The Sound and the Fury 6th April 1928
Jason Compson’s narration begins from the day before Benjy’s narration. It begins with Jason thinking about his family history, he remembers Caddy’s marriage to Herbert Head, who had promised to secure a lucrative job for Jason with the bank. However, Caddy’s marriage with the man had fallen apart when he had learned that Caddy had been pregnant with another man’s child. Their divorce had inevitably deprived Jason of the bank job, and he had been forced to take a job at the local supply store. Mrs. Compson had refused to take Caddy back into the household although Mr. Compson had insisted on taking in Caddy’s daughter. Mrs. Compson had been reluctant to mother Quentin but had eventually taken to her, and Dilsey had been extremely kind to her as well. Jason had been left as the head of the family after Mr. Compson’s death from alcoholism, and Quentin’s suicide. He continued to hold Caddy responsible for the loss of his job and believes that his whole family has been taking unfair advantage of him.
Jason becomes an extremely bitter man in his mid-thirties and has constant arguments with his mother over the financial condition of the house as well as Quentin’s promiscuous behavior. He blackmails his sister over the welfare of her daughter, as Caddy sends Jason money for Quentin’s upkeep, but instead of using the money on Quentin, Jason steals it for himself. By this day in 1928, Quentin has stolen nearly fifty-thousand dollars of Caddy’s money. Jason lies to his mother about the money by having her burn fake checks that he claims have been sent to him by Caddy. Quentin talks to her mother through letters sometimes, but Mrs. Compson doesn’t wish Caddy to have contact with her, thus their contact is severely limited. Mrs. Compson learns from the school that Quentin has been missing school, and Jason claims that the situation is Mrs. Compson’s fault since she is extremely forgiving of Quentin’s behavior. He wishes to deal with her on his own, but Dilsey gets in his way when he tries to beat the girl with his belt. He then drives her to the school and tells her that he would find out if she chose to miss her classes again. He makes his way to the farm store, where his boss watches over him with a keen eye, but Jason isn’t quite serious about his work. He spends a lot of time thinking about the cotton market, which is where he has traded and lost nearly all of the fortune that he has been pilfering from his sister. Jason’s mother often regrets Jason’s fate as she claims that her husband had traded away a vast majority of his fortune due to his alcoholism. Jason is more bitter about the fact that his father had sold a piece of land to send Quentin to college, but had never quite mentioned doing the same for Jason.
Mrs. Compson always tells him that he is more Bascomb than Compson, although Jason doesn’t quite like his uncle either. Jason is constantly complaining about one aspect of his life or another, as his thoughts turn rapidly from berating Caddy to racist diatribes about the Jews in New York who are playing the stock market. Quentin tries to get some money from her mother, but Jason intervenes and takes over the money order. He gives Quentin just ten dollars of the original when she comes to see him about the mail he had received. In addition to using Caddy’s money for his trading, Jason also supports a prostitute in a nearby town, although he never writes to her claiming that it goes against his standard of what men are supposed to do. Jason is extremely bitter about his life, and he spends the whole work zipping in and out of the shop to either go to the bank, post office, and western union. His boss tries to admonish him, but Jason seems eager for his boss to fire him, but he never does so, due to the friendly relationship he has with Jason’s ailing mother. On one of his trips out on that day, Jason catches sight of Quentin going around town in a ford with a man in a red tie. Jason tries to chase them down in his car but fails to do so. He finds the car parked in a field and sets out to look for them on foot only to be deserted there with a punctured tire. He believes that Quentin had made a fool of him by luring him and abandoning him in the field with a punctured tire. Quentin likes to use his car, even though the smell of gasoline gives him a severe headache, and he complains about having to use the car with his mother.
Jason returns to his workplace after restoring his tire and goes home after completing his workday. He meets Luster and Benjy in the house and learns that Quentin and Mrs. Compson were arguing as Dilsey attempted to mediate between the two. Luster asks Jason for a quarter since he had lost the one he had intended to use for the ticket to the musical show. Jason has two extra tickets that his boss had given him, but he has no intention of using them, and yet he refuses to give them to Luster. He demands that Luster buy it from him for a nickel, but the boy doesn’t have money and so Jason burns the tickets in front of him.
Quentin and Mrs. Compson don’t wish to have dinner with Jason but he insists on it. An argument erupts over dinner as Jason creates a false story about his car being used by a friend to chase down the man with the red tie, whom he claims was a married man, cheating on his wife with some girl in town. Mrs. Compson reveals that Quentin had told her about Jason chasing her down in his car when she had been with her friend. Quentin has a difficult time hearing Jason’s snide insults and questions Mrs. Compson about why Jason treats her so badly. She storms away to her room to study, but Jason believes that she plans on sneaking away.
Analysis
The third section of the book is written from the linear perspective of Jason Compson, whose clear narration allows us to glean important details of the plot. This section allows us to learn about what had occurred with Caddy after her marriage, and it also leads to confirmation that Benjy had been castrated. Jason’s narration can be a challenging read since it is filled with hatred and contempt. The offensive third section reveals the inner workings of the almost evil Jason Compson, who takes advantage of his mother’s love to steal from her. It is evident that Mrs. Compson favored her son, Jason, above the rest of her children, but, surprisingly, he displays no redeeming qualities like the other Compson children.
The book explores the theme of moral decline, and it is developed through the rapid descent that the Compson reputation undergoes throughout the plot of the book. This degradation begins with Mr. Compson, whose alcoholism significantly reduces the family’s wealth, but this decline culminates with the four siblings. It would be natural to assume that Caddy’s promiscuity was a large contributor to this decline, but Jason’s role can be argued to be bigger. This third section contains a poignant example of Jason’s decrepit nature that thoroughly demonstrates moral decline. Jason trades thousands of dollars in the cotton market, supports a prostitute, keeps a motorcar for himself, and yet cannot afford to give away tickets worth half a dollar to his servant Luster. Jason takes pleasure in making the young boy see his desire turn to ash in front of him. Thus it is evident that Caddy is a significant cause of the Compson decline, yet Jason is most certainly a bigger actor in the process.
