Darl & Jewel: Dynamic Duo

My favorite characters in William Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying are Darl and Jewel. I love the complicated and hateful nature of the relationship between them – Darl taunts Jewel about his mother being “a horse”, and Jewel hates him for dangling unknown (and unwanted) information in front of him. Their motivations for their actions towards each are blurry, and are what I find especially fascinating about them, particularly as they are the two characters who have no clear ulterior motive for going to Jefferson.

I think Darl’s motive for tormenting Jewel is some form of jealousy. It’s never explicitly shown that Darl has any sort of desire for love from his mother, but lack of love is certainly a factor that would explain his open resentment towards Jewel. Perhaps he doesn’t even need to desire Addie’s love to be jealous of Jewel – perhaps he is just jealous of the fact that Jewel has a mother, while his own mother was snatched away by the identity change that came after her affair. Perhaps he feels he never even had a mother at all, as his clairvoyance has probably told him she hated him from the start. On page 95, just after the two have confirmed Addie’s death, Darl reflects that he “cannot love his mother because I have no mother. Jewel’s mother is a horse.” This passage implies that while Jewel’s mother is still alive (as the horse is referred to as “is”, or being), Darl’s is nonexistent (not even “was”). In the same two-page section, he taunts Jewel about missing his mother’s death by pointing out the buzzards in the sky, and repeating that his “horse” (either the symbolism of Jewel’s freedom from Addie, or Addie’s memory) isn’t the one that’s dead. Jewel understandably becomes angry at Darl, his only dialogue being “goddamn you” or “goddamn him”. This scene comes after their deceivingly easy trip to Jefferson, which caused them to miss the moment of Addie’s death. Darl made Jewel come with him on the journey, knowing that she would die “‘before we get back’”. When asked by his sister why he’s taking Jewel if he knows Addie’s going to die, he responds that he wants him to “help me load” (which I feel isn’t a truthful answer). All of this effort can be seen as some ploy to use Addie’s death to hurt Jewel further – after knowingly taking Jewel away from his mother’s deathbed, he taunts him about her death by pointing out the buzzards. He also repeatedly torments him about the nature of his family relations, hinting that his father isn’t Anse by telling him his “mother is a horse” (which maybe says to that his mother isn’t their Addie, or at least not the right version of her).

Jewel’s reaction to Darl’s cruelty is fierce anger, which also suggests that Jewel (very deep down) loved his mother – at least, more than the other Bundrens did. On the surface, it sounds like Darl is saying that Addie is not his mother, or at least that he is different from (and therefore alien to) the rest of the family. He’s also furious at the fact that the neighbors are hanging around, waiting for her to die, as well as the fact that Cash is making her coffin right outside her very window. He also ends up giving away his prized horse for her (the thing that caused her much grief, as well as symbolized his freedom from the family), believing that her last wish was to be buried in Jefferson. I think this action in particular shows the strength of his hidden love for his mother, especially as he had the chance to run away from her supposed cause. The immense risk he takes to retrieve the coffin from the barn, then, could be explained by the dedication he has to what he believes is her will.

I think Darl burning down the barn could be explained in the same futilely heroic way – he’s doing what he believes is Addie’s will, as he heard it from her coffin (“She wants Him to hide her away from the sight of man…so she can lay down her life”). In his mind, perhaps cremation is the easiest way to leave them all behind, stopping the ultimately selfish journeys the rest of the family were taking to Jefferson. This perhaps implies that he has some sort of respect (or even love) for Addie, as like Jewel, he’s determined to carry out what he thinks she wants. In this way, their opposing actions could both be seen as heroic – one son tries to do his mother’s will by burning her, another tries to accomplish the same by burying her. This sense of heroism is multiplied when considering that they don’t have ulterior motives for going (or not going) to Jefferson. Their hateful struggle, then, could be born out of a heroic respect for their mother.

(Guys this blog is a Darl-hate-free zone!!! Just kidding, express your opinions, go ham on him, but someone give some RESPECT to my favorite character okay please and thank you)