论文总字数：43218字

摘 要

1. Introduction 1

1.1 About the author 1

1.2 About the work 1

2. Literature review 2

2.1 Foreign research status 2

2.2 Domestic research status 2

2.3 Purpose of writing 3

3. Abnormal Family Values Embodied in As I Lay Dying 5

3.1 Family values based on Marxism 5

3.2 Anse --- the selfish father 6

3.2.1 A stubborn poor peasant 6

3.2.2 A negligible husband 7

3.2.3 An incompetent father with good fortune 8

3.2.4 Anse---One of the builders of abnormal family values 8

3.3 Addie-- the rebellious mother 9

3.3.1 An extremely lonely outlier 10

3.3.2 A rebellious mother and wife 10

3.3.3 A nihilist with no devout faith 12

3.3.4 Addie---the other builder of abnormal family values 12

4. Children of the Bundrens' --- The Victim of Abnormal Family Values 14

4.1 Cash--- a dull working machine 14

4.2 Darl--- a lunatic with the soul of a poet 15

4.3 Jewel--- an irritable outlier 16

4.4 Dewey Dell--- the next incompetent mother 17

5. Conclusion 19

References 20

Acknowledgments

In a blink of an eye, a four-year college life full of tension and meaning is about to come to an end. As I approach the completion of my dissertation, I would like to take this opportunity to express my sincerest gratitude to all those who have supported, helped and encouraged me throughout this period.

First of all, I would like to express my heartfelt gratitude to my supervisor, Prof. Zhu Li for her rigorous and effective supervision and a great help. From the writing of this paper to the final draft, Prof. Zhu Li has given me careful guidance and help, professional revision and suggestions, so that my graduation thesis can be completed smoothly.

Secondly, I am indebted to all the teachers of the Foreign Language Institute for I have acquired professional knowledge and mastered solid professional skills on account of their careful instruction. At the same time, I also feel grateful for my classmates who encourage mutually during the four years. It is valuable that we always have a good living environment and a positive learning atmosphere in the collaborative efforts of us.

Finally, I would like to thank my family for their constant care and support, without which this thesis would never have been finished. Moreover, during the long time I spent at home caused by the novel epidemic this year, I had a chance to communicate with my family, which helped me think more deeply about my thesis writing, especially in terms of family values. In the future work and life, I will bear in mind teachers’ instruction, and continue to work tirelessly and wish to repay all these support and help!

Abstract

As one of the significant saga novels in William Faulkner’s well-known "Yoknapatawpha County Lineage", As I Lay Dying tells the story of a poor white southern family the Bundrens trying to return the body of their mistress, Addie, to her hometown for burial. The journey full of ordeals reveals the tragic consequence of the family without love and normal family values. Selfish father and rebellious mother lacking the support of traditional values and spirits cannot correctly recognize and integrate the role of parents in the traditional sense, still less can they construct the upright family values for their children, so that the whole family is on the brink of constant disintegration. Many scholars blame the divisive and evil behaviors of family members for distortion and despicability of human nature, while few of them analyze the role characteristics of each family member from the perspective of family values. Based on the basic viewpoint of Marxism about family, this paper makes an in-depth study of the reasons for the abnormal family values of the Bundrens' family, thus reveals the profound influence of the alienation role positioning of family members on the construction of family values, and finally analyzes the indelible influence as well as injury to the Bundrens' children caused by the abnormal family values of the original family.

Key words: family values; alienation; role positioning; As I Lay Dying

中文摘要

《我弥留之际》作为威廉·福克纳“约克纳帕塔法世系”中的家族小说之一，讲述了美国南方穷苦白人本德仑一家为将女主人艾迪的遗体送回家乡安葬而经历的一段艰险旅程。这段险象迭生的送葬路程展现出这个没有爱，拥有异化家庭观的家庭的悲剧性。自私的父亲和反叛的母亲缺乏传统价值观精神的支撑，无法正确认知并融入传统意义上的父母角色，更无法为孩子构建正确的家庭价值观念，从而使整个家庭处在不断分化破裂的边缘。众多学者将家庭成员展现出的分裂与恶行归咎于人性的扭曲和卑劣，而鲜有人从家庭价值观入手剖析家庭各成员的角色特性。本文将基于马克思家庭观的基本观点，对本德仑一家家庭价值观的异化原因进行深入探究，揭示家庭成员角色定位的异化对家庭价值观构建的深刻影响，并剖析这种原生家庭的异化家庭观对本德仑一家的孩子们造成的影响与伤害。

