WEBVTT 00:10.400 --> 00:12.270 WAI CHEE DIMOCK: Last time, on Tuesday, 00:12.267 --> 00:15.067 we were talking about the use of 00:15.067 --> 00:18.297 the word "nigger" by various people-- 00:18.300 --> 00:24.500 in context, sometimes trying to be trivializing, sometimes 00:24.500 --> 00:28.870 obviously agonized, but trying to disguise that fact. 00:28.867 --> 00:31.697 But sometimes by one's neighbors, 00:31.700 --> 00:33.730 sometimes by oneself. 00:33.733 --> 00:39.503 But always in kind of a nontrivial usage. 00:39.500 --> 00:43.930 So today, we're turning to the other side of the phenomenon 00:43.933 --> 00:48.503 and thinking about what it means to inhabit that 00:48.500 --> 00:49.770 adjective, "nigger" -- 00:49.767 --> 00:55.727 what it means to embrace that as one's identity. 00:55.733 --> 01:00.173 At least the Joe Christmas part of the story of Light in 01:00.167 --> 01:04.597 August is really about what it means for somebody to choose 01:04.600 --> 01:05.600 to be black. 01:05.600 --> 01:08.270 So it's very important to recognize that this is a 01:08.267 --> 01:09.767 volitional act. 01:09.767 --> 01:14.067 It is a decision, active conscious decision. 01:14.067 --> 01:19.197 But in that sense, it's also about someone poised on two 01:19.200 --> 01:21.170 contrary possibilities. 01:21.167 --> 01:24.997 Joe Christmas could be either black or he could be white. 01:25.000 --> 01:29.670 So the either or possibility is something that actually 01:29.667 --> 01:31.897 becomes quite important in American literature 01:31.900 --> 01:33.200 outside of Faulkner . 01:33.200 --> 01:37.030 So I just wanted to talk about one other book published very 01:37.033 --> 01:40.033 close to Light in August by Nella Larsen. 01:40.033 --> 01:45.503 As we can see, Nella Larsen herself is someone who could 01:45.500 --> 01:47.470 go either way. 01:47.467 --> 01:51.097 She's classified as African American, because of 01:51.100 --> 01:52.230 the one drop rule. 01:52.233 --> 01:55.733 So if you have the slightest bit of African American 01:55.733 --> 01:57.573 heritage, it classifies as black. 01:57.567 --> 02:00.127 So she's a black writer. 02:00.133 --> 02:02.803 But she really could be anything. 02:02.800 --> 02:07.930 And in fact, she disappeared in mid career and just 02:07.933 --> 02:11.403 completely vanished from public, until 02:11.400 --> 02:12.300 she was found dead. 02:12.300 --> 02:15.200 And there was a lot of surmises that actually she was 02:15.200 --> 02:18.670 passing all those years when she disappeared. 02:18.667 --> 02:23.727 And she wrote a novel called Passing about two black women, 02:23.733 --> 02:27.603 one choosing to be married to someone who's identifiably 02:27.600 --> 02:33.130 black, and the other choosing to pass as a white woman, but 02:33.133 --> 02:36.503 not succeeding, at least not being very 02:36.500 --> 02:38.730 happy with that decision. 02:38.733 --> 02:44.403 So Passing, this was published in 1929, so very close to 02:44.400 --> 02:50.270 Light in August. And as we can see from the book cover, it's 02:50.267 --> 02:53.597 really about the choice of someone who looks completely 02:53.600 --> 03:00.300 white who is classified as black, but who chooses to 03:00.300 --> 03:04.570 behave as a white person, live the life of a white person. 03:04.567 --> 03:12.497 So in Faulkner, what, when you see is also a kind of passing. 03:12.500 --> 03:16.370 So let's not forget that actually it's very much 03:16.367 --> 03:20.797 similar to the dynamics in Nella Larsen's Passing. 03:20.800 --> 03:22.430 It is someone-- a man-- 03:22.433 --> 03:27.603 who looks as white as the woman here, who actually is 03:27.600 --> 03:33.230 initially classified as white, but then chooses, in spite of 03:33.233 --> 03:36.203 his outward appearance, to embrace the 03:36.200 --> 03:37.370 life of a black man. 03:37.367 --> 03:42.097 So it is passing in the opposite direction. 03:42.100 --> 03:46.900 It is self-blackening, a white person blackening himself. 03:46.900 --> 03:49.930 There's no way he can blacken his interior. 03:49.933 --> 03:54.733 But at least he can try to blacken his inside, try to 03:54.733 --> 03:59.273 blacken his emotions, his choice of companions and all 03:59.267 --> 03:59.797 the rest of it. 03:59.800 --> 04:04.900 So this is what Joe Christmas decides to do when he starts 04:04.900 --> 04:09.330 on this run down this long street that goes from the 04:09.333 --> 04:12.103 south to Chicago to the north. 04:12.100 --> 04:15.700 And endless for 15 years he's on this street. 04:15.700 --> 04:18.130 And that's what happens to him when he's on this 04:18.133 --> 04:19.703 15 year-long street. 04:19.700 --> 04:24.100 "He lived with negroes, shunning white people, He ate 04:24.100 --> 04:28.170 with them, slept with them, belligerent, unpredictable, 04:28.167 --> 04:29.897 uncommunicative. 04:29.900 --> 04:34.870 He now lives as man and wife with a woman who resembled an 04:34.867 --> 04:36.627 ebony carving. 04:36.633 --> 04:40.303 At night he would lie in bed beside her, sleepless, 04:40.300 --> 04:43.730 beginning to breathe deep and hard. 04:43.733 --> 04:47.003 He would do it deliberately, feeling, even watching, his 04:47.000 --> 04:51.470 white chest arch deeper and deeper within his ribcage, 04:51.467 --> 04:55.667 trying to breathe into himself the dark odor, the dark and 04:55.667 --> 05:01.827 inscrutable thinking and being of negroes, with each 05:01.833 --> 05:05.503 suspiration trying to expel from himself the white blood 05:05.500 --> 05:07.900 and the white thinking and being. 05:07.900 --> 05:11.930 And all the while his nostrils at the odor which he was 05:11.933 --> 05:17.803 trying to make his own would whiten and tauten, his whole 05:17.800 --> 05:23.100 being writhe and strain with physical outrage and spiritual 05:23.100 --> 05:23.730 denial." 