Caddy, Capitalism, and Chronology in 'The Sound and the Fury'

Abstract

'The Sound and the Fury' (1929) is a novel concerned with historical transition, and its chronologically discontinuous narration is linked to its representation of socio-economic change in the United States South. In his 1933 introduction to the text, Faulkner proposed that "the South [...] is dead, killed by the Civil War" ... Throughout 'Sound', the cross-cutting between different time periods sets the Compsons' various personal memories in revealing relationships, which enables them to express broader historical processes - in particular, the growth of free-market capitalism in the former Confederate states. Further, distinctive 'temporalities' associated with plantation slavery and industrial capitalism are seen in tension in each of the novel's sections, suggesting the artificial imposition of capitalist development on an incompatible landscape.