关键词：家庭价值观；异化；角色定位；《我弥留之际》

1. Introduction

1.1 About the author

William Cuthbert Faulkner is one of the representative figures among the American Southern writers who had made outstanding contributions to contemporary American literature. Though Faulkner wrote various types of literary genre all his life such as novels, screenplays, poetry and essays and so on, he is primarily famous for his “Yoknapatawpha saga”—novels and short stories set in the fictional Yoknapatawpha County. Faulkner’s works always leave readers an impression of complication and unintelligibility for the utilization of complicated writing techniques as well as the frequent change of the writing style. William Faulkner's creative use of stream-of-consciousness and multiple-perspective narrative enriches the temporal and spatial expression pattern of the novel, bringing to the reader an innovative reading experience.

1.2 About the work

As I Lay Dying, a novel published in 1930, was finished by Faulkner within 47 days without changing one word of it. Faulkner once acclaimed it was “easier to read and the most interesting one” (Meriwether amp; Millgate, 1968:53). Although Faulkner himself greatly stressed the significance of this novel, the publication of it brought more negative criticism than active appreciation at the beginning. Some claims it is “one of Faulkner’s most complex and enigmatic novels” (Bakker amp; Wilkinson, 1980:57). Julia K. Wetherill criticizes characters in As I Lay Dying as “contemptible white trash.” To be sure, Faulkner’s particular writing style and complex means of expression not only became a kind of unique advantage but also to some extent hindered the extensive study of his works. In As I Lay Dying, the Bundrens’ experiences show the tragedy of the family devoid of love and traditional family values.

2. Literature review

2.1 Foreign research status

Up to now, all the research abroad about As I Lay Dying can be split into the following perspectives: characters, writing techniques, theme, genre and research from certain literary theory. The much-discussed themes of As I Lay Dying in the literary circle often focus on the degeneration of South American values, human weakness, life and death, family conflicts and so on. However, there is one point to notice that the Bundrens, as the center of the whole story, attracts the attention of most critics for the theme of family. David Minter considers As I Lay Dying as a story of unqualified parents and their injured children (1981). Wadlington holds that the family disruption was caused by those hidden family secrets (1992).

Critics lay emphasis on the analysis of individual characters as well. In As I Lay Dying, by way of multiple narrative perspectives, Faulkner depicted multiple characters by their own narrative and mental activity providing readers diverse perspectives of analysis. Simon points out that the tragic fate of Darl results from his inadequate parents. Harold Hellwig declares that “despite her ignorance and vulnerability, Dewey Dell insinuates signs—divergent from those offered by Addie—of patriarchy and traditional female gender roles” (2010: 200). All in all, although many scholars agree that the tragic consequences of Darl and his siblings and the alienation of the family are all caused by inept parents and family environment, very few of them have a deeper research of the root cause of alienation from the perspective of family values.

2.2 Domestic research status

On account of the limited political and social environment, the systematic study of Faulkner started at a comparatively later time in China. In the 1930s, some researchers like Lin Changyan first introduced Faulkner to China, however, Faulkner’s multitudinous works were hardly known by the public for they are devoid of systematic translation and research until 1980s. The first Chinese translation version of As I Lay Dying was finished by Li Wenjun in 1988. Since then, a growing number of scholars kept their eyes open on the study of As I Lay Dying. Similarly, domestic research of As I Lay Dying generally concentrates on the following aspects: theme, characterization, writing techniques and so on.

