowers them and takes up the adze. A good carpenter. Addie Bundren could not want a better one, a better box to lie in. It will give her confidence and comfort” (699). It is interesting that Addie chose Cash, but it is clear that he is a good carpenter. Not much was said about Cash and how much Addie loves him. This same idea can be said for Toni Morrison’s, “The Bluest Eye” with Pecola. Pecola is the “scapegoat” of the community and suffers from abuse. For example, “Mrs. Breedlove entered with a tightly packed laundry bag. In one gallop she was on Pecola, and with the back of her hand knocked her to the floor. Pecola slid in the pie juice, one leg folding under her. Mrs. Breedlove yanked her up by the arm, slapped her again, and in a voice thin with anger, abused Pecola directly and Frieda and me by implication” (107). Mrs. Breedlove wants perfectio...

... middle of paper ...

...oth William Faulkner’s “As I Lay Dying” and Toni Morrison’s “The Bluest Eye” the parents affect their children in a damaging and immoral way. In both stories the characters are bound to specific needs and wants, and unfortunately the children pay the price for these unconceivable heinous deeds. Both Faulkner and Morrison have portrayed the parents in a ruthless, but interesting way, one for which the reader cannot help but feel sorry for the children within these works. These works both tell the readers that children will suffer at the hands of their parents, especially when the parents only desire destructive, immoral, and manipulative means.

Works Cited

Faulkner, William. "As I Lay Dying." 2012. The Norton Anthology of American Literature. New York: W.W. Norton, 2012. 826-42. Print.

Morrison, Toni. The Bluest Eye. New York: Plume Book, 1994. Web. 29 Mar. 2014.