Light in August, Ch. 5-6

1. chiaroscuro (page 111): pictorial representation in terms of light and shade without regard to color

2. In chapter five it goes back to two nights before the fire and the murder to a night where Joe Christmas is unable to sleep because he was awakened by Joe Brown, the two of them are drunk and sharing stories. Christmas suddenly becomes annoyed, and beats Joe Brown. Brown is calling him many racial names, but eventually he falls asleep. Christmas cannot sleep because he is only thinking about how angry he is at Joanna Burden for lying about her age and trying to get him to pray with her. He goes out to the side of the road and decides to take off his clothes and scares a woman who goes past him. Then he decides to go into the stable to sleep. The next morning he wakes up and shaves and reads a magazine. Later that night he eats in a restaurant where through the window he can see Brown being shaved. He then ventures through the white and black parts of town and eventually through the forest. He realizes that he has a razor in his hand when he goes towards Joanna's house he sits in the lawn and when it was midnight all he could think about was that something was going to happen to him. Then in chapter six it is a flashback to Joe Christmas' life when he was five and living in an orphanage. One day, he sneaks into the dietician's room to steal some toothpaste, when the dietician enters he runs and hides in a closet. The dietician and an unknown man begin to have sex. When Christmas vomits loudly from eating the toothpaste, he is discovered. The dietician scolds him but then becomes paranoid that he will tell somebody what he saw so she bribes him with a silver dollar. The dietician finds out from the janitor that Joe is both black and white and she intends to turn him in. The janitor quickly takes the child away with him to be adopted by a strict, very religious man named McEachern.

3. I found reading about Joe Christmas' past very helpful in understanding him as a character. He is never quite sure about his own roots, or his name. So I am under the impression that thus far in the novel he is searching for an identity. He desires to be a part of a community that will accept him for who he is and not force him to conform. In the book, when he is sent to live with the McEacherns, he is told he must pray. Joanna Burden has tried to get him to conform to her religion, and also get a job. He does not want any of these things, he needs to find a society where he fits in in order to figure out his true identity.



4. a) Why did Joe decide to take all of his clothes off on the side of the road?

b) Who was the janitor who wanted to conceal the fact that Joe was part black?

c) Faulkner sheds a very negative light on the community and those who are isolated from it, could this possibly mean that Faulkner was in some way isolated?