Religious Myth Utopia Resembled in “the Sound and the Fury”: Dilsey’s Episode

Abstract

This paper will be focused on the elements of religious utopia exposed in the novel “The Sound and the Fury” by William Faulkner, through the episode of Dilsey. In contrast to Quentin and Jason’s meaningless, decomposed perception of time, responsible for its perversity, Dilsey’s religious sensitivity transmits a systematic structure to the world because historic human awareness is recorded by God’s projection: all events are based on Christ’s Alpha and Omega. Religious myth utopia, anticipated by Dilsey in the last episode, achieves its climax in Shegog’s predication. Just like Dilsey, who varies from the characters of the novel with her positive utopia, even the positive utopia projected by the priest’s predication alters from the alienating caustic and mortal circumstances of the whole novel. Dilsey together with the church congregation were gathered to listen to this predication, living the joy of Easter in the novel. Shegog is a transmitter of God’s word, to touch people’s hearts and join them in a “collective dream” dedicated to the Easter celebration. The people in the church reached a small utopian dream, part of the big dream instigated by the myth of Christian religion. Impeding all negativities, the ritual enabled the unification of humanity in a common positive dream. This dream is responsible for the religious utopia in the novel. Through an empirical analysis of this episode, Dilsey, and the sermon, I will arrive to the point to present the elements of religious utopia involved in this part of the novel.