William Faulkner came from a Southern American background and in his time wrote a series of novels that featured themes of patriarchal power and the struggles caused by race. Joe Christmas plays an unusual role in Light in August: in him Faulkner creates a central character with very few redeeming features. Instead, Christmas is misogynistic, cruel and, above all, murderous. This essay will examine Faulkner's treatment of race, sex, and gender in Light in August, whether this was simply a depiction of the time of publication or a deeper critique aimed at 1920s American society and precedents. We will also examine the reasons why Joe Christmas is such a malevolent man, such as his upbringing and the people around him. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay To provide historical context, Faulkner wrote Light in August in 1932, during “the Southern Renaissance of 1925-39” (Wittenberg, 1995, p. 148). This was a time, several decades before the civil rights movement of the 1960s, when institutionalized racism was widespread, particularly in the South. An example of society's acceptance of racism and view of Black Americans as subhuman can be seen in the fact that, across the country, people were "uninterested in enforcing Southern school desegregation" (Klarman, 2004, p . 27), long after emancipation. of Slaves in 1863 (NARA). Just as African Americans were marginalized members of society, so were women: they were expected to be obedient housewives and little more (Tames, 1997, p. 46). However, there are powerful characters at all ends of the spectrum in Light in August – although he does not accept his “black blood” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 181), it is suggested that Joe Christmas takes the lives of a number of white people like Simon McEachern and certainly kills Joanna Burden for "praying for" him (Faulkner, 1932, p. 45). This demonstrates Christmas's non-compliance with the social expectation that it should be meek and obedient. Among the female characters, Lena Grove and the “masculine” (Clarke, 1989, p. 403) Joanna Burden stand out, women who have overcome the patriarchal hierarchy of the time. There is an order of submission in the novel that encompasses both race and race. and gender: white men like Joe Brown are held in higher regard than black men, despite the fact that Brown is often "drunk in town" (Faulkner, 1932, p. 25), a gossip, and ready to sell out Joe Christmas, presumably a friend, as soon as money is mentioned – even involving race – “accuses the white man and lets the Negro go free” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 41). Women are definitely below men in the hierarchy, weakness and naivety are just a couple of the inherent character flaws attributed to them by Faulkner. However, Deborah Clarke points out that women of Light in August are connected differently than men, communicating in “a language unknown to them” (Clarke, 1989, p. 399). This shows that there is a clear difference between the impressions Christmas had on women and Faulkner's feelings towards them. Further down the list are still men and women of color. Indeed, although the novel has the theme of race recurring throughout, there is “not a single significant character who is identifiably African American” (Wittenberg, 1995, p. 146). This does not necessarily demonstrate disdain for African Americans on the part of Faulkner, who chooses instead to focus on the struggles of Christmas, a mixed-race man who is “neither black nor white” (Godden, 1980, p. 240). Rather, as Wittenberg writes,Faulkner believes that race is a “linguistic and social construct” (Wittenberg, 1995, p. 146) rather than something that can be broken down simply into black and white – they are too closely intertwined in Christmas and yet he apparently rejects both parts of his identity, filled instead with self-loathing - So, at Christmas, Faulkner creates a character who can represent both sides of race relations, without the need for an explicitly named black character. To highlight how bad racism was at the time, especially in Faulkner's fictional Yoknapatawpha County, citizens who come to investigate the fire at Joanna Burden's house “believed and hoped” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 117) that she had been raped before her murder. They also choose to believe that it was a crime committed by a “nigger” rather than “a nigger” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 117). This shows that they want their inherent hatred of African Americans to be justified, inventing scenarios simply because Burden is ostracized for her “excessive sexuality” (Clarke, 1989, p. 404) involving black men. It also demonstrates a categorization of black Americans as a whole, a dehumanized mass rather than individuals with free will and thought: they act under the impulse of their “black blood” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 181). Along the same lines, Faulkner raises the dichotomy of the United States, divided between the “Yankees” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 117) of the north and the people of the south. To the “casual Yankees” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 117) living in Jefferson, Burden is seen as the one who caused her own death while someone above the Mason-Dixon line might have seen her as the victim of a crime senseless. Interestingly, the most likely culprit in citizens' minds is a person of color when the real culprit, Joe Christmas, is “neither black nor white” (Godden, 1980, p. 240). This confirms that both Christmas and Burden are isolated based on their perceived affiliation with other races, no matter how real the basis. As an example of Joe Christmas's distrust and contempt for women from an early age, Miss