05:23.733 --> 05:28.573 So this is an incredible instance of self-blackening, 05:28.567 --> 05:34.397 somebody who doesn't have to be black choosing against 05:34.400 --> 05:37.030 everything in him-- 05:37.033 --> 05:41.473 his sense of smell, sense of sight, his sense of touch, 05:41.467 --> 05:42.397 everything-- 05:42.400 --> 05:47.500 against everything in him, even though every inch of him 05:47.500 --> 05:51.930 is revolting against being classified as black and 05:51.933 --> 05:53.073 associating with blacks. 05:53.067 --> 05:54.497 That's what he chooses to do. 05:54.500 --> 05:58.200 So it's a very, very complicated kind of 05:58.200 --> 05:59.070 psychology. 05:59.067 --> 06:02.167 Usually when somebody identifies with someone, they 06:02.167 --> 06:05.127 usually, obviously, identify with us because they really 06:05.133 --> 06:06.703 like that identity. 06:06.700 --> 06:10.400 But in this case, it's absolute loathing of being 06:10.400 --> 06:14.300 black, and at the same time, deciding to be black himself. 06:14.300 --> 06:20.900 So this is a much more complex psychology that we've seen in 06:20.900 --> 06:21.630 this novel. 06:21.633 --> 06:24.473 And I think to understand this, I think we need to 06:24.467 --> 06:29.067 borrow the terminology from someone who talks about what 06:29.067 --> 06:35.367 he calls double-consciousness, So this is W. E. B. Du Bois, a 06:35.367 --> 06:40.867 very important thinker and activist from the nineteenth 06:40.867 --> 06:43.927 to basically twentieth century. 06:43.933 --> 06:47.833 And he wrote a book called The Souls of Black Folk, which as 06:47.833 --> 06:51.703 you probably forgot, came out a while before Light in 06:51.700 --> 06:52.300 August. 06:52.300 --> 06:55.000 And this is what he says about blacks. 06:55.000 --> 06:57.370 Let's not forget he's talking about blacks, 06:57.367 --> 07:00.127 people who look black. 07:00.133 --> 07:03.073 This is what he says about the kind of complicated 07:03.067 --> 07:05.627 consciousness that blacks have. 07:05.633 --> 07:10.433 "It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, 07:10.433 --> 07:14.773 this sense of always looking at one's self through the eyes 07:14.767 --> 07:20.067 of others, of measuring one's soul by a tape of the world 07:20.067 --> 07:23.927 that looks on in amused contempt and pity. 07:23.933 --> 07:26.373 One ever feels his twoness-- 07:26.367 --> 07:31.527 an American, a negro; two souls, two thoughts, two 07:31.533 --> 07:37.173 unreconciled strivings, two warring ideals in one dark 07:37.167 --> 07:41.097 body." 07:41.100 --> 07:43.370 Keep looking at this person. 07:43.367 --> 07:48.797 A person who looks black has no choice but to inhabit this 07:48.800 --> 07:52.970 double-consciousness, both to be aware of oneself, as 07:52.967 --> 07:57.367 oneself, having a completely internal relation to oneself. 07:57.367 --> 08:01.027 But at the same time, having another's views superimposed 08:01.033 --> 08:04.473 upon oneself, because of the way other people 08:04.467 --> 08:06.567 are looking at you. 08:06.567 --> 08:12.067 So it is this doubleness, one is looking at oneself through 08:12.067 --> 08:15.627 involuntarily through the eyes of other people. 08:15.633 --> 08:20.003 But we shouldn't forget that, in fact, Joe Christmas doesn't 08:20.000 --> 08:20.800 look like a black man. 08:20.800 --> 08:23.570 He looks like the male counterpart to this white 08:23.567 --> 08:24.927 looking woman. 08:24.933 --> 08:28.833 So it's even more complicated that what Du Bois is 08:28.833 --> 08:29.503 suggesting. 08:29.500 --> 08:32.370 It's not the double-consciousness of an 08:32.367 --> 08:36.867 obviously black man, but the double-consciousness of a 08:36.867 --> 08:41.227 white looking person, who even though he is repelled by the 08:41.233 --> 08:44.603 blackness, nonetheless embraces blackness. 08:44.600 --> 08:49.970 So it is just double-consciousness redoubled 08:49.967 --> 08:53.697 in terms of this degree of complexity. 08:53.700 --> 08:57.200 And today, I'd like to talk about this kind of redoubled 08:57.200 --> 09:00.800 double-consciousness in Faulkner along 09:00.800 --> 09:03.170 three lines of inquiry. 09:03.167 --> 09:05.967 One is obviously the importance of the light and 09:05.967 --> 09:10.727 shadow, which is epitomized, dramatized in the title. 09:10.733 --> 09:13.133 The other is something that we've sort of been talking 09:13.133 --> 09:16.333 about, the relation between a single individual and then 09:16.333 --> 09:19.903 kind of the population of group or multitude. 09:19.900 --> 09:22.370 Today, that's what I'd like to introduce. 09:22.367 --> 09:25.527 And then something that we've been talking about all the way 09:25.533 --> 09:30.973 through about the question of genre and balance between 09:30.967 --> 09:32.297 comedy and tragedy. 09:35.333 --> 09:40.673 Also given this configuration, I'd like to look at three 09:40.667 --> 09:41.697 characters-- 09:41.700 --> 09:45.430 basically the two ends of the spectrum and a mid point. 09:45.433 --> 09:47.873 I think that you know which two ends of the spectrum would 09:47.867 --> 09:52.297 be, would be Joe Christmas and Lena Grove, one tragic figure 09:52.300 --> 09:54.270 and the other a comic figure. 09:54.267 --> 09:57.697 And between the two of them, I would like to put now a third 09:57.700 --> 10:00.330 figure, which is the Reverend Hightower. 10:00.333 --> 10:03.073 We've been talking about Reverend Hightower in various 10:03.067 --> 10:06.597 contexts, but I'd like to bring him to bear now on the 10:06.600 --> 10:10.770 two obvious protagonists of Light in August. 10:10.767 --> 10:14.967 But first starting with Joe Christmas, I'd like to talk 10:14.967 --> 10:16.427 about three moments-- 10:16.433 --> 10:20.573 actually, there's more than three-- but three clusters of 10:20.567 --> 10:25.497 moments revolving around the act of striking a match. 10:25.500 --> 10:31.330 It is so obviously a pattern, a symbolic pattern revolving 10:31.333 --> 10:34.633 around that act that I think is really worth thinking about 10:34.633 --> 10:39.333 the three of them in sequence and in the interrelations. 10:39.333 --> 10:45.703 So the first instance of striking a match is when he's 10:45.700 --> 10:49.300 contemplating killing Joanna. 