With the development of literary theories, people constantly make efforts to analyze all aspects of As I Lay Dying based on a series of literary theories and strategies. For instance, Feng Jiqing introduces the binary opposition principle in the story between the two images “life” and “death”; Li Dong makes use of archetypal critical theory to explicate the subject and Biblical images of the novel (2016); some scholars choose to interpret the deep relations between characters and nature based on the alienation theory.

Given that this novel was jointly performed by the narrative of fifteen narrators, there is no distinct protagonist. The utilization of multiple narrative perspectives provides scholars with a wider study view of distinct characters from multiple point of penetration. Among all the relevant studies, those articles that involve the relationship between the tragic endings of Darl and the lack of maternal love share the larger proportion. Feng Lili (2010) in her article makes use of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs to find out the underlying cause of Darl’s insanity. Besides, some critics interpret Addie’s struggle based on the theories of existentialism as well as feminism. As a female, Addie was “a victim of patriarchy; a marginalized outsider of the society; a lost woman devoid of self-awareness” (Zhou, 2012: 189). All these show the alienation and separation among the role of family members.

2.3 Purpose of writing

To sum up, an inevitable achievement of the studies of As I Lay Dying at home and abroad is obtained, which is worthy of recognition. Scholars endeavor to explicate and analyze the novel from multiple perspectives. Comparatively speaking, domestic studies about this work still lag behind comparing with foreign countries both in content and breadth. Although there are a few articles concerning the topic of alienation, they mainly focus on the alienation between people and people, people and society or people and God. Rarely do scholars study further for the underlying reasons for the alienation of the Bundrens from the perspective of family values.

On the one hand, this thesis interprets the text and the characters of the novel from a different perspective. On the other hand, the Bundrens' family is not alone in its division and predicament. In daily life, there are still families constantly constructing alienated family values, which will inevitably exert a negative impact on the family and the upbringing of future generations. This paper anatomizes the roles played by family members through the interpretation of the Bundrens' abnormal family values, which also can serve as a meaningful reminder and warning to the modern family. Therefore, this thesis intends to figure out the underlying causes for the abnormal family values of the Bundrens’ family by analyzing the abnormal role positioning of family members under the mainstream cultural values as well as having an insight into the irreversible mental injury of the Bundrens' children.

3. Abnormal Family Values Embodied in As I Lay Dying

3.1 Family values based on Marxism

The majority of literary work is a reflection of parts of the real world around us in a different historical period. Human is a unique creature, existing with sociality as his essential attribute. Therefore, family, as the basic unit of the society, always exists as an epitome of a particular history of the society or nationality as well as the direct witness and sufferer of social change. The so-called "family values", that is, people's views, attitudes or beliefs about family affairs and the way family members treat each other and the outside world. The Marxist view of marriage and family expounds the relationships among love, marriage and family. The main viewpoints are as follows: it’s believed that love and marriage are the basis of family; it is parents' duty to educate and cultivate children; and family members’ relations should be equal and harmonious (Chen, 2013: 24-28). A civilized and harmonious family needs the joint efforts of each family member, which means that parents should be responsible for the development of their children, and family members should be harmonious and take the initiative to assume family responsibilities. From ancient times to the present, the Chinese people always make account of the construction of family values, and many families are proud to pass down good family education values and family tradition to the younger generation. The Bundrens in this book, however, does not form correct family values of a harmonious family.

The Bundrens encounters a huge upheaval of the family because of the hostess Addie's death. The funeral journey which is regarded by Addie as revenge shows the tragedy of the family devoid of love and traditional family values. The plight of the Bundrens reflects the living conditions and moral dilemma of the poor white people in the America South, which can be considered as an epitome of the south in a specific era. Alienation of family roles and family values implies the disappearance of traditional America's spirit and values. The alienation of family values in As I Lay Dying is mainly reflected in abnormal role positioning of family members. In the Bundrens’ family, the father and mother were the constructors of the alienated family values, and the children were the direct victims of that kind of alienated family values. This thesis intends to interpret the constructor role of parents in this divided family by dissecting the personal character traits and the sense of personal identification among family members, and further analyzing the indelible injury stem from the entire alienated family values that exert a strong passive influence on the Bundrens’ children unconsciously.

