Southern Masculinity in Faulkner’s The Unvanquished Essay...

Southern Masculinity in Faulkner’s The Unvanquished The narrator of Faulkner’s The Unvanquished is apparently an adult recounting his childhood. The first person narrator is a child at the story’s outset, but the narrative voice is lucid, adult. Telling the story of his childhood allows the narrator to distinguish for the reader what he believed as a child from what he â€Å"know[s] better now† (10). The difference affords an examination of dominant southern masculinity as it is internalized by Bayard and Ringo, and demonstrates the effects on the boys of the impossible ideal. The initial indication that narrator Bayard may be an adult recounting his childhood comes with the past tense in the story’s opening line: â€Å"Behind the smokehouse†¦show more content†¦(87) As children, neither Bayard nor Ringo would possess the capacity for critical thinking necessary to employ the linguistic precision demonstrated above.Children think more abstractly, in grander and simpler terms. For example, they may take role models unreflectively; Bayard and Ringo play-act as General Van Dorn and General Pemberton, but they obviously do not understand why these men are their heroes. Based on what they have been told, and wholly independent of reality, the boys have constructed a General Pemberton that represents good and a General Grant that represents evil. By rule, Bayard plays the good guy twice for every single time Ringo gets to. The unfairness of this rule is apparently as lost on the boys as the idea that in the context of this game, Grant would make a more suitable good guy for Ringo. The disparities in their relationship are apparently unnoticed by both Bayard and Ringo. They think that they are equals. They â€Å"had been born in the same month and had both fed at the same breast and had slept together and eaten together† until they felt like brothers. They are not brothers, though. When Sartoris comes home in spring, both boys run to meet the man they look up to as a father, and they enter, Bayard â€Å"standing in one stirrup with Father’s arm around me, and Ringo holding to the other stirrup and running beside the horse† (8). Later we find that the boys do sleep together, Bayard on a bed, andShow MoreRelated Southern Masculinities in Faulkner’s The Unvanquished and Barn Burning1486 Words   |  6 PagesSouthern Masculinities in Faulkner’s The Unvanquished and Barn Burning The youthful protagonists of The Unvanquished and Barn Burning, Bayard Sartoris and Sarty Snopes respectively, offer through their experiences and, most importantly, the way their stories are told, telling insights about the constructions of southern masculinities with respect to class. The relative innocence that each of the boys has in common, though ultimately loses, provides a record of sorts to the formation of theRead More Narrative Techniques in Faulkner’s The Unvanquished and Barn Burning779 Words   |  4 PagesNarrative Techniques in Faulkner’s The Unvanquished and Barn Burning The Unvanquished is composed of a series of stories during which Bayard Sartoris, the narrator, grows up from a twelve-year-old boy to a young man of twenty-four years. The narrative style makes it obvious that events are being related by an adult who is looking back at his past. There are several indications of this: in the very first story â€Å"Ambuscade†, the narrator, while describing his war games with his coloured friend, RingoRead MoreEssay on The Maturation of Bayard in Faulkner’s The Unvanquished636 Words   |  3 PagesThe Maturation of Bayard in Faulkner’s The Unvanquished William Faulkner tells his novel The Unvanquished through the eyes and ears of Bayard, the son of Confederate Colonel John Sartoris. The author’s use of a young boy during such a turbulent time in American history allows him to relate events from a unique perspective. Bayard holds dual functions within the novel, as both a character and a narrator. The character of Bayard matures into a young adult within the work, while narrator Bayard relays