10:49.300 --> 10:53.100 "So Christmas lit the cigarette and snapped the 10:53.100 --> 10:56.630 match toward the open door, watching the 10:56.633 --> 10:59.833 flame vanish in midair. 10:59.833 --> 11:03.833 Then he was listening for the light, trivial sound which the 11:03.833 --> 11:08.003 dead match would make when it struck the floor. 11:08.000 --> 11:10.970 And then it seemed to him that he heard it. 11:10.967 --> 11:15.227 Then it seemed to him, sitting on a cot in a dark room, that 11:15.233 --> 11:19.933 he was hearing a myriad sounds of no greater volume-- 11:19.933 --> 11:25.433 voices, murmurs, whispers, of trees, darkness, earth, 11:25.433 --> 11:30.203 people, his own voice, other voices evocative of names and 11:30.200 --> 11:31.470 times and places-- 11:31.467 --> 11:35.367 which he had been conscious of all his life without knowing 11:35.367 --> 11:41.727 it, which were his life, thinking God perhaps and me 11:41.733 --> 11:43.503 not knowing that too. 11:43.500 --> 11:48.200 He could see it like a printed sentence, fullborn and already 11:48.200 --> 11:54.900 dead God loves me too like the faded and weathered letters of 11:54.900 --> 12:00.830 last year's billboard, God loves me too." 12:00.833 --> 12:03.833 So it is just an incredible passage. 12:03.833 --> 12:06.533 And I just want to say some obvious things about it and 12:06.533 --> 12:08.403 then come back to it. 12:08.400 --> 12:11.800 But there's the striking of the match and then the dying 12:11.800 --> 12:14.630 out of the match, so literally, 12:14.633 --> 12:16.103 the light dying out. 12:16.100 --> 12:19.070 But what is also interesting is that actually as the light 12:19.067 --> 12:25.127 dies out, then it becomes a completely auditory moment. 12:25.133 --> 12:29.773 It's all about the sounds that come to Joe Christmas, the 12:29.767 --> 12:32.027 voices he hears. 12:32.033 --> 12:37.473 The light, the visual tableau completely gives way to an 12:37.467 --> 12:40.727 auditory soundscape, basically. 12:40.733 --> 12:44.503 And then there's this weird kind of 12:44.500 --> 12:48.830 emergence of his own theology. 12:48.833 --> 12:54.533 We've been talking about the importance of Calvin last time 12:54.533 --> 12:57.873 and the play, the repetition of the name Calvin in Light in 12:57.867 --> 13:03.097 August. And here is this obvious invocation of his 13:03.100 --> 13:06.200 relation to God and what it means to repeat that line, 13:06.200 --> 13:07.730 "God loves me too." 13:07.733 --> 13:10.073 So I just wanted to point out these obvious things. 13:10.067 --> 13:13.567 But because this is the last class, I thought that it would 13:13.567 --> 13:17.267 be good to bring back the other two authors. 13:17.267 --> 13:22.527 So just to the obvious detail of God appearing on the 13:22.533 --> 13:25.573 billboard, we actually have seen exactly this before in 13:25.567 --> 13:27.027 The Great Gatsby. 13:27.033 --> 13:30.773 "and I said, 'God knows what you've been doing, everything 13:30.767 --> 13:31.327 you've been doing.'" -- 13:31.333 --> 13:37.933 This is Michaelis talking to George Wilson, 13:37.933 --> 13:41.333 Myrtle's husband -- 13:41.333 --> 13:46.333 "Standing behind him Michaelis saw with a shock that he was 13:46.333 --> 13:50.933 looking at the eyes of Doctor TJ Eckleburg which had just 13:50.933 --> 13:54.873 emerged pale and enormous from the dissolving night." 13:54.867 --> 14:00.167 So this is George Wilson at the moment when he's starting 14:00.167 --> 14:04.967 out on his quest to kill the killer, the person who he 14:04.967 --> 14:07.367 thinks kills his wife. 14:07.367 --> 14:11.727 And pointing to this God on the billboard as the 14:11.733 --> 14:15.903 authority, invoking that authority to justify the 14:15.900 --> 14:19.270 mission that he's just beginning. 14:19.267 --> 14:21.597 The other way in which Fitzgerald would also come 14:21.600 --> 14:24.870 into play is obviously the dynamic mix between the visual 14:24.867 --> 14:26.127 and the auditory. 14:26.133 --> 14:28.733 So this is something that we talked about before about 14:28.733 --> 14:29.533 Daisy's voice. 14:29.533 --> 14:33.133 "For a moment the last sunshine fell with romantic 14:33.133 --> 14:37.133 affection upon her glowing face; her voice compelled me 14:37.133 --> 14:39.803 forward breathlessly as I listened-- 14:39.800 --> 14:43.400 then the glow faded, each light deserting her with a 14:43.400 --> 14:45.500 lingering regret, like children leaving a pleasant 14:45.500 --> 14:46.670 street at dusk." 14:46.667 --> 14:49.897 So the quality of voice described in 14:49.900 --> 14:51.930 terms of a visual image. 14:51.933 --> 14:56.903 And finally, The Great Gatsby, and the great self-made man in 14:56.900 --> 15:01.200 American literature, but described by Fitzgerald as a 15:01.200 --> 15:04.100 quasi-religious self-making. 15:04.100 --> 15:07.970 "The truth was that Jay Gatsby of West Egg, Long Island, 15:07.967 --> 15:11.567 sprang from his Platonic conception of himself. 15:11.567 --> 15:13.527 He was a son of God-- 15:13.533 --> 15:17.103 a phrase, which, if it means anything, means just that-- 15:17.100 --> 15:20.370 that he must be about his Father's business, the service 15:20.367 --> 15:24.327 of a vast, vulgar and meretricious beauty. 15:24.333 --> 15:28.873 So he invented just the sort of Jay Gatsby that a seventeen 15:28.867 --> 15:32.567 year-old boy would be likely to invent, and to this 15:32.567 --> 15:34.997 conception he was faithful to the end." 15:35.000 --> 15:39.800 So it is very hard to ignore the centrality of religion in 15:39.800 --> 15:45.370 both The Great Gatsby and in Light in August. In the case 15:45.367 --> 15:49.197 of The Great Gatsby, the religious language is really 15:49.200 --> 15:53.670 used to underwrite a special kind of self-making. 15:53.667 --> 15:58.167 What it means to be a son of God in the twentieth century 15:58.167 --> 16:00.397 and in the debased environment. 