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Light in August | Introduction

While William Faulkner's complex novels drew mixed critical responses in the 1930s, two events in the 1940s helped inspire a fresh look at his work and a subsequent reevaluation of his literary talent: the appearance of Malcolm Cowley's edition of The Portable Faulkner in 1946, which included Cowley's astute analysis of Faulkner's work, and the awarding of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1949 to Faulkner, followed by his stirring acceptance speech. As of 2006, more scholarly work was being done on Faulkner than on any other American author, which attests to his work's relevance to modern readers. In the early 2000s, he was considered one of America's finest authors.

Light in August, published in 1932, is one of his most highly acclaimed works. The novel traces the experiences of three main characters: Lena Grove, who is searching for the father of her unborn child; Gail Hightower, an elderly minister who seeks a measure of peace in his troubled existence; and Joe Christmas, who spends his life struggling to deal with his belief that he is part black. As Faulkner weaves together the stories of these three characters, he explores the devastating effects of racism and religious fanaticism. Inevitably, however, the novel's tragic elements are juxtaposed with resilience and optimism, especially in its closing pages. Light in August thus becomes an apt illustration of this famous passage from Faulkner's Nobel Prize address: "I believe that man will not merely endure: he will prevail. He is immortal, not because he alone among creatures has an inexhaustible voice, but because he has a soul, a spirit capable of compassion and sacrifice and endurance."

Light in August Summary

Chapters 1-2

When Light in August opens, Lena Grove has been walking for four weeks from Alabama to Jefferson, farther from her home than she has ever traveled. After living in a tiny room in her brother's house in the small town of Doane's Mill for eight years after her parents died, she began to sneak out of the bedroom window at night until she found herself pregnant. Even though Lucas Burch had left town six months before her brother found out, Lena refused to reveal his name.

Deciding not to wait for him to come for her, Lena sets out to find Lucas. On the road, Mr. Armstid, a farmer, decides to bring her home for the night. She later admits to him and his wife that she is not married but makes excuses for Lucas, insisting that such a good natured fellow as he needs some time to settle down. The next morning Armstid drives her to the town store and informs the men there that she needs a ride to Jefferson.

Byron Bunch thinks about the time three years earlier when he first met Joe Christmas at the lumber mill where he works in Jefferson. Joe did not speak to anyone, and no one spoke to him for months. Another stranger who came to the mill named Brown revealed that Joe lived in the woods on Joanna Burden's estate. After three years, Joe suddenly quits his job at the mill. Rumors circulate that he and Brown are selling whiskey and that they both are living in the cabin on Miss Burden's place.

One Saturday afternoon, Byron is alone at the mill since the others have gone to watch the fire that is consuming Miss Burden's house. Lena appears looking for Burch, and Byron falls in love with her. Byron soon realizes that the man she is looking for is Brown and, in order to prevent her disappointment, provides her with only a few minor details about him.

Chapters 3-5

The narrative shifts to Reverend Gail Hightower, a defrocked minister who now struggles to make a living by selling greeting cards. He had been the town's Presbyterian minister but lost his church after "his wife went bad on him." She was killed in Memphis one night after either jumping or falling from a hotel window. The townspeople heard rumors that there was a man in the room with her and that they both were drunk.

Believing that Hightower drove his wife to commit suicide, the townspeople refused to come back to his church, so he was forced to resign. After he did not fire his housekeeper when he was warned about being alone in his home with a black woman, he was severely beaten by members of the Ku Klux Klan. Eventually, the townspeople began to ignore him and left him alone.

Byron tells Hightower about Lena, whom he has just set up at the boarding house, and they wonder who started the fire at the Burden house. A man passing by saw the fire and found Brown drunk inside the house. Upstairs, he discovered Miss Burden, almost decapitated. Byron informs Hightower that Brown and Joe have been selling whiskey from her property and that Joe is part black.

That night, Brown appears in town claiming Joe killed Miss Burden and demands the reward that has been promised for information about the murder. He tells the sheriff that she and Joe had been living "like man and wife" and that Joe is of mixed race. Byron believes that Brown set the house on fire and hopes that if he gets the money, he will marry Lena.

The narrative then goes back to the night before the murder, as Joe thinks about his complex and brutal two-year relationship with Joanna Burden. He is angry that she lied about her age and never told him that women can lose their sexual desire after going through menopause. He is also incensed that she tried to pray over him. Filled with the desire to "smell horses … because they are not women," and hearing strange voices in his head, he walks the next day to the black community on the outskirts of town and confronts some residents with a razor in his hand. Later, that night, he kills Joanna.

Chapters 6-7

The narrative flashes back to when Joe was five and living in an orphanage "like a shadow … sober and quiet." One day, he sneaks into the washroom and eats some toothpaste that belongs to the young dietician who works at the orphanage. As the dietician enters the room with a man, he hides behind a curtain and begins to feel ill from the toothpaste. When the couple begins to have sex, Joe throws up and so is discovered. Thinking that he had been spying on her, the woman screams, "you little n―bastard!"

Over the next few days, she becomes desperate as she waits for him to tell the matron about what she was doing in the washroom. Determining that the janitor, who readers later discover is Joe's grandfather, hates Joe as well, the dietician tells him what happened. The janitor snatches him the next morning, afraid that he will be sent to a black orphanage. The police catch him, however, and bring Joe back.

The woman who runs the orphanage determines that Joe needs to be placed at once and finds a farming couple, Mr. and Mrs. McEachern, who agree to adopt him. Mr. McEachern, who is characterized by his cold eyes, vows to make Joe "grow up to fear God and abhor idleness and vanity."

Three years later, the battle of wills between Joe and Mr. McEachern has intensified, as evinced in an incident when the latter tries to force the boy to learn his catechism. When Joe refuses, Mr. McEachern beats him. Feeling pity for the boy, Mrs. McEachern brings him a tray of food that evening but he dumps it in the corner. An hour later, he eats the food alone in his room, "like a savage, like a dog."

When Joe is fourteen, a group of friends and he gather one afternoon at a sawmill where they take sexual turns with a black girl who sits in the shadows. When it is Joe's turn, he begins to beat her and the others pull him off. At home, McEachern whips him for fighting.

Chapters 8-9

One night, when Joe is eighteen, he climbs out his window using a rope. He wears the new suit that he had hidden in the barn, bought with the money he gained from selling his calf. McEachern had given the calf to Joe to teach him responsibility. Joe sneaks out that night to meet Bobbie, a waitress he met in town, and to take her to a dance at the local schoolhouse. He wishes that McEachern would try to stop him.

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