Not Just a Cash Crop: Etymology and Naming in As I Lay Dying

Abstract

FAULKNER SCHOLARS HAVE LONG OBSERVED HIS FONDNESS FOR CHOOSING names, both given and surnames, that fit thematically into his works. He frequently gives his aristocratic families the Scots-Irish surnames that populated the antebellum US South. He often follows the plantation tradition of giving classical or biblical names to enslaved people. In some cases, symbolic significance is obvious (Joe Christmas in Light in August ). In others lie deeply buried jokes (for example, Caroline Compson’s maiden name is Bascomb, a name which arrived in England with the Norman Conquest, as did Compson, and which Jason Senior, at least, likely knows means “a valley filled with thistles and burrs”1). Critics have addressed such diverse aspects of Faulkner’s onomastics as consonance and alliteration (Candace/candle2), biblical allusions (Benjamin Compson, Candace Compson, Abner Snopes3), and literary sources (Jason Compson4). In As I Lay Dying, some of the minor characters bear names with symbolic or historical importance. Cliff Staebler explores the relationship of Vernon Tull to the historical figure of Jethro Tull, who perfected the horse-drawn seed drill and revolutionized tenant farming. Cora’s name denotes her sense that she is unloved by Addie in the resonances of Cora and coral, the stuff of inexpensive jewelry versus the true Jewel. The Bundren’s family name, as many have observed,