Reading Faulkner: 'Sanctuary,' Glossary and Commentary.

Zeitlin, Michael

By Edwin T. Arnold and Dawn Trouard. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1996. xviii, 280 pp. $45.00 cloth, $17.50 paper.

These impressive volumes are part of the Reading Faulkner Series edited by Noel Polk and conceived by James Hinkle, who, as Polk explains in the Series Preface, "established its principles, selected the authors, worked long hours with each of us in various stages of planning and preparation, and then died before seeing any of the volumes in print. The series derives from Jim's hardcore commitment to the principle that readers must understand each word in Faulkner's difficult novels at its most basic, literal, level before hoping to understand the works' `larger' issues" (p. vii). Based on Hinkle's insistence on minute attention to detail, the Reading Faulkner Series also reflects Hinkle's conception of an ideal community of Faulknerians dedicated to reading the novels aloud, and hence to the communal circulation, exchange, and discussion of Faulkner's meanings. As Polk relates, "we spent hours with each other and with other Faulkner scholars reading the novels aloud, pausing to parse out a difficult passage, to look up a word we didn't understand, to discuss historical and mythological allusions, to work through the visual details of a scene to make sure we understood exactly what was happening, to complete Faulkner's interruptions, to fill in his gaps, and to be certain that we paid as much attention to the unfamiliar passages as we did to the better-known ones, not to let a single word escape our scrutiny; we also paused quite frequently, to savor what we had just read" (p. viii).

Reading through these glossaries, one feels the intensity of the authors' desire to understand and appreciate every nuance and detail of "the art of William Faulkner" (p. xi)--and hence, in keeping with the glossary genre, to track meanings to their home in and beyond the cosmos Faulkner claimed he owned. In the words of Edwin Arnold, "We ... hope that this reading will aid in basic understanding of Faulkner's world, encourage close examination of Faulkner's text, and arouse further discussion of his intentions and meanings" (p. xv). In necessarily evoking a fairly substantial "idea of the author" as central agency and cause, these glossaries repeatedly reinforce a sometimes elusive truth: that myriad meanings achieving point and coherence (or even splendidly suggestive incoherence) are those Faulkner himself intended. Naturally, that fact should not be felt as incompatible with the knowledge that there is always a dynamically evolving remainder or surplus that perpetually exceeds what can be imputed to Faulkner's intentions.

Some of these "surplus" meanings (as engendered especially by these two novels above all) are personal, private, woven into our own egos, and one sometimes resists yielding them even to Faulkner (or to what Ross, Polk, Arnold, and Trouard show or suggest Faulkner means). In this sense, Ross and Polk are perhaps too generous in anticipating "that one pleasure of this volume for our readers will be in finding differences from their own, sometimes previously unquestioned, assumptions about what a particular passage `really' means" (p. x). Well, it is not always a pleasure to have to give up one's meaning, even in the face of compelling evidence. Still, in the final analysis, one must be grateful for the evidence given in these glossaries, whose richest final effect is to invite us, even the Canadians among us, to say, "No, you wait. Let me play a while now": for no matter how tight or comprehensive the weave of the net-work that one lays across Faulkner's turbulent textuality, some meanings--perhaps even facts and allusions--will inevitably escape it.

Rich with valuable information and keen insights, Ross's and Polk's volume on The Sound and the Fury keys its entries to line and page numbers of the Corrected Text, in both the Vintage International (New York, 1990) and Random House (New York, 1984) editions. The glossary proper is preceded by an elaborate six-page chronology of events and time levels in Benjy Compson's narrative. Working through this chronological schema, one gains a vivid perspective on the staggering complexity and dimension of what Faulkner achieved in this first section of the novel and beyond.