16:00.400 --> 16:06.500 And that's the kind of self-making that Fitzgerald is 16:06.500 --> 16:10.870 talking of, relatively non-racialized, even though 16:10.867 --> 16:13.367 we've seen that there's a little bit of race in The 16:13.367 --> 16:14.527 Great Gatsby as well. 16:14.533 --> 16:21.373 So against that example from Fitzgerald, let's look one 16:21.367 --> 16:26.227 more time at what Faulkner is doing with exactly that 16:26.233 --> 16:29.003 configuration, the billboard, the interplay between the 16:29.000 --> 16:33.500 visual and the auditory and some invocation of God. 16:33.500 --> 16:41.630 It seems that when the light dies out, our only relation to 16:41.633 --> 16:44.773 light is by way of a dead match-- 16:44.767 --> 16:47.427 a dead match and then it hits the ground. 16:47.433 --> 16:50.133 And then the light goes out completely. 16:50.133 --> 16:54.603 And instead what we get is all these sounds 16:54.600 --> 16:56.500 that come to Joe Christmas. 16:56.500 --> 17:02.500 And he becomes an involuntary, strictly passive recipient of 17:02.500 --> 17:03.670 sounds that come to him. 17:03.667 --> 17:06.697 And that it really is the central 17:06.700 --> 17:09.500 function of Joe Christmas. 17:09.500 --> 17:13.900 We've talked before about how passive he is, that he's less 17:13.900 --> 17:18.500 an actor than a recipient of either the goodwill, or in 17:18.500 --> 17:21.970 this case, the ill-will coming from other people. 17:21.967 --> 17:30.267 So he really is a blank slate, which other people, the entire 17:30.267 --> 17:35.127 community, can write the collective signature. 17:35.133 --> 17:37.033 He really is the bearer. 17:37.033 --> 17:40.503 And it's not a very good metaphor, considering that 17:40.500 --> 17:42.670 we're looking at an auditory image. 17:42.667 --> 17:48.027 But just to switch to visual image briefly, he's the bearer 17:48.033 --> 17:51.573 of the collective signature of that community. 17:51.567 --> 17:57.697 So the transition from light to darkness in this moment and 17:57.700 --> 18:03.200 transition from input coming into the eye and the input 18:03.200 --> 18:07.800 coming through the ear is the increasing of a dramatized 18:07.800 --> 18:09.970 passivity of Joe Christmas. 18:09.967 --> 18:13.597 That he's really completely a blank page that everyone else 18:13.600 --> 18:16.400 writes the deeds on to. 18:16.400 --> 18:19.000 But there's this further complication, because this is 18:19.000 --> 18:21.170 a racialized landscape. 18:21.167 --> 18:27.697 It seems to give us a racialized version of a 18:27.700 --> 18:31.200 Calvinist theology that we talked about last time. 18:31.200 --> 18:35.070 So I just want to think about what it means that the first 18:35.067 --> 18:41.497 italicized cluster was "God perhaps and me not knowing 18:41.500 --> 18:44.870 that too," and then "God loves me too," repeated twice. 18:44.867 --> 18:49.097 It's almost as if the only thing Joe Christmas is sure 18:49.100 --> 18:53.170 about is that God loves other people. 18:53.167 --> 18:55.927 That is an undisputed statement. 18:55.933 --> 18:58.803 So God loves other people. 18:58.800 --> 19:01.370 Maybe God loves everyone else. 19:01.367 --> 19:05.367 Maybe he loves me too. 19:05.367 --> 19:11.997 So there can't be a more devastating self-reflection, 19:12.000 --> 19:17.930 speculation about yourself is that everyone 19:17.933 --> 19:19.903 else come before you. 19:19.900 --> 19:23.800 Basically, you are an afterthought, and maybe not 19:23.800 --> 19:28.170 even an afterthought in God's mind. 19:28.167 --> 19:33.197 And even if it's an afterthought, it is written on 19:33.200 --> 19:34.630 God's consciousness. 19:34.633 --> 19:38.903 It's written like those faded and weathered letters of last 19:38.900 --> 19:44.300 year's billboard, that unimportant, that 19:44.300 --> 19:46.800 negligible to God. 19:46.800 --> 19:51.670 So it definitely is an interesting racialized 19:51.667 --> 19:54.467 variation on predestination. 19:54.467 --> 19:57.867 So just it's worth going back to Calvin for that reason and 19:57.867 --> 20:02.467 see why it actually lends itself so readily to this 20:02.467 --> 20:06.497 particular negative kind of racialization. 20:06.500 --> 20:09.270 Last time we talked about original sin and so on, so 20:09.267 --> 20:15.327 this another very famous statement coming from Calvin 20:15.333 --> 20:17.673 on predestination. 20:17.667 --> 20:21.427 And there's nobody more upfront than Calvin about 20:21.433 --> 20:23.673 predestination and what it means. 20:23.667 --> 20:29.827 "By an eternal and immutable counsel God has once for all 20:29.833 --> 20:35.233 determined those who he would admit to salvation and those 20:35.233 --> 20:38.933 whom He would condemn to destruction. 20:38.933 --> 20:45.303 To those whom He devotes to condemnation, the gate of life 20:45.300 --> 20:51.600 is closed by a just irreprehensible, but 20:51.600 --> 20:54.570 incomprehensible judgement." 20:54.567 --> 21:01.597 So "the gate of life is closed by a just and irreprehensible, 21:01.600 --> 21:05.470 but incomprehensible judgment." There's no way you 21:05.467 --> 21:07.967 can quarrel with God. 21:07.967 --> 21:09.427 It's his decision. 21:09.433 --> 21:12.973 He decides that you're going to be condemned. 21:12.967 --> 21:14.797 It doesn't make any sense to you, obviously, 21:14.800 --> 21:17.030 if you're the condemned. 21:17.033 --> 21:18.903 You can't make any sense of it. 21:18.900 --> 21:20.500 It's completely incomprehensible. 21:20.500 --> 21:23.500 But at the same time, if you're a Calvinist you also 21:23.500 --> 21:25.130 have to believe that is irreprehensible. 21:25.133 --> 21:29.633 That God has every right to condemn you, even though from 21:29.633 --> 21:32.203 your point of view, it seems completely arbitrary. 21:32.200 --> 21:38.000 So that really is the meaning of predestination in a 21:38.000 --> 21:42.670 particular interpretation of a racialized context is that to 21:42.667 --> 21:48.197 be black is to be predestined in that particular way, always 21:48.200 --> 21:52.400 to come second, always to be an afterthought, and maybe 21:52.400 --> 21:55.870 even less than an afterthought in the mind of God. 21:55.867 --> 21:59.767 And that is what Joe Christmas metaphorically as well as 21:59.767 --> 22:03.527 pragmatically chooses to, given his own sense of being 22:03.533 --> 22:06.503 so negligible in the world. 