William Faulkner used this quote from the Odyssey as inspiration for the title of his book As I Lay Dying: “As I lay dying the woman with the dog’s eyes would not close my eyes for me as I descended into Hades” The speaker in the Odyssey is bitter because he would rather not see and experience the sights on the way to hell. As I Lay Dying too has myriad of eyes open and watching as Addie dies and then as her body is taken to her home-town of Jefferson to be buried. Each chapter, with its multitude of characters, watching and looking, sees what is before them in different angles, different perspectives, different motivations. From the portentous eye of the sun to the fish’s eye covered with dust, this novel is full of watchful eyes and eyes that are blinded by greed, fear, and pain. Indeed, Addie must have been in her own hell if she could see the foolishness and selfishness of her family during their pilgrimage.
Anse, the father of the family, is perhaps the worst offender. His unwise decisions coupled with his unrelenting complaints and unreasonable obstinance causes the devastation of the remaining members of the family. Anse often bemoans that he has no luck, and that life has dealt him a hard blow, but it is also known that he does nothing that makes him sweat, leaving the hard work to others. A man who doesn’t work is hardly a man in the place and time he grew up in, underlining Addie’s observation that “then he died. He did not know he was dead.” His eyes are described as “burnt-out cinder” as if any life that was in him has also fled. His inaction and inability to reason, to have compassion or to adjust to circumstances--characteristics of being fully human-- becomes the family’s greatest downfall. But Anse’s main problem is only seeing what he wants to see. He is described as being “constantly surprised to see his wife in bed” as if he carried an image of her alive and healthy in his head, and couldn’t accept the reality of her sickness. He also refused to meet Jewel’s eyes as he reveals the negotiation for a new pack of mules resulted in the trade of Jewel’s horses, as if by not witnessing the anger in Jewel’s reaction he could pretend it was alright.
Addie’s eyes are described as “steam” or “lamps blaring up just before the oll is gone’. They reflect that she is dying, and that her will to live is also fading away--”all her failing life appears to drain into her eyes, urgent, irremediable.” She has lived a life where expediency was the driving force. She was a school teacher not because she loved the children or learning, but simply because that was how she could make a living. She married Anse only because she knew he would have her. She took the preacher as a lover without shame or remorse because she desired him, and when he called it off, she went back to Anse and became his dutiful wife because there was no other option. “I gave Anse the children. I did not ask for them. I did not even ask him for what he could have given me: not-Anse. That was my duty to him, to not ask that, and that duty I fulfilled.” Although Addie describes Anse as dead, she too, has lived her life without the passion and fulfillment that would make one truly alive. “My father said that the reason for living is getting ready to stay dead. I know at last what he meant…” After her fling with the pastor, Addie has simply lived so that she can die without Anse’s reproach. And her stipulation that she be buried in Jefferson becomes the revenge on him that she could not exact in her lifetime.
Cash becomes the pragmatic character in the novel. Even his name speaks of the practicalities of life. His main concern is getting the coffin built and doing it correctly. He makes the coffin on the bevel simply because that is the way of “animal magnetism”, the way the “earth sinks down” and the “natural” way of things. Once the body is in the coffin, his priority is to get the body balanced. His worries go unheeded, and as a result, the coffin spills out of the wagon as they try to ford the stream. Just before they cross, Cash and Darl exchange a look--”looks that plunge unimpeded through one another’s eyes and into the ultimate secret place where for an instant Cash and Darl crouch flagrant and unabashed in all the old terror and the old forboding, alert and secret and without shame.” This is perhaps the only time in the novel when Darl has an accomplice, where they acknowledge the danger and futility of their mission. They seem to read each other’s minds and Cash feels the burden of being pragmatic in a fantastic situation. Why hasn’t he foreseen this disaster? He should have come out and got a “sight on it”, prepared the road and wagon for this eventuality. Cash becomes the casualty of the river crossing and ends up unconscious. His eyes from this point on are only occasionally opened as if he cannot behold the increasingly unreasonable actions of his family. His role from this point on is to simply endure all that follows.
