Stream of consciousness In The Sound and The Fury by William Faulkner.

Stream-of-consciousness is  a technique through which the writer sketches the thinking patterns of his character. The time runs according to the internal clock of the character’s mind, real time does not exist when the thought runs in the mind of the character. The writer explains the traits and personality of the character through his/her psychological patterning. This technique has been used by many writers but, James Joyce and Virginia Wolf are famous for the apt use of this technique in their novels.

Stream-of-consciousness comes under the title of modern fiction. Though Virginia Wolf is not considered as pure modern novelist yet, she is famous of using stream-of-consciousness in her novel To The Lighthouse.

The novel under discussion has many ways to present the technique of Stream-of-consciousness. Faulkner has not merely used the technique but, he has made it more complicated yet attractive and effective. His use of the technique is not merely the representation of the thoughts and ideals of the character rather, he has used the technique according to the psyche of the character; which shows how a character will think or behave in a particular circumstance. It also displays the personality of each character in a different way. Let us start with the Character of Benjy. The youngest son of the Compson’s family. He is a retard. Here we can test the narrative, whether it supports the character or not. But, the design of Faulkner’s narrative is amazing. He has not left a puny thread behind to be objected. In Benjy’s character we see him constantly lost in his memories. He thinks and while thinking one thought he forgets and starts yearning an other one. That makes his character complex and interesting at the same time. Faulkner has justified his character by giving him an unfocused and broken speech. His character is simple with words, as he cannot use or remember difficult vocabulary items so, his language is not hard to understand. But, to keep up with his thinking pattern is hard. We cannot follow the flow as, it is not in a normal manner. The flow of his thoughts is disturbed as he jumps from one thought to an other. Thus, the character of Benjy is both simple and complex.

Caddy is the one who is running the story. She is the center of the novel. Without Caddy there would not be any “sound” and there would not be a hint of “fury”. She is not a physically present character in the novel. She does not explain herself or her thoughts in the course of the story. She is actually controlling the story and holding it tight as she runs in the minds of all characters. Benjy loves her as a mother, all his thoughts and all his life revolves around her. He remembers the day of her wedding which disturbs him the most as, that was the day when she went away from him. He holds her scarf to feel her presence. He yearns her affectionate actions and loving smiles. In short she is the only thought in Benjy’s character and in his Stream-of-consciousness.

Then comes Quentine, He also likes and loves to move around Caddy. He wants her to be under the control of family traditions and norms on the other hand, Caddy does not like to follow traditions. She is not a simple lady with simple ideologies. She wants to live her life according to her own desires and rule. She has a strong personality to empower anyone. She is kind, Affectionate and loving. The only flaw is that she cannot control her desires rather, she cannot bound herself. She runs in the mind of Quentine as well. Quentine has many problems; he cannot decide how to shed off the filthy thoughts of love making with his sister. He is sexually attracted towards Caddy, which makes him jealous of seeing her with any other guy. There are tow reasons to this too; i that he loves her with sexual imagination and, ii that he wants her to keep the honor of the family intact. Faulkner has shown the confused character of Quentine through his thinking pattern. The novel starts with Quentine’s death, he commits suicide as, he couldn’t hold the burden of his cursed conscience and agonized fate. He is the older son of Compson family and a great loss to them. He is a coward as, he couldn’t face the reality and killed himself for no reason. The whole family is disturbed by Caddy it seems but, when we go deep into it, we see that the characters of the novel do not give space to each other to breath in peace.

Jason is the one who is not concerned about anything but, money. He wants the name and money from his family nothing else. He is the bad guy and the selfish one. He uses Caddy the junior for this purpose. They have kept Caddy the junior away from her mother even then she has the same nature in fact, her rebellious nature is worse than her mother. She also does not care about Jason and her grandmother. She teases Jason as, she knows that he himself is not true to his family then how can he expect it from others to stay loyal to the family. Caddy the junior has learnt it all from her surroundings. She knows that no one around her is pure. Therefore, she does everything what she likes.

So, the representation of characters through stream-of-consciousness has changed the pattern of the narrative. It has made it complex but, it also has enhanced the understanding of internal world orders. Through this technique we understand behaviors and situations. It makes the way for critical thinking and opens the doors of multiple interpretations. Though we think that it is purely a modern technique but, it was there in classic fiction too. In Emily Bronte’s Wuthering  Heights we see the technique of stream-of-consciousness in the character of Heathcliff. Similarly, we see it in the character of Maggie in George Eliot’s The Mill on The Floss.  There are many other examples. But the full picture has been represented in the modern times by modern writers.

Ayesha Aamir.

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