Light in August, Ch. 11-12

1. fortitude (page 234): strength of mind that enables a person to encounter danger or bear pain or adversity or courage.





2. At first chapter eleven takes a look at the strange relationship between Joanna Burden and Joe Christmas. She leaves him food on the table, but rarely visits him while he is eating. The two of them are sexually involved, but Joe is disgusting with her strength and masculine qualities. He even starts to refuse her meals. He still lives in the cabin on her land, but he doesn't visit Joanna for a long time, until she is waiting for him one night on his bed. She proceeds to tell him her entire life story including the fact that her grandfather and brother were killed due to a disagreement over the voting rights of blacks. In turn he then reveals to her that one of his parents was indeed part black. They become intimate again, although Joe still seeks sex from prostitutes in Memphis. Joanna tells Joe that she wants a child, and Joe does not. One day four months later, Joanna reveals to Joe that she is pregnant. Meanwhile, Joe Brown comes to stay with Joe Christmas in the cabin and when he inquires about the affair Christmas hits him, therefore chasing him off of the property. Joanna summons him into her house to tell him that she would like to send him to a black college so that he can prepare himself to take over her affairs. He does not want to do this, and he is angered at the idea so he hits her. She again asks him to come to her house, this time he goes with his razor in his hand to find Joanna praying, she reveals a gun that fails to shoot when she pulls the trigger. Christmas finds himself on the street waving down a car, not realizing that he has the gun in his hand. He opens it to see that there are two bullets, meaning she was going to kill him, and herself.



3. After reading this section I could not help but to think about how strange the relationship between Joe and Joanna really was. They were both considered to be outcasts of the town, but not by choice. Joe because he is biracial and Joanna because of her Yankee roots. I know that Joe's hate comes from Joanna's desire to control him and change him, and he does not want to have to change he wants to be accepted into a community the way that he is. But, why does Joanna hate Joe to the point that she wants to murder him? Is it because Joe helped her abandon her religious values because she became addicted to sex? Or by bringing attention to all of the similarities between the characters is Faulkner trying to suggest that they saw so much of themselves in the other one, and that is what motivated them to kill?


4. a) Why does Joanna tell Joe that she is pregnant?

b) If the two of them already discovered their hate for each other, the why do they pursue their sexual relationship for a second time?

c)Why did Joe Brown come to stay with Joe Christmas?