22:06.500 --> 22:09.970 So that would be one interpretation of why he 22:09.967 --> 22:11.997 chooses to blacken himself, even though he 22:12.000 --> 22:13.730 doesn't have to. 22:13.733 --> 22:16.703 So this Faulkner's version of predestination, the 22:16.700 --> 22:20.030 self-blackening of a white-looking man. 22:20.033 --> 22:25.533 It completely honors logic of the gate of life being closed 22:25.533 --> 22:29.533 by a just and irreprehensible, but incomprehensible judgment. 22:29.533 --> 22:32.203 And it's always under the shadow of race. 22:32.200 --> 22:35.470 So I would say that the part of Light in August that is 22:35.467 --> 22:38.397 associated with Joe Christmas is very much 22:38.400 --> 22:39.900 the regime of shadows. 22:39.900 --> 22:44.800 And Faulkner's actually quite heavy-handed about how often-- 22:44.800 --> 22:48.570 we've said the original title of Light in 22:48.567 --> 22:50.467 August was Dark House. 22:50.467 --> 22:53.627 It could also be The Shadows of August because so much of 22:53.633 --> 22:56.973 the book is really about shadows. 22:56.967 --> 23:00.967 And the shadows tend to emerge in context 23:00.967 --> 23:01.897 of striking a match. 23:01.900 --> 23:06.800 So let's go on to the next moment, next episode of Joe 23:06.800 --> 23:13.230 Christmas striking a match, lighting a lamp. 23:13.233 --> 23:18.333 This is the moment after the dialogue that we looked at 23:18.333 --> 23:22.573 last time of Joanna offering to send him to study with a 23:22.567 --> 23:25.197 black lawyer and turning over all her funds to him. 23:25.200 --> 23:28.400 And then the next thing that she asks him to do is to kneel 23:28.400 --> 23:30.100 with her and pray. 23:30.100 --> 23:33.400 So this is all in that context. 23:33.400 --> 23:35.300 "'Light the lamp,' she said. 23:35.300 --> 23:37.900 'It won't need any light,' he said. 23:37.900 --> 23:40.470 'Light the lamp.' 'No,' he said. 23:40.467 --> 23:41.297 He stood over the bed. 23:41.300 --> 23:44.500 He held the razor in his hand. 23:44.500 --> 23:47.370 But it was not open yet. 23:47.367 --> 23:51.367 But she did not speak again and then his body seemed to 23:51.367 --> 23:53.297 walk away from him. 23:53.300 --> 23:58.570 It went to the table and his hands laid the razor on the 23:58.567 --> 24:01.997 table and found the lamp and struck the match." 24:02.000 --> 24:07.330 So very heavy-handed alienation of Joe Christmas 24:07.333 --> 24:08.503 from his body. 24:08.500 --> 24:12.430 It's not Joe Christmas that's doing the walking. 24:12.433 --> 24:14.903 His body seemed to walk away from him. 24:14.900 --> 24:19.530 It's not Joe Christmas who's laying the razor on the table. 24:19.533 --> 24:22.733 It's his hands that is doing it and his hands that is 24:22.733 --> 24:24.103 striking the match to light the lamp. 24:24.100 --> 24:28.370 So it's just the action coming strictly just from the 24:28.367 --> 24:32.097 fragmented body parts. 24:32.100 --> 24:35.700 So just highlighting the utter passivity of Joe Christmas 24:35.700 --> 24:38.770 himself, is as if his individual fragmented body 24:38.767 --> 24:43.427 parts have agency, but not Joe Christmas as a whole. 24:43.433 --> 24:47.733 The consequence of lighting this lamp is this. 24:47.733 --> 24:50.873 This is what we see when the lamp is lit. 24:50.867 --> 24:53.967 He actually see something else that casts a 24:53.967 --> 24:55.797 shadow on the wall. 24:55.800 --> 25:01.700 "It held an old style, single action cap-and-ball revolver 25:01.700 --> 25:06.070 almost as long and heavier than a small rifle. 25:06.067 --> 25:10.627 But the shadow of it and of her arm and hand on the wall 25:10.633 --> 25:15.933 did not waver at all, the shadow of both monstrous, the 25:15.933 --> 25:19.903 cocked hammer monstrous, back-hooked and viciously 25:19.900 --> 25:23.870 poised like the arched head of a snake; it did 25:23.867 --> 25:24.667 not waver at all. 25:24.667 --> 25:27.067 And her eyes did not waver at all. 25:27.067 --> 25:30.197 They were as still as the round black ring 25:30.200 --> 25:31.800 of the pistol muzzle. 25:31.800 --> 25:34.430 But there was no heat in them, no fury. 25:34.433 --> 25:36.303 But he was not watching them. 25:36.300 --> 25:39.370 He was watching the shadowed pistol on the wall; he was 25:39.367 --> 25:43.667 watching the cocked shadow of the hammer flicked away." 25:43.667 --> 25:46.127 It's almost as if it's irrelevant, but it's 25:46.133 --> 25:47.103 actually going on. 25:47.100 --> 25:49.030 The most important thing is the play of that 25:49.033 --> 25:49.933 shadow on the wall. 25:49.933 --> 25:53.903 But we do know that the shadow is produced by that revolver. 25:53.900 --> 25:57.800 But here we have actually the symmetry of weaponry. 25:57.800 --> 26:01.100 So Joe Christmas has come fully equipped. 26:01.100 --> 26:05.230 He has the razor in his hand, even though it's not open. 26:05.233 --> 26:08.473 And Joanna has the revolver all ready. 26:08.467 --> 26:10.727 And she thinks that it's ready to go. 26:10.733 --> 26:13.803 And that's what Joe Christmas is seeing. 26:13.800 --> 26:20.030 So this is the outcome of that particular relationship that 26:20.033 --> 26:23.473 is completely under the shadow of race. 26:23.467 --> 26:28.427 So we know Joanna would call him, "Nigger, nigger," or 26:28.433 --> 26:32.233 "Negro, negro, negro." That relationship is completely 26:32.233 --> 26:33.873 under the shadow of race. 26:33.867 --> 26:36.397 And this is actually the earlier moment where she talks 26:36.400 --> 26:40.770 about race as a curse, as an eternal curse. 26:40.767 --> 26:43.597 It's the equivalent of predestination in America. 26:43.600 --> 26:46.330 "But after that I seemed to see them for the first time 26:46.333 --> 26:51.003 not as people, but as a thing, a shadow in which I lived, we 26:51.000 --> 26:53.900 lived, all white people, all other people. 