3.2 Anse --- the selfish father

The American South is a place full of mystery with distinctive cultural norms as its feature. However, the sudden outbreak of the American Civil War put the system and spiritual beliefs on which the people of the South had depended for their survival on the brink of collapse. In addition, the invasion of northern capitalism accelerated the process of modernization in the south, which caused a very strong conflict between new social changes and the old dregs of the traditional concepts. In this social context, the image of Anse as a poor white man is typified.

3.2.1 A stubborn poor peasant

As a farmer, Anse was a watchman of the stagnant rural life, clinging to the old ways of life, refusing to accept new things caused by social change, and even blaming the misfortunes that occurred on the road before his door. His nature is stubborn and rigid, refusing to accept the help of others, and constantly stressed that he did not want to owe anyone. "I wouldn't be beholden, God knows" (Faulkner, 111). To some extent, as an individual, he is also the victim of poverty, which makes the selfishness of him seems a kind of human nature.

Pa's feet are badly splayed, his toes cramped and bent and warped, with no toenail at all on his little toes, from working so hard in the wet in homemade shoes when he was a boy (Faulkner, 5).

However, as the master of a poor white family, Anse is definitely not a good father or husband.

3.2.2 A negligible husband

Anse was a very mean person, particularly selfish and insensitive, neglecting his role as a husband, and to some extent morally deficient. He was also a failure in his marriage, with almost none affection for his wife. Addie resented him until her death. In the eyes of others, he was selfish, lazy and idle, and Doctor Peabody thought that his presence was a kind of torment to Addie. He did not marry Addie out of love, but because he needed a woman to keep house and raise children for him.

While revealing his selfish nature in his actions, Anse often disguised himself with words to show his understanding and respect for his wife when he communicated with others, which like a kind of self-persuasion.

It's for her, pa said. It's for her sake I am taking the food. I got no team, no nothing. But she will be grateful to ere a one of you (Faulkner, 98).

After the death of his wife, what he thought is that he could save the medical fee to buy his own dentures. According to him, he lived a normal life and supported a large family, in which case, he had fulfilled his task of shouldering responsibility. In fact, he always used some mendacious words to whitewash his real intention, using the dead Addie as an excuse to pretend to be poor in front of the children in order to meet his personal desire. He also utilized various excuses to escape his responsibility to the family. Anse's selfishness and indifference led to the increasingly deterioration of the spousal relationship, which was not founded on love at the first place. Even though he had turned into a lifeless symbol in the eyes of Addie, Anse still acted the same way, not caring about his wife's empty inner world or even her physical condition. Such behaviors undoubtedly exacerbated the formation of the alienated family values.

3.2.3 An incompetent father with good fortune

There is no denying that Anse was not a competent father. As a father, he is supposed to give more paternal love to his own children after his wife died, but he only considered his own interests. He declared for more children from Addie so that they could share the work with him. As a father, he had no credibility with his children and never taught and cared for them. He was, so to speak, a total egotist, not caring about everything except what was related to his interest. He sold Jewel's beloved horse on his own initiative; obstinately refuse to let the family accept the kindness of others; and forcibly took the money that Dewey Dell was going to use for an abortion. Throughout the funeral journey, he showed no sign of the leadership of a father and declined to take actions but only spoke verbally.

What’s more, Anse was well aware of the emotional gap between him and the children as well as Addie and the children, but he did not aim to improve the situation, just looked on coldly. For Anse, his indifferent and athymia were perhaps caused by the hardship of life and the poverty of his family. Therefore, he could not act as an upright father. Neither could he build a normal and harmonious family relationship, which led to the alienation of family values. Finally, he faced the tragic consequences of the collapse and breakdown of the fragile family relationship in the process of the journey. Even so, he did not care for it at all. Ironically, at the end of the novel, Anse was the only one who got what he wanted. Cash broke his leg; Darl was sent to an insane asylum; Jewel had lost her beloved horse; Dewey Dell was molested after a failed abortion; Vardaman didn't get the little train he wanted. But Anse installed a pair of false teeth, get a phonograph, show himself in front of the children with a new look, and has a new wife.