Jewel’s eyes are described often as “pale”, “hard”, and “wrong”: “his face and eyes were two colors of wood, the wrong one pale and the wrong one dark.” It makes his eyes appear inhuman like wood, plates, or marbles. Coupled with the intensity of his glares, the shortness and abruptness of this speech, and the quickness of his temper, Jewel is presented as a formidable presence. He seems to have a strong dislike of his family, refusing to ride with them, and often not responding when they speak to him. Yet he is also the one to save Addie again and again--when she falls in the water, and from the fire Darl sets in the barn. He has worked and sacrificed for his horse but ultimately gives it up to buy a team of mules to replace the ones drowned in the fire. Out of all the members of the family, Jewel shows the most dedication for his mother. Indeed, Addie had prophesied this when she said “ He will save me from the water and from the fire. Even though I have laid down my life, he will save me.”
If Jewel acts with blind devotion, Darl is cursed with seeing too much. He can surmise that this trip will ruin his family, that the best thing would be to let Addie go--by water, by fire--than to continue on this trip that will cost Cash his leg, Jewel his horse, and Dewey Dell her dignity. His eyes are described as looking as though the “land dug out of his skull and the holes filled with distance beyond the land”. He seems to float just outside of reality, with an ability to discern what is happening around him without actually being there, such as when he describes the death of Addie while he and Jewel are on the road. Unlike Jewel, whose eyes look wrong, it is Darl’s look that is wrong. He “can’t see eye to eye with most folks”, “It’s like he had got into the inside of you, someway. Like somehow you was looking at yourself and your doings outen his eyes.” It is a heavy load to carry, and although setting fire to the barn was a logical solution to the problem of their journey, his family elects to have him committed--perhaps to keep them out of financial obligations towards the farmer, or perhaps because they cannot stand to see themselves reflected in his discerning eyes.
Dewey Dell, particularly, can not stand to see herself through Darl’s eyes. Somehow Darl has surmised that Dewey Dell is carrying Lafe’s baby. She is determined to solve this problem with a pharmacist in town and Lafe’s money. It is the consequence of a choice made for her by chance--she would only go into the woods with Lafe if her bag were full, and Lafe filled it for her, so she had no choice. While Jewel’s eyes are pale, her’s are dark, but just as hard. She often turns her head and refuses to look at things, her sole purpose driving her on, while she seems to only give a passing regard to what else is going on around her. Her looks are “blank” and “repudiant”, and she herself describes herself as blind to things that happen around her :“I could not see”. Her fear and worry has pin-pointed her focus to her one need, and everything else becomes ancillary to it.
Vardaman’s eyes are described as “round” and “big-eyed”. He is the youngest of the family, and although he sees everything, he often cannot understand the cause and effect. He knows his fish was alive, and now it is dead, and they eat it for supper. He also understands his mother is dead, but cannot understand how she died. Could she also not breathe? Is there a connection between the doctor and her death, for when he came she died. If the doctor leaves now will she live? Throughout the trip, Vardaman becomes a non-judgemental witness to the scenes around him, and only the reader can discern the import of what he sees.
Neighbors and witnesses along the way fill in the gaps, often describing the trip and the players as foolish, obstinate, and queer. People try to help, or to talk them out of their plans, but most go unheeded. As readers we become yet another witness to this tragedy and our judgements and experiences to add yet another layer to the tale.
What Faulkner has done is more than simply describe a funeral trek. By abandoning an omniscient narrator he surrenders an authoritative pronouncement on his characters. The myriad of open eyes looking and seeing from their own point of view, through their own lenses, brings a sort of reflective quality to the picture. We can collect the pieces and fit them together in what we think is the right order, and get a general idea of the overall narrative, but there are still gaps that the reader must fill in with their own knowledge. Ironically, by creating such a multi-faceted look, the picture itself becomes somewhat fragmented and instead of getting a definitive idea of what happened, each piece both fills in gaps and obscures other parts. It is as though Faulkner is pointing out that what we witness is both what happened and what we perceive as having happened. Each look is tainted with each character’s motivations, experiences, and prejudices. The dog-eyed woman may not allow us to close our eyes, but it is clear that there is more than one way to not see what is before us, and that what we think we see may not be what others see.
Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood
