P. 3, Scene 1 (1928) Through the fence . . .
As indicated by the heading, this section is set in the present time, April 7, 1928, which is the Saturday before Easter Sunday. (Faulkner was very careful to make the date coincide with the actual date of Easter in that particular year.) Throughout this section, the dating is easy since each scene is identified by the presence of Luster as Benjy's attendant and by Luster's searching for a lost quarter as they wander about the Compson premises.
In the appendix to Malcolm Cowley's The Portable Faulkner and also in the Norton critical edition of the novel, Faulkner wrote that Luster was fourteen years old and that Luster was capable of handling an idiot who was twice his age. Since Benjy is thirty-three on this day, Luster would have had to be sixteen or seventeen. Furthermore, internal evidence in the section indicates that Luster would have to be more than fourteen because in another scene (Scene 7), which occurs in April 1913, Luster is already born and is playing with baby Quentin, Caddy's daughter. We must therefore assume that Faulkner was in error in assigning Luster's age as fourteen. After all, he wrote the appendix approximately sixteen years later without rereading the novel (see Malcolm Cowley, The Faulkner-Cowley File), and the appendix should be viewed, at least partly, as a separate artistic creation because there are several other troublesome inconsistencies between it and the text.
As noted above, the date, April 7, 1928, is also Benjy's thirty-third birthday. All of these facts have a certain symbolic importance. April, as a month, is symbolic of growth and also decay, of life and also death. It is the month in which Christ was crucified, and the Saturday between the Friday of Crucifixion and the Sunday of Resurrection is, by tradition, one of the figuratively darkest days in the history of Christianity. April is also the month when all things begin growing again—the beginning of the cycle of life. Thus, Benjy is placed in the midst of greenness and fertility of April, and his moaning becomes the hopelessness of all the voiceless misery represented by the death of Christ. The flowers that Benjy loves are a contrast to the ugliness of his own appearance. In this month of rebirth, however, Benjy is conscious only of death—many of the things he remembers are associated with funerals and with deaths.
Critics have often characterized Benjy as a Christ figure because he is thirty-three years old, the age of Christ when He was crucified. Benjy has been castrated, which implies that the modern Christ is impotent against all the evil present in the modern world. Benjy also suffers as Christ did, but Benjy's suffering is to no avail. He cannot intervene, as did Christ, because he is, Faulkner says, an idiot. The implication through all these Christ images is that the Christ figure in the modern world is reduced to an impotent, moaning, mindless being who cares only for his own personal comforts.
This section is narrated as though we were seeing all the events through the eyes of a thirty-three-year-old boy-man. Since Benjy is incapable of logical thinking, we have a section that seems terribly confused and illogical. Most of the section simply records sensory impressions that he remembers. When he sees one thing, such as a fence, he is immediately reminded of another episode in which the same object was involved. There is often a jump back in time without any warning to the reader. In one paragraph Benjy might be remembering something that happened only a few years ago, and then suddenly he recalls a similar event that happened some fifteen, twenty, or thirty years ago, and, once in the past, he might either come forward or go further backward in time. Often, but not always, the time change will be indicated by the use of italics.
Since the section is being narrated by a mentally slow man who cannot comment on actions, we must note carefully the images that affect him. For example, when he hears the golfers call for their caddie, the word reminds him of his sister, Caddy, whom Benjy loves more than any other person. The mention of her name causes him to start moaning. Likewise, the golf course at one time belonged to the Compsons. It was generally referred to as "Benjy's pasture." In 1909, Mr. Compson sold this pasture in order to send Quentin to Harvard and to buy more liquor for himself. Thus, in one sense, Benjy misses both his sister, Caddy, and his pasture. Furthermore, in 1910, Benjy was castrated after people thought he was trying to attack some young girls. Consequently, when Benjy sees the golf balls, he is perhaps reminded of his castration.
P. 4, Scene 2 (two days before Christmas, about 1902) Caddy uncaught me . . .
In this paragraph, we shift abruptly into the past, into what we call "the Patterson episode." It is virtually impossible to date this episode with absolute accuracy since there is no definite indication of its chronology. However, from suggestive evidence, we must assume that both Caddy and Benjy are still rather young. It is therefore safest to assume that this passage—and the entire Patterson episode—occurs in December (two days before Christmas) in 1902, or 1903, or 1904. The earlier date is more likely since Caddy would be only eleven years old and would still have her innocence, as suggested by Benjy's reaction to her. The later date (1904) would place her in early puberty and would probably cause a different reaction in Benjy's mind.
A close examination of the shift in time will familiarize the reader with the basic technique, or rationale, by which Faulkner shifts time. When Luster helps Benjy through the fence in 1928, Benjy's mind automatically returns to an earlier scene in which he was involved in the same type of activity. Getting snagged on a nail while he is with Luster reminds him of a time twenty-six years earlier when he was snagged on a nail when he was with Caddy. Time, of course, has no meaning for Benjy, and the past and the present blend into one response for him. Many of the scenes in the past that Benjy remembers are connected with his sister, Caddy, in one way or another. Note also that when there is a sudden shift in time, as in this passage, Faulkner will often (but again, not always) give the reader a hint of a time change by putting part or all of the scene in italics; or if one scene in the past is in italics, he will often shift to roman type for the next scene in the present.
