Stream Of Consciousness In The Sound And The Fury And The Great Gatsby
The Great Gatsby and The Sound and The Fury are well known novels written by two famous American writers. These two novels are widely read and appreciated by many scholars, as both novels are a perfect example of Modernism. Both works use the stream of consciousness and focus on similar themes and hypocrisy are found in both texts.
The Sound and The Fury is written by William Faulkner and is extremely dense and hard to read. The story revolves around the downfall of a family in the south. The past haunts the family members, and they can't escape it. The novel is unique, as four people narrate it. The first three are the Compson brothers. Part one is narrated by the mentally disabled younger brother, Benjy. The second part is by Quentin, a Harvard student. The third part is told by Jason, the cruel, mean, and bitter brother. In contrast, the last part is narrated by a third person omniscient. In each section, the shameful past is revealed. The only daughter in the Compson family has committed a sexual act and got pregnant. Within the sections, we see how each brother and the family are dealing with it.
Whereas The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald is much easier to read and comprehend due to the simple narration. The story takes place during the Jazz Age and is narrated by Nick Carraway, Daisy Buchanan’s cousin. Nick recently moved to the West Egg and is neighbors with Jay Gatsby, a man that lives the American dream, throws lavish over the top parties, and loves Daisy, who is married to Tom Buchanan.
Stream of Consciousness is a technique that was developed and used by many writers. It is a style of writing where the thoughts, feelings and emotion of a character is written. For instance, in The Great Gatsby we see the view point and how the narrator Nick Carraway feels about the people around him. In the first few chapters Nick states that a certain remark said by Tom regarding his business annoyed him. It is due to this technique, as viewers we are given one of the reasons as to why Nick moved to East Egg is because of the rumors of his engagement. In The Sound and The Fury we are given the viewpoints of the three brothers and it all centers Caddy’s situation. In Quentin’s section, his thoughts regarding his
