Water Motif in William Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury

Abstract

William Faulkner (1897-1962) is one of the great American novelists during the twentieth century, born at New Albany, Mississippi, and his family later moved to Oxford, Mississippi. Faulkner’s subject is mankind in his county, and he wrote about particular men in a particular place. So “most of his novels are set in the rural South and explore the conditions and particularities of Southern life, which can be viewed as a microcosm of the greater world outside” ( Ferster , 980 ) . The place is Yoknapatawpha County, Mississippi. Faulkner carried the human issue of this county from one novel to another. He showed the friction between Negro and white, and the corrupting influence of women from which the explosive sin is doomed. Faulkner wrote many novels like; Light in August, Sanctuary, As I Lay Dying, The Sound and the Fury, Absalom , The Wild Palms , The Hamlet , Go Down , Moses , and other novels . In 1949, Faulkner received a Noble prize for literature; this is the highest prize, which is awarded to a writer. Throughout The Sound and the Fury different motifs appear and water is considered one of the important motifs. This research aims to show the significance of water motif in the novel and the function of water according to each character. Faulkner said that The Sound and the Fury (1929) is the book that caused him “ the most grief and anguish” ( Quoted in Salami , 472 ) , and in an interview with Jean Stein in 1956 , Faulkner claimed that his feelings for The Sound and the Fury resembled those of “ the mother [ who ] loves the child who became the thief or murderer more than the one who became the priest” ( Quoted in Cowan , 16 ). Later on when he was asked about how he wrote the story Faulkner signified that