There is no mistake that Christmas is a character modeled after Christ. Faulkner presents many aspects of characterization to prove it, however there is something that I noticed from looking at Christmas to other Christ figures.
The famous thing with Christmas, and also Simon of Lord of the Flies (William Golding), is that they represent Jesus majorly through crucifixion, but not completely.
Both involve gruesome impalement, and the die for a purpose.
Though then that's the end of their rein. They die with hardly (if any) resolution to the problem they where created to address. The story of Jesus Christ is meant to show that universal belief that good will overcome evil.
However, with Christmas and Simon, it's a tragedy with little comfort towards what tortured them.
Why do you think Faulkner chose to use Christ, one of the world's most sacred figures, to be this troubled Christmas, and to die with a world that will never hear the complete story of his life?
I never made the connection that Christmas was a Christ like figure. I can not see how he could be considered Christ like.
ReplyDeleteTo me, a Christ like figure is innocent. He willingly makes a sacrifice for something he did not do in order to fix a cause.
I don't see Christmas ever doing either of these things. His killing wasn't a sacrifice because he did commit the murder and his death didn't fix anything. So I don't see how he could be considered a Christ like figure.
Maybe its the fact that unjust measures were taken to punish him because he wan't white.
ReplyDeleteI think that Faulkner used Christmas as a troubled embodiment of Christ as a means to gain sympathy for his character. Christmas had done such awful things such as rape, steal, and kill throughout the novel that readers would have no reason to have apathy for his character unless he was shed in such a light that would make him seem like a sacrifice.
ReplyDeleteSierra,
ReplyDeleteDo you mean empathy?
I see his being a sacrifice to appease the mob's need for justice, even though there is no evidence that he actually committed the crime. Faulkner purposely omitted the scene where Ms. Burden dies so that we could mirror society's mentality, and that is to jump to the conclusion that it must be Christmas that did it. Society needs someone to blame--so it's Christmas. Like Christ was innocent and killed, it very well could be that Christmas was also wrongly accused and then killed for the sake of the people's need for vengeance.