Designed to serve both new and seasoned readers of Faulkner, the glossary entries themselves are focused as much on major as on minor or seldom-noticed aspects of the novel. An example in the former category shows how worthwhile it is to be given a lucid articulation of a major theme: "44:7 Bad health is the primary reason for all life. Created by disease, within putrefaction, into decay Mr. Compson's humor serves his nihilism and cynicism, which works powerfully throughout the novel, especially on Quentin. Father's and Mother's arguments about Uncle Maury and their constant sniping and whining take place in the presence of the children, with devastating cumulative effect on them" (p. 29). Other entries invite us to notice or linger over precious details that one might otherwise risk moving past too quickly: "64:19 the cushion came back and Caddy held it above Mother's head While Mother finally tearfully embraces Benjy, Caddy performs a lovely deception by holding the forbidden cushion so that Benjy can see it but Mother cannot: by holding the cushion where Benjy can see it she induces him to stop crying, to stop resisting, while he is in his mother's lap; she then draws Mother `back in the chair' where she lies crying" (p. 36). Some entries offer useful speculations about internal relational patterns: "112:4 Quentin has shot all of their voices through the floor of Caddy's room See 105:25. The source of the image of shooting Herbert Head's voice may lie in the association Quentin makes between Head and the thoroughbred horse, for this is the horse that had to be shot after it threw Quentin and broke his leg" (p. 94). And some entries point to historical discourses and contexts well worth exploring further. "252:91 wouldn't bet on any team that fellow Ruth played on The source of Jason's antagonism toward Babe Ruth may be the rumor that Ruth was part Negro. This rumor maintained some currency during the late twenties and into the late thirties" (p. 173). In addition to the knowledge it imparts and the perspectives it opens to view, the glossary is in itself a living demonstration that one cannot read the novel too slowly, and this is its ultimate pedagogical value.

From its opening gloss on the title of the novel to its five-page chronological appendix, Arnold and Trouard's volume on Sanctuary, which keys itself both to the Library of America Edition of William Faulkner. Novels 1930-1935 (1985) and to the Vintage International paperback text (New York, 1993), consistently rewards the reader, student, and scholar with shrewd insights and absorbing material. Especially admirable is its frank handling of matters as sensitive and "scandalous" now as they were in 1931: "219:27 you'll say Yes Yes and you'll crawl naked in the dirt and the mire for him to call you that ....... Such a man could also introduce Temple to yet unimagined sexual passion; he would break down her silly pretenses and release her fundamental emotions. See Temple and Red later in the book (344:16 / 238:30). Ruby's description, however, also reminds us of her own father after he kills Frank, in one sense she admires her father for his brutal display of authority" (p. 69). Such entries trace for the reader especially valuable pathways of significance, as does the following: "198:6 Coop Student nickname for Ricks and Ward Halls, the two women's dormitories at the University of Mississippi at this time. The name involves a sexual joke--that hens are kept in a coop to lay eggs--and anticipates the houses of prostitution in Memphis: the female dorms will be compared to the Memphis bordellos, one of the many ways Faulkner heightens resemblances between proper and improper" (p. 40). Other kinds of entries point to historical, cultural, and biographical contexts while supplying their nuggets of helpful knowledge: "195:32 F.F.V. First Families of Virginia, a somewhat satiric description applied to native-born, rather pompous Virginians who considered themselves superior to Southerners from other states, because of their leading role in the founding of the United States" (p. 35); "312:39 Kimono a loose fitting gown, suggesting the exotic and sensual. Estelle [Franklin] Faulkner wore kimonos following her return from Shanghai, China after divorce from first husband, Cornell Franklin" (p. 163); "389:16 At first they thought he was blind ... he did not learn to walk and talk until he was about four years old Symptoms associated with syphilis. (The adult Popeye is also impotent, another effect of the disease.) An obvious comparison can be made between baby Popeye and the Goodwin baby, which is also clearly very ill" (p. 238).

Even the most experienced reader of Faulkner is bound to glean much valuable insight and knowledge from these meticulously researched, eminently practical, and intellectually suggestive glossaries.