Comments on Barn Burning by William Faulkner

ENG 113

Instructor Risch

Donna Stevens

January, 29, 2011

Comments on “Barn Burning” by William Faulkner

My initial response to the reading was I could not believe the courage and maturity of the boy. I have had many people tell me their parents set a really good bad example and that is what I thought of when I read this story. Sarty had a difficult decision to make but all things considered, it was his only choice. He chose to be free from the life his father wallowed in. His decision definitely “burned the bridge” as his father burned the barn. I think that Sarty knew his decision meant losing his father and gaining his manhood. Most people are fortunate enough to keep both, but this was not Sarty’s fate.

In my opinion, this story is a coming of age story about Sarty. His conflict is presented in the lifestyle choices of his father. As he grows older, he understands that his father is choosing this hard road over and over. He ultimately decides that if the road is going to be hard for him, nothing could be harder than being dishonest and bitter like his father. In revealing his father’s intentions he broke free from the lifestyle of his father and became a man in his own right.

Sarty is the central, dynamic character who I really enjoyed reading about. He started out as a young boy who listened to and followed his father’s footsteps. Just like every young boy, he idolized his father and memorized his father’s character good and bad. As Sarty matured, he saw in his father a habit of bad choices and a definite bend toward bitterness and vengeance against invisible unchangeable realities. Sarty becomes his own man as he turns his back on his father’s choices and steps into his own. Sarty’s father is best described as a hard-headed, bitter, educationally defiant, and dangerous man who drove his son away. Sarty’s father knew right from wrong and he constantly pressured the family to choose him or “them”. I do not feel any pity toward Sarty’s father.

Sarty’s emotions are revealed in the opening paragraphs as a young boy who is taking everything in. He is in awe of the stock on the shelves. His family was always in want and the shelves stood stocked in contrast. He could not read the labels. I think that his father kept his son uneducated in an attempt to keep him loyal to him. The boy knew the outside world had stocked shelves and laws and words that his father would not use. He knew there were words that his father drove into him such as “ourn! Mine and hisn both!” (503). These words were another attempt to force loyalty toward the father from the son.

The story’s exposition helps us understand that Abner is so afraid that his family will turn against him that he creates an environment of oppression to keep them close. His mantra is “you got to learn to stick to your own blood or you ain’t going to have any blood to stick to you” (516). Abner feels increasingly threatened by Sarty because he sees a budding man inside his son. He warns Sarty, “You’re getting to be a man”(516). This warning is really something Abner is saying to himself. Another exposition by DeMott says that Abner is a “victim of class”. I’m just not that sympathetic. Everyone has choices. Abner consistently chose to be abusive. The love between a parent and child is not a complicated thing. Abner knew he was damaging that relationship. He selfishly damaged their relationship out of his burning desire for admiration and validation as a man.

Faulkner’s physical description of Abner furthers our understanding of him in the fact that he rudely drags that leg. I see that as part of his obnoxious personality coming out into his physical being. This is yet another choice to “stick it to the man”. His father wore a “stiff black coat” (504). This coat made him feel like he was in charge. It gave him a sense of formality and he hoped it would command respect.

Mr. Harris was a foil for Abner when Harris described to the judge that Abner was not keeping up with his livestock. Even when he gave Abner wire to “patch up his pen,” Abner further neglected the hog(503). This was Abner’s way of playing with Mr. Harris. The hog was just Abner picking at Mr. Harris. He was jealous of Mr. Harris and he brought Mr. Harris down a few notches when he burned his barn. Mr. Harris was a flat character because he did not change in his argument or attitude.

Major de Spain served as a foil for Abner when he was kind of confused that Abner did not have a woman who knew how to clean a rug. Abner kept his family living so rough and gypsy that his woman never owned a rug let alone knew how to properly clean one. Major de Spain was a flat character because he stayed constant in his character.

The stock characters in the story are the Snopes sisters, Abner’s wife, and in a lesser way, Major de Spain’s staff. The Snopes sisters represent the stereotype of uneducated, oppressed daughters. They are overweight and probably too ignorant to be depressed. They are following the lead of the mother who has given her life to Abner. Major de Spain’s staff represent the stereotypical southern staff in a wealthy white southerner’s home.

The description of Major de Spain’s house represents a courthouse. This frames the main conflict between right and wrong. His father Abner’s homelessness represents the wrong he wallows in. Major de Spain’s large pillowed home represents the right choices he lives by.

Question 10 Write an Essay.

Sarty had three opportunities to become his own man. He faced these opportunities during the first barn burning hearing, during the rug fiasco, and finally during the second barn burning attempt at Major de Spain’s. Sarty’s attitude towards his father at the beginning of the story is one of a young boy who idolizes his father even though his father is doing wrong. His love for his father is greater than his need to do the right thing. He sees his father wiggle out of the barn burning. He also feels the coldness of his father when so young, as he stood in the first court he knew his father “aims for me to lie” (503). Abner just quietly waited for his boy to lie for him. He was being used by his father and he knew it. He would become his father if he did not stand up for himself. Each time he followed in his father’s footsteps, the author would say that Sarty “followed the stiff black coat” (504). Sarty needed to make the decision whether he would follow the “stiff black coat… and the wiry figure” for the rest of his life (504).

The next time Sarty was presented with the decision to break away or follow the “stiff black coat” was when his father ruined Major de Spain’s rug. This was quite like the hog harassment of Mr. Harris. It was never about the rug for Abner. The rug was only a poke at Major de Spain. Sarty began to see how ridiculous his father had behaved. He began to feel like he was “being pulled two ways like between two teams of horses”(510). Again he sat behind his father in the wagon on the way to court. He did not understand that his father was in court about the rug and not about the barn burning. But again, he defended and lied for his father.

The second barn burning attempt changed Sarty forever. He purposed in his mind that he would not follow that “stiff black coat” another day (504). He knew right from wrong. He ran to warn the just that injustice was headed their way. He ran from a life of cowardly squalor to the unknown world of brave extravagance. He knew he would not partake in the luxury of this world in the material sense, but his hard earned honest choice was bought and paid for.

Finally, these circumstances taught Sarty how to become his own man. He will not follow his father’s “stiff black coat” anymore even if he wanted to (504). He realizes his father’s worst fear is being abandoned by the ones he loves. However, he cannot continue to follow a man who he now realizes is a coward. He has made the toughest decision of his life, one that he is sure his father could never have made. More than a barn was burned. The bridge between Sarty and his father was burned both ways. Sarty burned it with his decision to warn Major de Spain. Abner burned it when he drove his son away with his constantly selfish cowardly decisions. Out of the ashes rose Sarty, now a young man.

I think Sarty’s father and brother continue to live much like they have in the past. In the reading of the last paragraph, I was so proud of Sarty. Sarty knows he cannot go back even though he was cold and hungry. He was proud of himself and confident in the decision he had made. “He did not look back” (514).

The language of the final paragraph suggests a kind of resolution to the conflicts as the “slow constellations wheeled on”(514). This means that time moves on and we all make decisions that affect our future. I think that slowly Sarty will heal especially, as he moves to new places and meets new people who live in his future.

Works Cited

Faulkner, William. "Barn Burning." The Bedford Introduction to Literature. Michael Meyer. Massachuttes: Bedford, 2011. Print.