26:53.900 --> 26:57.000 I thought of all the children coming forever and ever into 26:57.000 --> 27:01.200 the world, white, with the black shadow already falling 27:01.200 --> 27:03.600 upon them before they drew breath. 27:03.600 --> 27:06.330 And I seemed to see the black shadow in the shape of a 27:06.333 --> 27:06.433 cross." 27:06.433 --> 27:08.933 I'm not even going to read you the whole thing. 27:08.933 --> 27:10.373 You guys remember this passage. 27:10.367 --> 27:14.897 It is very much the invocation of the black shadow as the 27:14.900 --> 27:16.770 modern incarnation of the Calvinist 27:16.767 --> 27:19.467 doctrine of original sin. 27:19.467 --> 27:25.027 And a curse that falls upon you before you are even born. 27:25.033 --> 27:27.103 When you're a baby, before you've done anything, even 27:27.100 --> 27:30.070 before when you're in the mother's womb that shadow is 27:30.067 --> 27:31.497 already falling upon you. 27:31.500 --> 27:36.200 So it's a very, very extreme version of 27:36.200 --> 27:38.130 the Calvinist theology. 27:38.133 --> 27:42.573 And right here, we also see it not only as theology, but as 27:42.567 --> 27:47.397 dramatic action as the shadow of that pistol on the wall. 27:47.400 --> 27:52.730 And we now know the final moment of Joe Christmas 27:52.733 --> 27:55.203 striking the match. 27:55.200 --> 27:59.070 "Then he paused, and he struck a match and examined the 27:59.067 --> 28:02.467 pistol in the puny dying glare. 28:02.467 --> 28:06.897 The match burned down and went out, yet he still seemed to 28:06.900 --> 28:12.130 see the ancient thing with its two loaded chambers; the one 28:12.133 --> 28:15.903 upon which the hammer had already fallen and which had 28:15.900 --> 28:20.470 not exploded, and the other upon which no hammer had yet 28:20.467 --> 28:24.127 fallen but upon which a hammer had been planned to fall. 28:24.133 --> 28:26.203 'For her and for me,' he said. 28:26.200 --> 28:28.270 His arm came back, and threw. 28:28.267 --> 28:32.727 He heard the pistol crash once through the undergrowth. 28:32.733 --> 28:35.573 Then there was no sound again. 28:35.567 --> 28:37.227 'For her and for me.'" 28:37.233 --> 28:43.803 So this is basically the tragic love in Light in 28:43.800 --> 28:46.800 August. That there's no denying the 28:46.800 --> 28:48.100 importance of tragedy. 28:51.800 --> 28:55.030 It depends on how much weight we assign to the Joe Christmas 28:55.033 --> 28:57.303 Joanna Burden section of the novel. 28:57.300 --> 29:03.470 If we were to give primacy to that section, then the 29:03.467 --> 29:04.997 symmetry of weapons-- 29:05.000 --> 29:11.630 the razor and the pistol, both chambers loaded in Joanna's 29:11.633 --> 29:14.173 pistol-- she really means for the two 29:14.167 --> 29:16.027 of them to die together. 29:16.033 --> 29:20.503 This is the appropriate end for a tragic narrative, even 29:20.500 --> 29:23.230 though Joe Christmas doesn't die at the end. 29:23.233 --> 29:27.403 Nonetheless, the stage is really set for that particular 29:27.400 --> 29:29.400 tragic outcome. 29:29.400 --> 29:33.130 So there's really not a whole lot more. 29:33.133 --> 29:35.173 It couldn't be any other outcome. 29:35.167 --> 29:40.527 There could be no other ending for Joe Christmas and Joanna. 29:40.533 --> 29:44.033 Either one of them had to die or the two of them had to die. 29:44.033 --> 29:48.933 But Faulkner can't really think of any other ending for 29:48.933 --> 29:50.203 the two of them. 29:52.333 --> 29:55.533 But thank God they're not the only ones in Light in August. 29:55.533 --> 30:01.203 So we're beginning to move to someone, towards the other 30:01.200 --> 30:03.230 side of the spectrum. 30:03.233 --> 30:05.873 And actually a very interesting transitional 30:05.867 --> 30:10.527 figure of someone who's at midpoint between Joe Christmas 30:10.533 --> 30:13.303 and Lena Grove is Hightower. 30:13.300 --> 30:18.700 And actually the image of the light and shadow and kind of 30:18.700 --> 30:22.900 contrast between light and shadow is also the visual 30:22.900 --> 30:27.200 landscape in which Hightower is situated. 30:27.200 --> 30:32.030 So this is the moment when Byron Bunch and Joe Christmas 30:32.033 --> 30:33.933 grandparents-- at this point we sort of know 30:33.933 --> 30:36.433 that they are related. 30:36.433 --> 30:42.473 But basically Byron Bunch going to Hightower and begging 30:42.467 --> 30:47.627 him to tell a lie so that Joe Christmas can have an alibi. 30:47.633 --> 30:51.173 So Byron says it's really your word against Joe Brown's. 30:51.167 --> 30:55.467 If you would just say that he was with you that night, that 30:55.467 --> 30:58.227 will be better, stronger evidence than anything coming 30:58.233 --> 30:59.873 from Joe Brown. 30:59.867 --> 31:04.727 So Hightower could have told a lie, and the lynching wouldn't 31:04.733 --> 31:05.503 have happened. 31:05.500 --> 31:07.970 But this is what he does. 31:07.967 --> 31:11.797 "Because now Hightower is shouting, 'I won't do it! 31:11.800 --> 31:15.130 I won't!' with his hands raised and clenched, his face 31:15.133 --> 31:20.203 sweating, his lip lifted upon his clenched and rotting teeth 31:20.200 --> 31:24.470 from about which the long sagging of flabby and 31:24.467 --> 31:26.427 puttycolored flesh falls away. 31:26.433 --> 31:29.603 Suddenly his voice rises higher yet. 'Get out!' he 31:29.600 --> 31:31.030 screams. 'Get out of my house! 31:31.033 --> 31:34.503 Get out of my house!' Then he falls forward on to the desk, 31:34.500 --> 31:39.270 his face between his extended arms and his clenched first. 31:39.267 --> 31:43.597 As, the two old people moving ahead of him, Byron looks back 31:43.600 --> 31:47.300 from the door, he sees that Hightower has not moved, his 31:47.300 --> 31:52.230 bald had and his expanded clenchfisted arms lying full 31:52.233 --> 31:57.133 in the pool of light from the shaded lamp." 31:57.133 --> 32:01.103 So this particular visual image suggests that Hightower 32:01.100 --> 32:05.100 is completely poised between light and shadow. 32:05.100 --> 32:08.170 There's light that is coming from a shaded lamp. 32:08.167 --> 32:11.967 And he's given an opportunity actually to do something 32:11.967 --> 32:13.827 significant in the world. 