3.2.4 Anse---One of the builders of abnormal family values

Father is supposed to be the role models of children who can help children develop positive values. However, in the case of the Bundrens, Anse, was so selfish and indifferent that he had lost his consciousness of being a father or a husband. His words and deeds had an imperceptible influence on the children all the time, which made it difficult for the children to learn positive lessons and develop upright values. Because of Anse who is devoid of almost all virtues, the relationship between Addie and him deteriorated, and the father-children relationship is disconnected (He, 2018). Therefore, in such a family where money and interest were more important than family ties, the original family bonds had become vulnerable in the face of personal interests. The whole family was shrouded in the crisis of social isolation and mutual distrust, for everyone rejected the approach and kindness of others. This led to constant alienation of family relations. As it were, Anse was the major builder of abnormal family values.

3.3 Addie-- the rebellious mother

The Civil War ended the slavery in the plantation and also negated the traditional values of the south based on that economy. Since then, the American South had been in the economic colonization of the North for a long time, so the southern farmers were in a long period of depression. At the same time, southern society believed in the superiority of male and white people. Women were regarded as the embodiment of all the virtues such as self-sacrifice, chastity and the representatives of family honor and social prestige. Women, on the other hand, were seen as a source of trouble and evil (Zhu, 2003). It can be said that women under this kind of social mainstream values are always put in the position of selfless dedicator. Meanwhile, the stigmatization of women ran so deep that it is difficult for them to shed it. With such passive brand engraved in their heart, it is difficult for women to become the dominant power in the family. Addie was a rural woman in the American south in this context, while she had a unique personality that set her apart from other servile characters.

Although there is only one chapter of monologue, Addie is undoubtedly one of the core characters in this book. In traditional families, the father is often the breadwinner, supporting the entire family, while the mother is usually more connected to the child. Among all family members, the mother is the bond of the whole family, the core figure of the family culture and family value and the guarantee of the family's felicity. Mother is not only the participant of husband-wife relationship, but also plays the vital role in parent-child relationship.

Since a mother always plays an indispensable role in the family, Addie affected every family member, leaving a lasting impact on the children even after her death. However, Addie was not a traditional mother or wife because we could perceive a strong sense of rebellion through her behaviors, thoughts and personality. At the same time, this sense of rebellion made it difficult for her to be a really good mother. This had led to the alienation of the role of the mother in family life, which stroke the children's spiritual growth and further aggravated the alienation of family values.

3.3.1 An extremely lonely outlier

Influenced by her father's nihilism, Addie always shut herself off and refused to trust everyone, suffering from loneliness continually. She used to be a teacher of primary school, but she never loved her students and even hated them. Addie had a unique understanding of words so that she did not believe in the traditional meaning of the words people used in daily life. Words were abstract symbols in her eyes. She completely negated the value and function of words, which is the embodiment of her nihilism thoughts, leading to her inability to communicate with people normally and the extreme loneliness.

For Addie, words were powerless, so she chose to take actions to rebel against the constraints of her life, to get rid of the emptiness of her life, even if the consequences of such actions were sinful. She felt totally disappointed about Anse in that he asked for more children ignoring her will. She tried to break away from the disappointment of marriage by cheating with priest Whitfield, but he left her alone to bear the outcome--Jewel. It was another blow for Addie.

3.3.2 A rebellious mother and wife

With a strong will to get rid of loneliness and seek spiritual sustainment, Addie accepted Anse not for love but for the need of reality. When perceiving the failure of her marriage, Addie began to resent her husband and the suffering of childbirth brought by Anse. She hated Anse because he treated her as a means of procreation but never really took action to get to know her or care for her. Instead of bringing her peace of mind and satisfaction, Anse gave her the pain of giving birth again and again.

