Stream of Consciousness in ohh look a bird the Sound and the Fury-ous monster truck

In the first section of The Sound and The Fury, we see the world through the memories of Benjy. Throughout the section, Benjy recounts his memories by stream of consciousness instead of chronological order. Faulkner’s choice of stream of consciousness writing allows for interesting psychological associations to take place within Benjy’s mind. Many of Benjy’s memories are triggered by associations within the memories themselves. Most of these memories are triggered by similarities in events or locations or emotions felt by Benjy.

A good percentage of his memories are triggered by similarities in a central focal point of the memory. In the text, a single significant object or word can be found in both the previous and triggered memory. For example, when T.P. tells Benjy that he “can’t do no good moaning and slobbering through the fence”, it triggers Benjy’s memories of Father interrogating Jason to the cause of the fence being open when Benjy escaped. Benjy’s memory is then turned to the night that he escaped through the gate, another memory association by event.

Benjy also associates certain events with each other. In his mind, certain events and impressions are combined and blurred into a single memory. The most specific blurring of two separate events in Benjy’s mind is his association of grabbing the schoolgirls and struggling to communicate with his memories of his subsequent surgical castration.

He combines the physical and emotional feelings of struggle and helplessness of both events. In both events, Benjy feels as if he cannot speak and he struggles to exhale and cry. In the escape incident, he feels as if he cannot force out the words that he wants to say to the girls. During the surgery, Benjy also struggles to cry out and breathe because of the constricting ether mask on his face. The feeling of helplessness is the common factor of these memories, so the recollection of one memory triggers the other to be recalled and merged with the other.

Benjy also recalls a part of this mixed memory at the end of the section. He mentions the bright shapes while he is going to sleep. In this instance, Benjy is associating his memory of being anesthetized during his operation with the act of falling to sleep.

Stream of consciousness writing is also extensively used in the Quentin section. Faulkner uses in an extreme manner though, intertwining memories and thoughts. The ridiculous lack of punctuation also emphasizes the chaotic nature of the human stream of consciousness. When reading, thoughts may seem completely jumbled and random, yet the content of these memories are related.

Faulkner uses the stream of consciousness method to compare each character’s interpretations and connotations of each specific event brought up in the text. Faulkner uses the same events in both sections of the text to present each character’s differing opinions and interpretations of the events by his or her stream of consciousness. Faulkner also uses many different types of mental associations to present his character’s personality by stressing their values and preferences as presented in their memories. (508)

Missing the Exit

In Joyce Carol Oates’s story, “Where are you going, Where have you been?”, the main character Connie faces a dilemma when she must choose between separating herself from her family remaining close to her most familiar environment. Connie wants to differentiate herself from the ways of her family and become her own individual, but in order to change she has to distance her family environment and her home. In the story, we find Connie struggling to maintain a position in between these two paths. We find her trying to neither forsake her roots and become independent or acknowledge her connection to her family. She must decide whether to break away from tradition and lead a free life or become part of the community and familial infrastructure that raised her.

This dilemma begins with the impossibility to completely reconcile these two paths. To choose a radical, individual life that is not “sanctioned” by the family is to seem ungrateful for the sacrifices that the family has made to raise you in one set of ways. It seems as if you were slandering the way of life of the family and stabbing those responsible for the continuation of that way of life right in the back. If you do not necessarily agree with the family customs, choosing to become a part of the family lifestyle can mean stabbing yourself in the back.

Connie struggles with this dilemma, but is indecisive until the presence of Arnold Friend (devil, dream, stalker or whatever he is) forces her down one path. Connie wants the support system of her home and friends and her conventional life, but she does not want to participate in family activities and makes no attempt to reconcile her differences with those of her family. For example, she makes no attempt to acknowledge her relationship with her sister or mother. She tends toward the path of independence but is too immature to make a commitment to this way of life and instead remains in limbo for too long. In this way, Oates shows hoe independence without the necessary maturity is a bad situation and that the decision to become independent should only be made when one is mature enough to understand the sacrifices of such a choice.

Arnold Friend represents a situation that forces her to choose a path. In this case, she is so far “behind the eight ball” that she can only go down one path. She has lost the power of choice because she has delayed too long and “flirted” with the idea of independence without serious consideration. She has lost her free will because she has denied her family for too long without acknowledging her commitment to the independent path. Arnold Friend is the last resort, and as he puts it where Connie wants to go now has been "cancelled out" and is no longer an option. To abandon the formal altogether, it’s like waiting too long to decide whether or not to get off the freeway. She has tended to continue down the path of independence. She has stayed too long in the right lane. If you miss the exit at first, you can still go across the gore point but this is a difficult thing to do without risking terrible consequences. Perhaps you hit the barrier and lose everything on both paths. If you stall even further, you cannot cross onto the exit without slamming into the concrete wall and dying a horrible death. At this point, you have no reasonable choice but to stay on your given path. Connie has waited too long and passed the gore point. She has no choice but to continue on the path to independent rebellion and follow Arnold Friend. Her indecision ends up making the choice for her.(635)