32:13.833 --> 32:16.833 To have saved Joe Christmas would have been a significant 32:16.833 --> 32:20.273 deed in the life of someone who actually has not done a 32:20.267 --> 32:22.397 lot of significant things. 32:25.500 --> 32:27.970 His life could have been much more consequential, and in 32:27.967 --> 32:30.727 fact, hasn't been all that consequential. 32:30.733 --> 32:32.933 So saving Joe Christmas would have been a 32:32.933 --> 32:35.333 consequential action. 32:35.333 --> 32:39.303 But Hightower just cannot bring himself to do it for all 32:39.300 --> 32:39.800 kinds of reasons. 32:39.800 --> 32:44.870 So we can speculate on why he chooses not to do it. 32:44.867 --> 32:49.667 But that is a moment when his voice is very high as 32:49.667 --> 32:52.027 befitting his name, Hightower. 32:52.033 --> 32:57.273 But what that very high voice is doing is turning away this 32:57.267 --> 32:58.527 opportunity. 32:58.533 --> 33:00.873 I think that all of us would have different decisions 33:00.867 --> 33:02.597 whether or not to lie at that moment. 33:02.600 --> 33:05.930 His decision is not to lie and to allow the violence to 33:05.933 --> 33:08.903 erupt, as everyone can see that it's about to. 33:11.500 --> 33:15.970 So this is the moment when he's sort of in this light 33:15.967 --> 33:17.967 from the poor light of the shaded lamp. 33:17.967 --> 33:22.427 But there's another possibility for Hightower that 33:22.433 --> 33:25.403 comes actually only five pages after that. 33:25.400 --> 33:29.600 So Faulkner actually, I would say, is quite gentle towards 33:29.600 --> 33:35.000 Hightower in terms of the final place given to him in 33:35.000 --> 33:37.830 the story, in the novel. 33:37.833 --> 33:40.773 So we know that once before Hightower's had 33:40.767 --> 33:42.327 tried deliver a baby. 33:42.333 --> 33:48.073 So we have a black woman, and the doctor's supposed to come, 33:48.067 --> 33:49.367 and the doctor arrives too late. 33:49.367 --> 33:52.797 So Hightower delivers the baby, and the baby is dead. 33:52.800 --> 33:55.070 And then rumors go all around town that the baby 33:55.067 --> 33:56.467 is his and so on. 33:56.467 --> 33:59.067 So it turns out that he actually get a second chance 33:59.067 --> 34:00.297 to deliver a baby. 34:00.300 --> 34:02.930 And of course, we know whose baby it is. 34:02.933 --> 34:06.633 But he gets to deliver the baby, because the doctor also 34:06.633 --> 34:10.373 arrives too late a second time. 34:10.367 --> 34:14.727 "The doctor arrived too late this time, also. 34:14.733 --> 34:17.603 Byron had to wait for him to dress" -- 34:17.600 --> 34:19.330 Byron's sent to fetch the doctor -- 34:19.333 --> 34:21.373 "Byron had to wait for him to dress. 34:21.367 --> 34:24.097 He was an oldish man now and fussy, and somewhat 34:24.100 --> 34:27.700 disgruntled at having been awakened at this hour. 34:27.700 --> 34:30.430 Then he had to hunt for the switch key to his car, which 34:30.433 --> 34:33.803 he kept in a small metal strong box, the key to which 34:33.800 --> 34:35.830 in turn he could not find at once... 34:35.833 --> 34:39.433 So when they reached the cabin at last, the east was 34:39.433 --> 34:43.773 primrosecolor and there was already a hint of the swift 34:43.767 --> 34:45.967 sun of summer. 34:45.967 --> 34:50.727 And again the two men, both older now, met a door of a 34:50.733 --> 34:55.533 one-room cabin, the professional having lost again 34:55.533 --> 34:59.403 to the amateur, for as he entered the door, the doctor 34:59.400 --> 35:02.600 heard the infant cry." 35:02.600 --> 35:08.600 So it is crucial that this is a repetition, this is a replay 35:08.600 --> 35:12.400 of an earlier scenario that Faulkner ends on is this over 35:12.400 --> 35:14.770 again, if it's a second time or it's too 35:14.767 --> 35:16.197 late this time also. 35:16.200 --> 35:17.970 Also and again. 35:17.967 --> 35:22.227 So it turns out that actually the second time around makes 35:22.233 --> 35:24.003 all the difference in the world. 35:24.000 --> 35:30.900 Because at this time Hightower is able to deliver the baby 35:30.900 --> 35:31.400 successfully. 35:31.400 --> 35:35.100 This is actually the consequential action that he 35:35.100 --> 35:38.170 manages to do, that is granted him. 35:38.167 --> 35:44.197 He's not granted the whatever, the bravery, or I don't even 35:44.200 --> 35:48.470 know what word to use if he had chosen to lie. 35:48.467 --> 35:53.127 He's not granted that, whatever, mental ability or 35:53.133 --> 35:59.303 mental toughness to lie for Joe Christmas. 35:59.300 --> 36:03.570 But he is granted something that actually is both more 36:03.567 --> 36:07.467 uncontroversial and with an obviously benign outcome-- 36:07.467 --> 36:11.527 to deliver a baby when the professional doctor is too 36:11.533 --> 36:13.573 late this time too. 36:13.567 --> 36:17.867 So it turns out Faulkner is giving us, not only-- and then 36:17.867 --> 36:19.697 that is why the double-consciousness is 36:19.700 --> 36:24.430 redoubled or maybe redoubled again in Light in August is 36:24.433 --> 36:29.873 that there are two meanings to being second. 36:29.867 --> 36:35.797 In Joe Christmas' usage, "God loves me too," being second 36:35.800 --> 36:39.100 means that basically you are nobody. 36:39.100 --> 36:40.170 That you are nothing. 36:40.167 --> 36:42.167 That you count for nothing at all. 36:42.167 --> 36:44.867 You're always going to be an afterthought. 36:44.867 --> 36:49.397 "God loves me too." That's what being second-- it means 36:49.400 --> 36:52.330 losing out and not even having the dignity of losing out. 36:52.333 --> 36:56.303 Just meaning being a non-contender really, in a 36:56.300 --> 36:59.670 field where everyone else is going to be ahead of you. 36:59.667 --> 37:05.427 Being a non-contender is what being second, having the word 37:05.433 --> 37:08.173 "too" attached to you. 37:08.167 --> 37:13.167 But that's not the only meaning of "too" or in the 37:13.167 --> 37:17.897 variation, "also." So the second time we see that in the 37:17.900 --> 37:22.600 case of Hightower, "the doctor arrived too late this time 37:22.600 --> 37:28.300 also," second actually means a second chance. 