Publisher's Synopsis
Essay from the year 2015 in the subject American Studies - Literature, grade: 1,7, University of Göttingen, language: English, abstract: Faulkner has a continuing concern with relationships of son and mother. The mothers seem to always stand in the central position of the family and have a big influence on the destiny of the whole family. In this paper, I will discuss the white southern mothers' role in the society and the family using Faulkner's two most representative works as examples, namely "The Sound and the Fury" and "As I Lay Dying": On the one hand, they are the evil force that traumatizes their sons and leads to the degeneration of the whole family; On the other hand, they are also the victims of the patriarchal society. They are victims and victimizers. In order to find the connection between the mothers' bad influence and the dysfunction of their sons, I will also analyze the sons' psychological response because the loss of the maternal love. These victims, mothers and sons, can help us take a look at the change and decline of the old South from social and psychological perspectives.
