As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner Online Book Summary

PLOT NOTES / BOOK SUMMARY

SECTION 7: Dewey Dell

Summary

Dewey Dell’s narrative reveals her poor syntax. Unlike Darl’s narrative, which reveals a degree of education, Dewey Dell’s narrative is broken with misspellings and incomplete sentences.

Dewey Dell mentions that she and Lafe are working in the fields. She then makes a passing reference to Jewel as "not kin to us in caring, not care-kin." From that, she mentions Cash sawing and Darl’s "eyes gone further . . . full of the land dug out of his skull and the holes filled with distance beyond the land."

She then returns to when she and Lafe are in the field; Lafe asks her to have sex and she says she will if she fills her bag by the end of the row. Lafe then starts putting his pickings in her bag, filling it up. Lafe has tricked her so she sleeps with him.

After this, Darl sees her and knows instantly. He says he knows "without words." Darl then states that he knows "without words" that Addie will die. The section ends with Darl stating that Addie will die before he and Jewel return.

Notes

The section reveals the diversity of Faulkner ’s prose to represent many different voices. Dewey Dell makes subtle observations about Jewel’s not being a Bundren and Darl’s melancholic and philosophic longings. Darl is also shown to have a keen awareness about the events surrounding the family.

SECTION 8: Tull

Summary

Tull and Anse are talking about Addie’s imminent death and Jewel and Darl’s trip with Cash hammering in the background. Vardaman comes up to them with a fish he has caught and intends to show to Addie. Vardaman drops it on the dirt, cusses it, and straddles it, and then picks it up and leaves.

Cora and Kate also enter into the discussion. Kate makes an offhand reference that if Addie is not with Anse for another thirty years, he will have a new wife "before cotton-picking."

Notes

This section establishes the fish as Vardaman’s animal attribute. For Vardaman, the fish represents Addie. Kate’s suggestion that Anse may have a new wife before harvest foreshadows the end of the novel.

SECTION 9: Anse

Summary

Anse is looking down the road after Jewel and Darl have left. This leads him to ruminate on his philosophy of humankind. Anse states that God made roads and other horizontally directed things for moving. He adds that people are vertical and thus were made to stay in one place. Had humans been meant to move around, they would have been made like snakes. Anse supports his argument by citing Cash who goes to work on a church only to fall off of its roof.

Anse and Addie then have a brief conversation. Addie says she is fine and Anse agrees, except that he thinks she is too much like the road. Dr. Peabody then arrives without being called and sends Anse out to the porch where he considers how he has tried to make enough to get new teeth so he can enjoy food again only to lose it to the road. Anse does not curse his luck because he has peace in his heart, but he not a religious man either.

Vardaman appears covered in the blood of the fish, which he apparently chopped up with an ax. Anse tells him to wash up, and Vardaman replies by saying, "It was full of blood and guts as a hog . . . is ma sick some more?"

Notes

This section represents Anse’s philosophy: people, because they are upright, are like trees meant to be stationary. The road is bad because it encourages people to move: because Cash works in town on the church instead of at home, he falls off and gets injured; because Addie needs to be buried in Jefferson, which is a hard day’s drive away, the family needs to sell the lumber and Anse will likely not get new teeth. Given Anse’s deeply held beliefs about roads, we can clearly see that he must care about Addie because he agrees to her wish to be buried in Jefferson.

Vardaman’s appearance at the end of the section reveals his simplicity. He does not know how to clean a fish so he cuts it up with an ax, making a huge mess. His statement that the fish was full of blood an guts like a hog suggests that he did not know what to expect. Similarly, the question about his mother’s health also suggests that he does not realize what that she is dying. Vardaman is beginning his association of this mother with the fish. The cutting of the fish also foreshadows Vardaman’s cutting of the coffin and his mother in it.

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