In a nutshell, I was pretty taken aback by Faulkner's short story "Barn Burning." The title was already making me squirm a little and I didn't know if the story would be just as cryptic as As I Lay Dying was. Thankfully it wasn't too convoluted. However, it was one of the saddest stories I had read in a long time. Imagine being the son of a man who has been charged with arson multiple times. The ethical dilemma is just screaming out to the reader, and this is what Faulkner was trying to show through the protagonist Colonel Sartoris Snopes. Snopes and his family live in Faulkner's made-up Yoknapatawpha County, Mississippi (no surprise) just like the Bundrens from As I Lay Dying (it will all make sense once you start reading the novel). This makes no difference, but it begs the question of whether Faulkner's some of the stories take place simultaneously in Yoknapatawpha County or are they all set in different time periods. No matter, the Snopes' are your average poor rural family with one little glitch: a disfigured father named Abner Snopes. A red flag should be going off immediately when one finds out a character is deformed (think Flannery O'Connor). Abner Snopes's issue is a limp in his leg from being shot in the Civil War. Besides that, he is described as stiff-bodied and even worse he speaks in a harsh emotionless voice. I really want to meet this guy (sarcasm ensues). Thus far there is no evidence that he is very likable, so he is a good candidate to be a criminal. For Sartoris Snopes, it means having to submit without fail to an angry father who loves to show his superiority as patriarch. The situation is almost as bad for Abner Snopes's wife (how could she have married this guy). She is scared into submission by her husband's violent nature.
With so many problems, Abner Snopes looks like he has a lot to answer to. He seems to lack a conscience and a sense of decency. Whatever happens, he will eventually have to confess any wrongdoings he may have done to either his family or the judge, who will be so happy to see him (not really). All of this and more made me sad and also glad to have read William Faulkner's short story "Barn Burning." I would highly recommend it because if one wishes to understand an author, it never hurts to read more than one of his or her works. Another one of Faulkner's short stories that is just as gut-wrenching is "A Rose for Emily."
Have you ever seen the film of The Long Hot Summer?? It comes from another Faulkner short story, and the mood is sooooo painfully tense--the Paul Newman version is my favorite. He's a barn burner too-at least everyone thinks so.
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