The Sound and the Fury | Essays and Criticism

  • Interpreting Caddy Compson

    In this essay, Jeffrey M. Lilburn analyzes how each of the novel's narrations comes to focus on Caddy Compson. He notes that while a reader of The Sound and the Fury can only learn of Caddy through the observations of her family, interpreting her character is central to understanding the novel.

  • Dilsey's Easter Conversion in Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury

    In the following excerpt, Philip Dubuisson Castille argues that the character of Dilsey is more developed than many critics have seen her. He interprets her actions after hearing the Reverend Shegog's sermon as leading her away from the Compsons and back to her family, a change that reflects the Christian idea of redemption.

  • The Death of a Family

    In this excerpt, John L. Longley Jr. states that the novel is about "the death of a family and the corresponding decay of a society," and explores how the character of Caddy is central to the actions of all three of her brothers..