There is distinctly that Addie’s positive identity as a mother to and role model for her children is denied (Hewson，2000). She had no sense of identity as a mother, because she saw her children not as the product of love, but as the result of marriage, the obligations that a woman was expected to bear in silence. She did not want to succumb to procreation, so she merely put her own feelings on the illegitimate child Jewel. Although Addie gave birth to five children, she did not give them selfless maternal love in that children are seen as a kind of invasion of her life and retribution of marriage for her. "My aloneness had to be violated over and over each day, but that it had never been violated until Cash came" (Faulkner, 92). Under these circumstances, the children of the Bundrens’, who were not born with love, inevitably faced the plight of the lack of maternal love and personality distortion.

In effect, Addie showed scarce motherhood to Jewel with a complex feeling. However, this kind of unfair motherhood had resulted in the jealous between siblings and the stronger misery in her heart. "And I knew that she was hating herself for that deceit and hating Jewel because she had to love him so that she had to act the deceit” (Faulkner, 67). On the one hand, she cared for Jewel and regarded him as her savior. On the other hand, however, she was ambivalent and suffered from her own favoritism. What's more, this rare mothering for other children is not a rare honor for Jewel, which did not let him learn to respect and love his mother. Anse thought Jewel had neither the least affection nor the least tenderness for Addie. It was another blow for Addie, who was constantly torn between the guilt of the unfair preference and an inner instinct she could not control.

3.3.3 A nihilist with no devout faith

Addie also showed her particularity in terms of faith compared with other women in the novel, especially her neighbor Cora. Cola, Addie's neighbor who was deeply influenced by Christianism, believed in God and believed that women must open their hearts to God and accept his gift, whether children or suffering. Nevertheless, Addie didn't trust God heart and soul for she thought God also has guilt and did not believe prayer is effective. Addie's behavior revealed the color of feminism, but her empty inner world had become even more lonely and empty on account of the lack of faith. She was unable to share her inner world with other Christian women and couldn’t be understood by others. By contrast, Cola, who was deeply religious, lived a very different life from Addie. Cola saw both marriage and children as a blessing, and found comfort and happiness in her husband's comfort, decency as well as love and respect of her children. Cola was buoyed up by her devout faith, which kept her away from confusion or fear. All these are in stark contrast to the Bundrens’ family. Without a strong faith or a loved family to trust and respect, Addie suffered constant loneliness and eventually died of illness after toil half her lifetime.

3.3.4 Addie---the other builder of abnormal family values

Since Addie's self-awareness was worn away gradually in the process of repeated childbirth, she was unable to establish normal relationships with others. At the same time, she could not gain the self-worth through her marriage, children or infidelity. Therefore, after the completion of her duty of childbirth, Addie's spirit had been in a state of dying. Living in a secluded circle of self-isolation, Addie was devoid of other's understanding even after her death. In the eyes of her neighbors and Anse, however, she was a virtuous woman who was able to do great housework and raise children. In a male-centered society, Addie's self-consciousness and inner loneliness was ignored, which put her on the status of a marginal person.

Since the emptiness and loneliness of her heart stayed with her all the time, Addie couldn't find her own meaning in reality all over her life. Nihilism's thoughts stuck Addie in her own world, making it difficult for her to communicate with others, to express her feelings or be understood. Nevertheless, her inner rebel consciousness pushed her to struggle unceasingly, trying to break through the secular cage and to find her own significance of existence. In this state, Addie can’t really integrate into the role of a mother in the family, thus ignoring the care and education of the children, and become another constructor of the alienated family values.

4. Children of the Bundrens' --- The Victim of Abnormal Family Values

Living in a family without maternal love, full of indifference and devoid of positive family values, the Bundrens' children did not share the traditional moral values like respecting the aged and cherish the young or showing love and respect between siblings. Alienated family environment brought them spiritual damage and warped their disposition (Wang, 2018). Everyone kept secret and declined to open up to other family members. The influence of abnormal family values on the children was firstly reflected in the alienation image of mother in their hearts: Cash's casket; Jewel's horse; Vardaman's fish. Due to the fact that the desire of maternal love can’t be satisfied in the real life, these children transferred their emotions to some specific things (Wang, 2004). What's more, there was no emotional connection between parents and children in this divided family. Their vision is limited to their own world. Therefore, these children was not only can't figure out what love is, but also didn't know how to love others. Since parents' personalities and behaviors affect their children all the time, we can see traces of Anse and Addie from the children of the Bundrens. Growing up in a family with an abnormal family values shaped by a selfish father and rebellious mother, Children of the Bundrens' fail to establish strong emotional bonds and also display many inherited defects in character, while the best parts of their nature which is neglected by anyone gradually fade away. To some extent, all these children were the victims of the original family's alienation family view.

