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Professor Adam Hazlett

English 132

27 February 2005

Vardaman’s Importance in As I Lay Dying

It is said that human beings only have one thing to do in life, die. William Faulkner’s novel, As I Lay Dying, deals with just that issue – death. Death is truly a human ordeal and humans deal with death on a personal and emotional level – to display no emotion or to not take death personally is considered ghoulish. Of the characters in this novel, one, Vardaman Bundren, displays this emotional and personal level of the human grieving process. However, many critics have chosen to ignore the youngest Bundren because they deem him a “Benjy-like idiot or a moronic child,” and so research regarding his importance in the novel is scarce (Rooks 145). Vardaman Bundren is one of the most important characters in As I Lay Dying and is the only character to show human qualities in the grieving process, and so earns the right to be established as the novel’s true human character.

Vardaman’s emotion begins to appear early in the work. Near the end of Anse’s first chapter, the importance that Addie plays in Vardaman’s existence begins to come to light. Vardaman becomes concerned about his mother and asks his father, “Pa…is ma sick some more?” (38). This shows that Vardaman has true compassion and love for his mother. In fact, Faulkner himself states, “it was because of the child’s dependence on his mother, and probably to that child nobody else except his mother paid any attention to him. She was something stable…in his world” (Gwynn 111). The second piece of evidence for Vardaman’s emotional side comes when his father is speaking with Peabody, the doctor. Anse is questioning Peabody on the probability of Addie’s death, but throughout the entire dialogue, Peabody is focused upon Vardaman’s reaction:

He sits on the top step, small, motionless in faded overalls. When he came out he looked up at me, then at Anse. But now he had stopped looking at us. He just sits there. (45)

Vardaman cannot comprehend what is happening and is overcome with emotions and feelings that he cannot control. These feelings come to a climax when Addie finally dies.

Before her death, Addie mounts her last gaze on Vardaman. She stares at the boy and then dies. This section appears in Darl’s chapter, but Darl pays much attention to Vardaman’s reaction; “From behind pa’s leg Vardaman peers, his mouth full open and all color draining from his face into his mouth […] [h]e begins to move slowly backward from the bed, his eyes round, his pale face fading into the dusk like a piece of paper pasted on a failing wall” (49). Vardaman is overwhelmed by the experience of seeing the death of someone he holds so dear. Darl is not present when this happens, as he is sitting in the wagon with Jewel. It is apparent through this fact that Vardaman’s reaction was passed among the family and became a point of interest among the Bundrens in the moment of Addie’s death. But with Darl’s observation, Palliser brings up a good point; “There is no sympathy for the child’s fear and bewilderment, but only an almost scientific interest in the appearance of the symptoms of these emotions” (141). This is true: not one of the other members of the family seem to show the emotional pain that Vardaman displays in his actions or care about the display.

Vardaman’s first section in the novel appears after the scene on the death bed. He begins to struggle with the events that have taken places with his mother. All he knows is that the “change in Addie came with a terrifying swiftness after the doctor’s arrival and examination, and Vardaman reaches the conclusion that the doctor killed her” (Rooks 146). Vardaman is then caught in a whirlwind of emotions with which he does not know how to deal. He takes out his misplaced anger on Peabody’s team, in order to exact a payment for his mother’s death. Bleikasten assert that the reason for this is that his mind is still steeped in emotion and imagination that the other family members seem to lack (98).

Vardaman’s next section continues his struggle with his mother’s death. It is at this moment when he begins to logically compensate for the loss of this loved one. Vardaman believes that his mother “went away when the other one laid down in her bed and drew the quilt up” (66). He refuses to associate his mother with the body in the bed. He doesn’t fully understand where she went, but he knows that she is not there. Vardaman concludes that his mother would not allow herself to be nailed into a coffin:

And so if she lets him [nail her into the coffin] it is not her. I know. I was there. I saw when it did not be her. I saw. They think it is and Cash is going to nail it up.

