Ｏｎ ｔｈｅ Ｕｓｅ ｏｆ Ｔｉｍｅ ｉｎ Ｔｈｅ Ｓｏｕｎｄ ａｎｄ ｔｈｅ Ｆｕｒｙ

［摘 要］The Sound and the Fury is William Faulkner’s representative work.Just as Sartre says：It is a book about time.This paper is attempt to talk about the understanding of the fiction as regard to the relationship between the time and the title，the theme and the writing skill.

［關鍵詞］William Faulkner time title writing skill

［中圖分類號］I106 ［文獻標識碼］A ［文章編號］1009－5489(2009)08－0105－02

William Faulkner is a great writer，who is viewed as a culmination of the development of twentieth-century southern fiction.As is known to us all，The Sound and the Fury is William Faulkner’s representative work.And the title is taken from a monologue spoken by Shakespeare’s Macbeth：“It is a tale told by an idiot，full of sound and fury，signifying nothing.And the time in it is also full of “fury”.Just as Sartre says：It is a book about time.

Faulkner never tells the story as a whole.Instead he prefers to make his characters tell parts of the Compsons' history to glue together \"a big picture\".The primary story being told in The Sound and the Fury is the decline of the Compson family.It is made up of four sections：The first section is told through the perspective of Benjy，an \"idiot\".The second one is Quntin’s narration and recollection.The third of the four is Jason’s narrative.Faulkner finally gives us some relief by narrating the last section through an outsider perspective.The content is easy to understand，except for the time sequence.Each of the four sections has a date rather than a chapter number，which gives us a sense of time.Faulkner introduces a pattern of the Christian Myth，superposing the time of the characters’ activities and the religious stories.And it makes the time more direct and forceful.Each title of the third，the first，the fourth section of the story is April 6th，7th，8th of 1928，and these three days is also the days from the Good Friday to the Easter.And that of the second one，June 2nd，1910 is the eighth day of the Saint Christ’s Day.Hence，these four important days on the Compsons’ history is corresponding to the four days on which Jesus Christ is in suffering.

In addition，Faulkner makes use of the converse type of technique of symbol to parallel the main character’s activities with Jesus’ suffering.The day on which Benjy told the story is just the Holly Saturday，which is also his 33 year-old birthday.While Jesus Christ was sentenced to death when he was 33 years old.Benjy is an adult with mental disabilities.He is not only quit emasculation，but also is sent to the mental institute，which suggests that in the actuality，he is a real “Jesus” who can’t be brought to life or rescued.Before Quntin’s committing suicide，he is constantly thinking of Jesus and the relevant resurrection with him.He considers himself as an alone Jesus subconsciously.And he thinks that he could save his sister Caddy and himself by way of death.

According to the above，we can see that the three of the narratives take place on three sequential days，but Faulkner breaks the traditional physical time sequence.He makes good use of Henri Bergson’s “the Theory of the Psychological Time”，suggesting that there is no difference between the past and present in consciousness.He is telling us a story about the decline of the Compson family in a sequence of the development of the affair.Judging from the surface of the story，time appears in every section of the novel as each character struggles in his own battle with the unavoidable forward movement of time.In fact，Caddy，the only girl in this motherless family，is a central character，although she doesn’t appear in the narrative structure.In some way or another，Caddy affects each of her brother's struggles with time.The oldest child of the Compson family Quentin，fights the most difficult war with time.All through his life，he is unable to escape the past and the memories of his beloved sister Caddy when they were innocent and happy as children.Quentin cannot force himself to accept the change.And as time moves on，he falls beneath the current and drowns in his memories.The idiot of the family，Benjy，holds no perception of time.He sees and thinks everything in a timeless present.In his mind，there is no present or past.Caddy supplies the central image around which Benjy bases everything in his mind.He does not categorize the events according to what has happened but instead，he orders them according to what makes him feel.Jason，the youngest brother，struggles to beat time.He pushes himself harder and faster in attempts to obtain money and his power before time catches up and bewilders him.Jason spares no effort to fill his wallet，thinking that the extra money will cushion his fall when time catches up with him.Caddy affects her mean-spirited brother by costing him his opportunity at a good job，and by leaving her daughter in his household.Each of the boys in the Compson family struggles with time during their hard lives，each battling for different reasons and each reaching different ends.However，one thing proves to be common to each struggle with time：their sister Caddy provides the central image around which their whole concept of time revolves.Her person controls the progress of time in their worlds，whether it is a fast paced world of the future，a confused world of a boy stuck in a timeless present，or even the tortured world full of memories of an innocence lost.Now，we can come to the conclusion that the whole story is in a sequence about Caddy’s childhood，her girlhood，her depravity and her adulthood.And from multiple points of view，we can get an integrated image of Caddy.

Faulkner gets away from the traditional time sequence.He uses the “Psychological Time” and the converse type of technique of symbol to reveal the characters’ psychological state.And he not only preserves the traditional style，but also brings some innovation，for which he is considered as a culmination of the development of twentieth-century southern fiction.

［參考文獻］

［1］TaoJie，Faulkner：selected papers international conference on William Faulkner，Peking University Press 1998.9.

［2］WengDexiu，ChenYongguo，WuJinghui Highlights of 20th Century British and American Literature II，JiLin University Press 2000.11.

［3］張立心：《二十世紀美國文學導讀》，遼寧人民出版社2002年1月版。

［4］伍厚愷：《外國文學名著快讀》，四川文藝出版社2002年1月版。

［5］高紅霞：《?？思{作品中的基督教深化模式解讀》，《燕山大學學報》2003年2月。

［6］李瓊：《〈喧囂與騷動〉中的象征模式》，《集美大學學報》2003年3月。