Concepts of Time in The Sound and the Fury

In Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury, time is explored, disassembled, mixed up, exploited, and rearranged. Faulkner's portrayal of time in The Sound and the Fury is extremely unique, and sometimes confusing. While the chronology of the book seems to be completely random and chaotic, a close examination and detailed cross-referencing of the book and its events will show that Faulkner carefully presented each section and event of the novel in a deliberate manner. In each section of the book, the idea of time changes, to represent the perspectives and opinions the characters of the book have toward time.

"Each of [the major characters] holds an idea of time which is appropriate to the theme Faulkner wishes to express and which serves the total structure he has created as well...In the final structure the characters' time concepts are correlated artistically with the various time devices which serve the telling of the story."

Faulkner presents time in each section of his novel differently; time is presented according to the concept of time held by the narrator of each section. In the first section, Benji narrates the story. If one examines the portrayal of time in this section, one would note that time seems jumbled up, and chaotic. While certain passages and thoughts trigger thoughts and passages that occur in the past, the portrayal of time in this section is unlike any other I've seen in any novel. The section shows that one can learn a lot about a person and family by following their actions for only a short period of time. Everything is connected. For Benji, the present triggers thoughts and memories of the past. He has a completely different concept of time. Faulkner's rearrangement of time mirrors Benji's idea of time. He does not view time in a linear fashion. Instead, Benji views time as a collection of memories and thoughts that are all connected in one way or another.

In contrast to Benji, Quentin has an obsession with time. In Quentin's section of the novel, we see many references to time, and watches, and clocks. His father even addresses Quentin's obsession with time. The sections of the novel Quentin narrates is much less chaotic than the first when it comes to the presentation of time and events. Quentin struggles throughout the novel to get out of time. Death is a means by which he thinks he can get out of time.

"When we begin to examine the concepts of time which Ben, Jason, and Quentin hold, some of the difficulty with motivation disappears. Each of the Compson sons has a concept of time which makes it difficult for him to live in his world. And these concepts of time are essentially signs to the reader, symptoms of something within the Compsons which brings each of them to final ruin. Only one person in the novel--Dilsey--escapes the wreckage of the crumbling house, and it is Dilsey who holds a proper notion of time, who understands that time is a continuum."

Benji cannot grasp the concept of time. In his mind, time does not exist as it does in the mind of any other character. He is unable to distinguish between the past and present. His thoughts are jumbled together. "If the circumstances surrounding any two acts are similar, the two acts tend to merge in [Benji's] mind into one act."


Faulkner manages to show that in a three-day period, he can present thirty years of history and events. In The Sound and the Fury, "it is apparent that there are two actions, which have different time spans. Once action takes place on April 6, 7, 8 of the year 1928...This action is minor, though it is climactic and stems directly from the major action. But more important, the three-day action serves as a framework about which Faulkner can hang a larger--and much more complex--action; and action which embraces thirty years' time. The large action begins in 1898, when the Compson children were small, and end on April 8, 1928."

One moment in time tells a lot more about the past than it does the present. By looking at small periods of time, we can learn about large peiods of the past.

Faulkner uses a very interesting method of portraying time to express exactly how he feels each character views times. The differences between each of the sections allow for time to be portrayed in different way; in the end, both Benji's and Quentin's concepts of time are wrong or misled. (616, w/o quotations)



Lowrey, Perrin. "Concepts of Time in The Sound and the Fury." Twentieth Century Interpretations of The Sound and the Fury. Ed. Michael H. Cowan. Prentice-Hall. (1968):
53-62.