Atkins, the racist dietician who often refers to Christmas as a “little nigger bastard” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 52), is described as young and stupid, attributing the “attributes of an adult” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 52), to Christmas when he is only five years old and she believes she has caught him spying. It can be seen that both Faulkner and Christmas consider this to be true as all of this is conveyed to the audience through an objective narrator, able to describe both the dietitian's “fury and terror” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 52) and the “astonishment , shock, indignation” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 53) of young Natale in remembering the event. While being unloved and abused as a child does not automatically translate into the terrible human being that Christmas grows up to be, one can see that interactions with Miss Atkins, in an orphanage where he had never “waited three days for being punished” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 53) certainly did not help his chances of becoming a balanced adult. Although many of the women in Light in August are seen as weak and unconsciously controlling, Byron Bunch is nevertheless "unmanned" (Clarke, 1989, p. 401) by Lena simply speaking to him, he is "already in love" (Faulkner, 1932 , p. 25) from the first conversation. This shows that not all of Faulkner's women are helpless. This is further confirmed when considering Lena's previous interactions with men: Amstrid, who we meet in the first chapter – thinks she knows “exactly what Martha [his wife] will say” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 8) when in fact, becomes the object of an attack aimed at all men, “You men[…]You damned man” (Faulkner, 1932, p.10), showing once again an unexpressed bond that many female characters in the novel have with each other. Faulkner also establishes the “foreign language motif” (Clarke, 1989, p. 409) in the speech between Joe Brown and Joe Christmas, who acts as if he “speaks a different language” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 19) from the one Brown knew. Just as there is a division between black and white, there is another between male and female. The separate halves of the novel truly converge in chapter 19 of Light in August in the death of Christmas at the hands of Percy Grimm. Grimm emphasizes that Christmas now leaves “white women alone” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 187), the mention of race suggests that Christmas is seen as black, it is unacceptable that his crimes were committed by a white man , there must be separation. This is further confirmed in the image of Christmas castrated after his death, the phrase “black blood” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 187) is again used with negative connotations. The fact that it was “repressed” and “like a breath released” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 187) suggests that it was a relief for Christmas: in death, he can finally admit his true African-American identity that he has tried so hard to avoid All. his life. The “bloody butcher's knife” (Faulkner, 1932, p. 187) also feminizes Christmas, a man who has detested women all his life – Clarke says the blood is also representative of “menstruation” (Clarke, 1989, p . 412). The scene rises and falls through brutal peaks of “flowing blood” (Spenko, 1982, p. 254), troughs of calm contemplation, and “peaceful valleys” before culminating in an “incredible crescendo” beyond the “realm of hearing.” (Faulkner, 1932, p.187). All of this serves to grab the reader and represent the ups and downs that run through the novel, experienced by both men and women, regardless of their race. In conclusion, race and gender in Light in August are both treated equally: it is irrelevant what race or gender a person is, Faulkner will give them both positive and negative attributes. As Deborah Clarke says, there is an “uneasy relationship” (Clarke, 1989, p. 413) between both sexes and races – although they are intertwined with each other, this does not necessarily mean that there will be a connection between two people. who share a gender or race. Joe Christmas chooses to dissociate himself from his supposed African-American ancestors, preferring to continue to pass for a white man but this ultimately does not save him from the punishment of the white Percy Grimm. As previously mentioned, there are no significant characters identifiable as black, but fleeting comments in the narrative suggest that they are peaceful and hardworking. Therefore, the portrayal of Christmas as biasedly representing African Americans does not negatively impact the reader's view of the black citizens of Yoknapatawpha. When it comes to gender, Lena Grove is not a weak woman like McEachern's wife is, she remains strong and confident in the face of her problems, the antithesis of the timid, careless and disloyal Job Joe Brown. In this sense Brown is also the opposite of Byron Bunch, mistaken for Brown's alter ego, Lucas Burch, faithful and diligent. Therefore it can be seen that there are strong and unconventional characters of both races and both sexes. Finally, in Light in August, William Faulkner shows that there is no inherent problem that comes from being black or white, male or female – you are shaped by your life choices, your upbringing and the environment you find yourself in – a progressive morality for a novel written in the midst of an era of legalized racism and sexism. Bibliography: Clarke, D. (1989). Gender, race and language in the light of August. American Literature vol. 61, no. 3, 398-413. Faulkner, W. (1932). Light in August. New York City: Smith & Haas. Godden, R. (1980). Call me nigger (1995)..