4.1 Cash--- a dull working machine

This alienated family values turned Cash, the eldest son, into an unconscious, callous working machine who indulged himself in woodworking. Though he knew he was the big brother, he failed to take on the responsibility. "I feel kin to them, all right, but I don't know” (Faulkner, 126). At the end of his mother's life, he simply buried himself in the build of the coffin, focusing on finishing a perfect wood work instead of comforting his brother and sister like an older brother, and even drilled a hole on Addie's face. Like his father Anse, Cash had no particular sense of family, so although he shared his brother's work on his own initiative, he was hollow inside. For instance, he shared no sense of suffering or objection when his younger brother Darl was forcibly taken away to the insane asylum. He did not know how to express his feelings, but only to put his feelings on the continuous woodworking, which is a way to prove his value and also an emotional catharsis.

4.2 Darl--- a lunatic with the soul of a poet

Darl was a solitary soul that was out of step with the world. As the principal narrator of this novel, Darl was the pivot and promoter of the plot. Although Darl is an uneducated peasant, his descriptive language is so abstract and aesthetic, which is called as stylistic distortion (Delville, 1994). As far as I am concerned, however, Darl was an insightful observer of this alienated family, a sensitive and observant man full of imagination which saw the world in a unique way and spoke poetically. He observed each family member in daily life, especially Jewel, and at the same time gained an insight into the hidden secrets of family members. Darl not only saw the world with a poetic eye, but was also engaged in philosophical thinking about the meaning of human existence.

How do our lives ravel out into the no-wind, no-sound, the weary gestures wearily recapitulant: echoes of old compulsions with no-hand on no-strings: in sunset we fall into furious attitudes, dead gestures of dolls (Faulkner, 111).

Feeling no maternal love from Addie, he refused to admit Addie is his mother, and was deeply jealous of Jewel who enjoyed Addie's care and love alone. Recognize that they would miss the moment Addie on her deathbed, he still urged Anse to let him and Jewel to haul wood, which can be seen as a kind of retaliation for Addie in that Jewel was the one she deeply wanted to see in her dying. Sometimes he felt lonely and distressed, not knowing how to prove his existence. For this strong sense of loneliness and loss brought about the trauma of his spirit, he was eccentric and was considered as mentally ill in the eyes of others. In fact, people hated him because they were afraid of the look in his eyes that seemed to see through everything.

Along the way, Darl witnessed the devastation and division of his family. In an unsuccessful attempt to stop it, he tried to discontinue the journey by setting fire to Addie's coffin. Eventually he was betrayed by his family and was carried to a train to the insane asylum where he laughed wildly, while he was already in a state of schizophrenia, mocking himself and his family whose spirit had long since broken up from another person's point of view.

Throughout the novel, Darl seems to be the rare "normal" person in the Bundrens' family. He knew that Addie was partial to Jewel, jealous of her unfair maternal love and act against her. What’s more, he was equally aware of Addie's struggles and pain. Instead of living his life as his father did, he pondered his own existence, trying to help the family breaking away from its increasingly divided situation, and calmly offered advice. However, Darl was seen as an outlier by the neighbors, and eventually a madman by his own family, facing the tragic end of mental dissociation. In my opinion, the alienated family values are the culprit of the tragic upshot. It is distinctly that Darl was misunderstood by the divided family, and that other people were unwilling to accept the consequences, which was detrimental to their own interests, so Darl ultimately became a victim of the alienated family values, descending to the miserable state of spiritual damage.

