In Section 3, Faulkner is again setting up Darl as the perceptive person receptive to all types of detail. He describes with poetic imagery the simplest detail, such as taking a drink of water. The other narrators do not attempt to record their ideas in any type of poetic language. Furthermore, Darl is also highly perceptive when it comes to human evaluations and understanding behavior. For example, he understands his father's ineffectual behavior and knows that his father is incapable of a definite action.
Darl's perceptive ability is further suggested in his visualizing the scene between Jewel and the horse. This technique is employed many times in the novel when Darl will frequently narrate a scene or an event even though he is not present at the event. This technique or this ability of Darl's has led some critics to suggest that this is an indication of Darl's possible madness.
The description of Jewel's relation to the horse is quite significant since Jewel's relationship with this horse is one of the central ideas in the novel. For example, in the scene that Darl visualizes for us, Jewel acts with violence toward his horse, but beneath the violence there is a sense of deep devotion to the animal. This particular dichotomy characterizes Jewel as a person who feels violently and can only express himself — even love — through acts or images of violence. Consequently, the violence of this short scene with the horse leads directly into Jewel's only narration.
Since Jewel is one of the most significant characters in the novel, it is at first puzzling that he narrates only one section in the entire book. We see Jewel from every other perspective; that is, we see him from Darl's viewpoint, from Cash's, and so forth, but this is our only chance to get into Jewel's own mind and hear his personal thoughts.
