Discuss
the character and role of Caddy in The Sound and the Fury.
The Sound
and the Fury is meant to be about the downfall of a Southern family
(symbolizing the downfall of the South in general), much of that downfall is
because of Caddy, and it soon becomes clear that this book is about Caddy.
About who she really is, who her brothers see her as, and the difference
between those two things. But Caddy never is able to speak for herself. She
never appears in the present to dispute or confirm the things her brothers
think about her. We only see her through three very biased eyes. But at the
same time, they are her brothers, so they do know her. Trying to figure out
Caddy really is the key of the book, but stop trying. You’re never going to do
it. Through the narrations of Benjy, Quentin, and Jason, we get ALMOST
everything we need to know about Caddy. ALMOST. But there’s a tiny piece
missing. And it always will be.
It’s
important to look at her brothers’ narrations not only as what they saw her as,
but what they forced her to be, unwittingly. Benjy, receiving no affection from
anyone in the family other than Caddy, pushes her into the position of mother
from a very young age. Quentin hangs all of his hope for the honor of the Old
South on her virtue. The face that he’s OBSESSED with her sexuality in some
very complicated ways can’t help matters. And Jason, cold and mean from
childhood, sees her less as a sister and more as a way into a better job. All
we see from the brothers’ perspectives is Caddy failing miserably in their
expectations of her. None of them realize that part of the problem was that
they were forcing her to be something she wasn’t.
At the
same time though, it is hard to tell if her brothers entirely forced her into
those roles. We see through Benjy’s memories Caddy as the strong willed little
girl who wanted to be in charge of her brothers and who broke the rules without
fear of punishment. From childhood she insinuated herself into the role of her
brothers’ controller. That desire, in the end, only made them the controllers
of her destiny. Her declaration that she be in charge of the three boys during
her grandmother’s funeral is almost as dooming as her dirtying her drawers in
the mud, foreshadowing her impurity.