4.3 Jewel--- an irritable outlier

Jewel was a self-centered person just like Anse. With the problem of communication barriers, it was hard for him to communicate with anyone normally except with his family. He did not know how to express his feelings or control his emotions, which led to his bad temper. He often spoke with dirty words and used silence to cover his emotional fluctuations and anxiety. Jewel was not the only child of the alienated Bundrens' family, but his existence was different from other children. Neighbor Cola said he “didn't love anyone or care about anything other than finding ways to make a profit with the least amount of effort” (Faulkner, 10). Addie had always had an ambivalent attitude toward Jewel, which she loved him instinctively but also often beat him. Dewey Dell said Jewel had no interest in his family and had no kinship with them.

On the other hand, however, Jewel was exceedingly fond of his horse, feeding it plenty of fodder and combing its horsehair carefully though the horse was very violent and often kicked him. Jewel was also not entirely indifferent: he could have taken the horse away with himself, but he chose instead to trade it for the mule to continue the journey. Knowing that Cash treasured his woodworking tools, he insisted on going down to the river in search of them; and when Darl set fire to the barn, he saved the coffin from the fire by himself. However, like the rest of the Bundrens, he didn't talk to his siblings, always rode alone, and when there was a dissension he often refused to have a discussion but always took his own course. It can be stated that due to the lack of link and communication barriers, he is tough to establish normal contact with his siblings, let alone others.

4.4 Dewey Dell--- the next incompetent mother

As the only daughter of the Bundrens, Dewey Dell did not enjoy any particular care and love in this family with alienated family values. On the contrary, because of the lack of maternal love as well as education, she became sensitive and withdrawn, which made her can only speaking her mind to the cow. Meanwhile, she was beset by the athymia that was unable to perceive or express her feelings normally.

I don’t know how to worry. I don’t know how to cry. I tried, but I can’t (Faulkner, 31).

She distrusted her family, even resented Darl after Darl discovered her secret of tryst, and eventually intentionally sent Darl to the lunatic asylum. She was devastated to find out she was pregnant out of wedlock, whereas she was afraid to tell her parents and brothers whom she was supposed to rely on because she didn't trust them. Without the instruction of her mother about the knowledge of female physiology, she was confused about her pregnancy but merely tried to take the money that was given by her irresponsible lover to buy aborticide in the city, and eventually was deceived and raped by the clerk of the pharmacy due to her ignorance. Like her brothers, she had no affection for Addie. The reason she had taken part in the journey was because she could go into the town to buy medicine, but in the end this poor child did not get what she wanted. It is easy to imagine that the unborn child will be the next victim of abnormal family values of the Bundrens.

5. Conclusion

Owing to the lack of communication and affection, the Bundrens' children were unable to express themselves properly and develop positive family values, thus depriving siblings of close emotional bonds, leading to mutual distrust and even resentment. In the final analysis, all these were attributable to the alienation of the family values. The main manifestations of this alienated family value are as follows: family members distrust each other, valuing personal interests above everything, lack of emotion, and family members' desolation of spirit as well as psychologically self-enclosing and indifference. Parents are supposed to be the role models for their children, the sources of love children need, the mentor of life who answers their questions, and the shapers of family values. Nevertheless, in the Bundrens' family, the parents did not fulfill the corresponding role and responsibility but formed the alienated family values, thus let the children bear the tragic consequences.

To be sure, the Bundrens' family is not alone in its moral dilemmas and divisions. However, the alienated family values of the Bundrens have its representativeness in the context of a particular era and in comparison with other family's situations in this book. The family composed of a father with selfish and indifference as his nature and a mother who was empty-minded with rebellious spirit was not only devoid of love, but also lack of spiritual support, gradually forming abnormal values. As a result, the children who were regarded as the appendages of marriage by their parents were faced with the influence of alienated values since their birth. Years of indifference further estranged the family, and no one attempt to reverse the status quo by reason of the alienated family views had left an invisible imprint on their psyche. We can still find similar case up to this day. Since some parents of the original family can’t successfully take the responsibility of the corresponding role in the family, their children who grow up under the guidance of the alienated family values will confront an irreversible impact on the development of personality. As it were, the Bundrens' experience is still a cautionary tale for the modern family.

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