Minor Themes : Big Deal

Absalom, Absalom! is Faulkner’s finest work. This was my second time reading Absalom, Absalom! and I have say that it was less overwhelming than my first and much more rich. One of the themes that I noticed this time was recognition; this theme gets overshadowed because the complex issues of race in the text. All of the male characters—Supten, Henry, and Bon all want recognition. Thomas Supten wants to be recognized as a gentleman. He goes about getting what he needs, in order to get that recognition by acquiring land, a big house, and respectable wife. Henry was recognition from his father, Supten, that he is his son. But, because Henry is most like his mother, Ellen, than Supten he does not receive it. Also, Sutpen is man driven be ambition. He literally views the people in life as means to building this dynasty so that his seed will never have to enter through a back door, thereby never recognized. Charles Bon is Supten’s first son from his first marriage. Bon is a mulatto and a tragic one because he too also wants recognition from Sutpen. Bon wants recognition probably more so than Henry because he is an outsider on three fronts.

Another minor theme is the transference of information, which actually is history being told of particular characters such as Ms. Coldfied is telling Quinton what she knows about the “demon that caused us to lose the war”. This information is history being transferred from one generation to another. When Quinton asks his father why Ms. Coldfield chooses him to tell this story to, Mr. Compsons’ answer is because Rosa knows Supten told your grandfather about his past and why she, Rosa, did not marry Supten. This history being transferred is yet another bias nostalgic way of carrying on the tradition of the old south. However, beginning with The Sound and the Fury Quinton is already a child of the new south, who accepts blacks as equal and not as inferior. He also witnesses women stripping down that platform of the southern bell role and becoming independent i.e. Candace.