It was not her because it was laying right yonder in the dirt. And now it’s all chopped up. I chopped it up. It’s laying in the kitchen in the bleeding pan, waiting to be cooked and et. (66)

It is at this time that Vardaman begins to create the image of his mother as a fish. He begins to recall the fish that his father had him chop up. He recognizes that there was a time when the fish went from being a fish, to being a not-fish. He begins to equate this with his mother; there was a time when she was and now she is not. He articulates this with, “Then it wasn’t and she was, and now it is and she wasn’t” (67). Vardaman’s chiastic description begins to define, for himself, his idea of death. Now that he had begun to understand and establish analogies to aid his understanding, Vardaman set out for the only person he believed might understand him, Vernon Tull.

Vernon, Cora and Vardaman arrive back at the Bundren house but it is interesting to note that not one of the Bundrens show concern for Vardaman’s absence or his whereabouts. Throughout that night, Vardaman is troubled by the body in the bedroom and continually opens the window so that wind can blow in on the body (Rooks 147-8). However, after opening the window a third time, the Bundrens become angered at the boy’s persistence and nail Addie into her coffin. It is at this moment, Vardaman becomes, what Degenfelder refers to as, Addie’s “quasi-savior” by boring holes into the coffin (76). After the holes that Vardaman bores are plugged up, he concludes that the body cannot be his mother because she would not allow a thing like that to happen. Thus he states, “my mother is a fish” (84).

Turner states that this response “exemplifies...regeneration and guileless expectations” (66). This means that the response is a way that Vardaman parallels his mother to the fish so that her spirit and memory will not die. He refuses to believe his mother is the body in the box. He would rather believe that she is an animal. Vardaman becomes enraged when he learns that Cora is cooking the fish, the one he butchered, but later is requited when Dewey Dell informs him of another fish out in the slough. Vardaman’s whole demeanor shifts when he realizes that there is another fish and this shift is documented by Vernon Tull. Tull describes Vardaman’s eyes as “round and calm” (92). Vardaman finds pacification in his idea that his mother can be regenerated in any fish.

It is at this point in the novel that another thing begins to take place – Vardaman’s character becomes more important with his equation to Darl, the protagonist. Darl is an important factor in establishing Vardaman’s importance in the novel. Vardaman is allotted ten chapters within the book, whereas Darl is the only character to have more chapters (nineteen). But the comparison of the two goes deeper than mere quantity of sections or the fact of the juxtaposition of seven chapters narrated by the two characters which takes up twenty-seven pages. The comparison can be found in the section in which Darl and Vardaman are talking about Addie’s death. Darl begins the conversation, “Jewel’s mother is a horse” (101). Rooks claims this to be a Vardaman-like statement (149). The conversation continues:

“Then mine can be a fish, cant it, Darl?” I said. Jewel is my brother.

“Then mine will have to be a horse, too,” I said.

“Why?” Darl said. “If pa is your pa, why does your ma have to be a horse just because Jewel’s is?” (101)

This shows Vardaman that, because there was no contradiction, his assertion that his mother is a fish must be correct. It is also important to note that Darl is the first person to speak with Vardaman on the subject of Addie’s death.

Vardaman’s emotional side continues to be prevalent in the section in which the coffin falls into the river. At the moment his mother’s coffin fell into the water, Vardaman makes the comparison of Addie to a fish reality. Vardaman actually begins to believe, at that time of extreme emotional stress, that his mother is going to swim out of the bored holes, the holes that he created. Thus he is the savior and the cause of her disappearance. His language reflects his stress and the punctuation that appeared in his previous sections disappears. The section contains 360 words but no punctuation. This is done to show the anguish and anxiety that Vardaman was feeling at the site of the coffin falling into the water. After Darl comes out of the water without her, Vardaman’s language appears italicized – again, to show the emphasis of emotion; “he’s got to have her go so I can bear it” (Ross 44). It is when Vardaman states, “you never got her…you never got her” (151), that he realizes his mother is gone for good. The way that Vardaman reacts to Darl not getting his mother strengthens the parallel between them. Vardaman is angered and attacked Cora for cooking the fish and Peabody’s team when he though that Peabody was the one who killed his mother, but he does not become angered and attack Darl, even though Darl is clearly at fault (unlike Cora). This also shows, beyond the parallel, the compassion that Vardaman has learned throughout the ordeal.

