Light in August (Masterplots, Revised Second Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: William Faulkner
- First Published: 1932
- Type of Work: Novel
- Type of Plot: Psychological realism
- Time of Work: 1930
- Setting: Mississippi
- Principal Characters: Joe Christmas, Doc Hines, Mr. McEachern, Joanna Burden, Joe Brown, Lena Grove, Byron Bunch
- Genres: Long fiction, Psychological fiction
- Subjects: Racism, Race, Murder or homicide, South or Southerners, Interracial relationships, Mistaken or secret identity, Betrayal, Prejudices or antipathies, 1930’s, Pregnancy, Mississippi, Small-town life, Cruelty, Hate crimes, Outlaws
- Locales: Yoknapatawpha County (fictive)
The Story:
Joe Christmas was the illegitimate son of a dark-skinned circus trouper who was thought to be of African American descent and a white girl named Milly Hines. Joe’s grandfather, old Doc Hines, killed the circus man, let Milly die in childbirth, and put Joe—at Christmas time, hence his last name—into an orphanage, where the children learned to call him “Nigger.” Doc Hines then arranged to have Joe adopted by a religious and heartless farmer named McEachern, whose cruelties to Joe were met with a matching stubbornness that turned the boy into an almost...
[The entire page is 2694 words long]
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