Study Questions
1. How does Henry feel about Charles Bon when he first brings him home?

2. Who is more sophisticated, Henry Sutpen or Charles Bon?

3. Why do Henry and Charles leave Jefferson suddenly?

4. What does Ellen do after Henry and Charles leave?

5. Who is the letter from that Mr. Compson is showing Quentin?

6. Who is the letter to?

7. What is the letter about?

8. Who brought the news of the murder to Miss Rosa?

9. What is a good way to read and understand this novel?

10. What is the name of the literary style in which Absalom, Absalom! was written?

Answers
1. When Henry Sutpen first brings Charles Bon home at Christmas vacation, they are the best of friends.

2. Charles Bon, from New Orleans, is more sophisticated. Henry Sutpen, who never before left Jefferson, is provincial in clothes, manner, and speech.

3. Henry and Charles leave Jefferson suddenly because Thomas Sutpen has confessed that Charles is his son and can therefore not marry Judith. In their anger, they join the Civil War.

4. After Henry and Charles leave Sutpen’s Hundred, Ellen Sutpen retires to a dark room, in which she eventually dies.

5. The letter that Mr. Compson is showing Quentin is from Charles Bon.

6. The letter is to Judith Sutpen.

7. The letter describes the Civil War and tells Judith that he does not know when he will return, but that he will return to marry her.

8. Wash Jones, Sutpen’s handyman, brought the news of Charles Bon’s murder by his half-brother, Henry, to Miss Rosa Coldfield.

9. A good way to read this chapter is in small pieces; the best way to understand it is to read it several times.

10. The name of the literary style in which Absalom, Absalom! was written is “modernism.”