The final section, in which Vardaman’s struggle with his mother’s death is finally laid to rest, takes places under the moonlight by the apple tree. Darl has Vardaman come with him over to their mother’s coffin. Darl instructs Vardaman to listen:

“Hear?” Darl says. “Put your ear close”

I put my ear close and I can hear her. Only I cant tell what she is saying. (214)

Darl informs Vardaman that their mother is “talking to God” and that she is calling on Him to “help her” (214). Vardaman insists on knowing what his mother wants God to do. At this, Darl simply replies, “She wants Him to hide her ways from the sight of man” (215). Vardaman again, like the child that he is, asks “why.” Darl replies, “So she can lay down her life” (215). But when his brother begins to question him again, Darl instructs him to listen.

“Listen,” Darl says. We hear her. We hear her turn over on her side. “Listen,” Darl says.

“She’s turned over,” I say. “She’s looking at me through the wood.”

“Yes,” Darl says.

“How can she see through the wood, Darl?”

“Come,” Darl says. “We must let her be quiet. Come”

“She cant see out there, because the holes are in the top,” I say. “How can she see Darl?” (215)

It is here when Vardaman realizes that his mother is actually in the box. He is instructed, by Darl, to hear his mother. But it was he and he alone that went a step beyond and actually saw the women in the box. This is when Vardaman’s emotions come full circle and he understands that act of death. He understands that his mother is not a fish and that she will not be seen in the next river. It is after this incident that the comparison Vardaman has been using throughout the book – “My mother is a fish” – is no longer seen. It appears no longer within the pages of this novel. Vardaman has coped with his mother’s death.

Vardaman’s emotional journey and pilgrimage through grieving has proved him to be human. Compassion, Anguish, Anxiety, Love, Anger – all these emotions, and more, appear throughout Vardaman Bundren’s sections. These emotions are at the base of everything that is human. Vardaman shows his depth and his many dimensions through his human emotions. Vardaman, unlike the others in his family, proves himself to deal with death on a deep personal and emotional level. He proves himself to be an important character. He displays his human qualities and emotions when others do not. He displays his truth and honesty in these emotions. Vardaman Bundren is undoubtedly one of the most important characters in As I Lay Dying and is the only character to show human qualities in his grieving process and earn the right to be established as the novel’s true human character.

Works Cited

Bleikasten, Andre. Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying. Trans. By Roger Little. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1973. 98.

Degenfelder, E. Pauline. “Yoknapatawphan Baroque: A Stylistic Analysis of As I Lay Dying.” William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying: A Critical Casebook. Ed. Dianne L. Cox. New York: Garland Publishing, 1985. 63-94.

Faulkner, William. As I Lay Dying. New York: Vintage International Press, 1990.

Gwynn, Frederick and Joseph Blonter, eds. Faulkner in the University. New York: Vintage Press, 1965. 111.

Palliser, Charles. “Fate and Madness: The Determinist Vision of Darl Bundren.” William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying: A Critical Casebook. Ed. Dianne L. Cox. New York: Garland Publishing, 1985. 131-144.

Rooks, George. “Vardaman’s Journey in As I Lay Dying.” William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying: A Critical Casebook. Ed. Dianne L. Cox. New York: Garland Publishing, 1985. 145-158.

Rosky, William. “As I Lay Dying: The Insane World.” William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying: A Critical Casebook. Ed. Dianne L. Cox. New York: Garland Publishing, 1985. 179-188.

Turner, Dixie M. A Jungian Psychoanalytic Interpretation of William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying. Washington D.C.: U. Press of America, 1981. 61-70.