The Creation of Self: A Story of Father and SOn
The Creation of Self: A Story of Father and Son
First published in 1950 The Barn Burning tells the tale of a young boy who betrays, and indirectly kills, his father in order to satisfy his burgeoning sense of right and wrong. At the beginning of The Barn Burning a boy named Colonel Sartoris Snopes is watching the trial of his father for an unproven barn burning. Colonel Sartoris Snopes is the son of Abner Snopes from The Unvanquished. Abner Snopes is found not guilty in the trial and the Snopes family moves out of town to a new sharecropper’s share. The land is owned by Major DeSpain, a southern aristocrat. Mr. Snopes manages to anger Major DeSpain by muddying a carpet in the big house. The Snopes family tries to clean the carpet but ruins it completely instead. DeSpain wants them to pay for it but instead Mr. Snopes sets fire to the DeSpain barn with Colonel Sartoris’ help and leaves. Colonel Sartoris tells the DeSpains about the burning barn and then runs away. The book ends with him sobbing on a hill trying to talk himself back into the complete trust in his father that has been lost. He is trying to convince himself that telling the DeSpains was right but also that his father deserves his reverence. His name, Colonel Sartoris, gives him much to live up to, especially in that county. The Barn Burning takes place in a fictitious county in southern Mississippi just after the Civil war. During the War Colonel Sartoris was a legend in the county. The boy Colonel Sartoris is named after this legend And inherits a great legacy that is impossible to live up to. When his father is on trial for burning a barn Colonel Sartoris is asked to testify and he lies; however no one doubts him. As the judge says, “I reckon anybody named for Colonel Sartoris in this country can’t help but tell the truth, can they?”(Faulkner 4). Everyone at the trial has know the old Colonel Sartoris and the young Colonel Sartoris, or Satty as he is called, is never doubted simply because of
First published in 1950 The Barn Burning tells the tale of a young boy who betrays, and indirectly kills, his father in order to satisfy his burgeoning sense of right and wrong. At the beginning of The Barn Burning a boy named Colonel Sartoris Snopes is watching the trial of his father for an unproven barn burning. Colonel Sartoris Snopes is the son of Abner Snopes from The Unvanquished. Abner Snopes is found not guilty in the trial and the Snopes family moves out of town to a new sharecropper’s share. The land is owned by Major DeSpain, a southern aristocrat. Mr. Snopes manages to anger Major DeSpain by muddying a carpet in the big house. The Snopes family tries to clean the carpet but ruins it completely instead. DeSpain wants them to pay for it but instead Mr. Snopes sets fire to the DeSpain barn with Colonel Sartoris’ help and leaves. Colonel Sartoris tells the DeSpains about the burning barn and then runs away. The book ends with him sobbing on a hill trying to talk himself back into the complete trust in his father that has been lost. He is trying to convince himself that telling the DeSpains was right but also that his father deserves his reverence. His name, Colonel Sartoris, gives him much to live up to, especially in that county. The Barn Burning takes place in a fictitious county in southern Mississippi just after the Civil war. During the War Colonel Sartoris was a legend in the county. The boy Colonel Sartoris is named after this legend And inherits a great legacy that is impossible to live up to. When his father is on trial for burning a barn Colonel Sartoris is asked to testify and he lies; however no one doubts him. As the judge says, “I reckon anybody named for Colonel Sartoris in this country can’t help but tell the truth, can they?”(Faulkner 4). Everyone at the trial has know the old Colonel Sartoris and the young Colonel Sartoris, or Satty as he is called, is never doubted simply because of