37:28.300 --> 37:33.870 That you messed up the first time around-- or it wasn't so 37:33.867 --> 37:35.067 much messing up. 37:35.067 --> 37:38.597 Some babies are just born dead. 37:38.600 --> 37:41.970 But I think there was some messing up. 37:41.967 --> 37:43.467 It wasn't a satisfied outcome. 37:43.467 --> 37:46.397 It wasn't an acceptable outcome to most people. 37:46.400 --> 37:48.730 So you messed up the first time around, you get a second 37:48.733 --> 37:52.333 chance to do it one more time. 37:52.333 --> 37:57.203 So being second actually completely supports that 37:57.200 --> 37:59.070 second usage. 37:59.067 --> 38:03.427 And that is why, to my mind, Hightower is such an important 38:03.433 --> 38:10.233 midpoint between Joe Christmas and Lena Grove is that he is 38:10.233 --> 38:18.433 actually taking us halfway in the direction of a much more 38:18.433 --> 38:22.603 affirmative view of what is possible, a much more 38:22.600 --> 38:26.070 affirmative view of the world. 38:26.067 --> 38:29.927 But it is important to recognize that is actually a 38:29.933 --> 38:33.073 completely accidental development. 38:33.067 --> 38:40.027 There's no reason, no logical reason why the doctor should 38:40.033 --> 38:40.833 arrive too late. 38:40.833 --> 38:42.433 It's only because the doctor arrives too late that 38:42.433 --> 38:44.233 Hightower gets to deliver the baby. 38:44.233 --> 38:46.603 The doctor arrives too late because he's old and didn't 38:46.600 --> 38:49.030 want to be awakened up in the middle of the night, can't 38:49.033 --> 38:50.833 find his key to the car. 38:50.833 --> 38:55.703 All these accidental developments contribute to-- 38:55.700 --> 38:58.400 and the doctor, other than the fact that he's appeared once 38:58.400 --> 39:01.200 before, he really is an absolute stranger to the 39:01.200 --> 39:04.030 novel, he's such a marginal character. 39:04.033 --> 39:10.233 So the second chance coming to Hightower comes to him by 39:10.233 --> 39:14.503 virtue of the pregnancy and the childbirth of a total 39:14.500 --> 39:20.530 stranger, Lena Grove, and the accidental lateness of another 39:20.533 --> 39:23.333 accidental person, the doctor. 39:23.333 --> 39:31.903 So we're beginning to get into an arena where it's really not 39:31.900 --> 39:38.700 Hightower's action alone, but the combined action of all 39:38.700 --> 39:43.470 these other people, many of whom are strangers to him. 39:43.467 --> 39:46.927 It is the combined action of all these people that produce 39:46.933 --> 39:47.373 an outcome. 39:47.367 --> 39:51.497 So this is a moment to introduce some theoretical 39:51.500 --> 39:53.600 speculation on this point. 39:53.600 --> 39:57.800 And James Surowiecki is a staff 39:57.800 --> 39:59.270 writer for The New Yorker. 40:03.567 --> 40:08.127 But five, ten years ago, he wrote a book called The Wisdom 40:08.133 --> 40:10.473 of Crowds, which actually got a lot of attention 40:10.467 --> 40:11.727 when it came out. 40:11.733 --> 40:20.333 And his basic argument is that the collective decision or 40:20.333 --> 40:24.333 just the collective conjecture, when there's a 40:24.333 --> 40:27.603 shortage of information, the collective conjecture, the 40:27.600 --> 40:31.630 collective guesswork, the aggregation of guesses from a 40:31.633 --> 40:35.473 lot of people, that aggregation is always going to 40:35.467 --> 40:40.397 be closer to the truth than the single guess of a single 40:40.400 --> 40:40.930 individual. 40:40.933 --> 40:42.503 So it's actually a kind of a complicated 40:42.500 --> 40:43.900 mathematical argument. 40:43.900 --> 40:49.430 It's about the aggregation of conjecture being better, 40:49.433 --> 40:51.973 having a much higher likelihood of being 40:51.967 --> 40:53.127 closer to the truth. 40:53.133 --> 40:55.933 So even though it doesn't talk about statistic, actually it's 40:55.933 --> 41:00.773 very statistical in its mode of thinking, that it's about 41:00.767 --> 41:03.297 chances and likelihood and so on. 41:03.300 --> 41:08.200 The other book that is also relevant and actually has the 41:08.200 --> 41:13.300 title Multitude is by Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri. 41:13.300 --> 41:16.800 It's a proven view with the first substance of that 41:16.800 --> 41:18.600 argument, but just one-- 41:18.600 --> 41:21.670 It's really not about what we're talking about. 41:21.667 --> 41:25.267 But there is one line that is relevant to what we've been 41:25.267 --> 41:29.667 talking about, which is about the thinking about what the 41:29.667 --> 41:34.627 meaning multitude could have. For them multitude, is "the 41:34.633 --> 41:38.003 cooperative convergence of subjects. . . 41:38.000 --> 41:43.070 Only the multitude through its practical experimentation will 41:43.067 --> 41:48.367 offer the models and determine when and how the possible 41:48.367 --> 41:49.897 becomes the real." 41:49.900 --> 41:56.930 So it has some resemblance to this Surowiecki argument, 41:56.933 --> 41:59.503 which is that it is about how the possible 41:59.500 --> 42:00.730 can become the real. 42:00.733 --> 42:04.173 And it turns out that the collective conjecture, the 42:04.167 --> 42:09.897 aggregation of individual guesswork, or the aggregation 42:09.900 --> 42:15.770 of action from a lot people would put us in closer contact 42:15.767 --> 42:20.167 to how the possible can become the real. 42:20.167 --> 42:24.397 So these are the two sort of contemporary lines of thinking 42:24.400 --> 42:28.800 about groups and about human populations as opposed to 42:28.800 --> 42:33.000 human individuals as the agents of history. 42:33.000 --> 42:35.270 It turns out that actually there's also a nineteenth 42:35.267 --> 42:38.867 century precedent for Faulkner. 42:38.867 --> 42:42.967 And we're so used to thinking of The Scarlet Letter of a 42:42.967 --> 42:45.427 condemnation as the bigotry of Puritans. 42:45.433 --> 42:48.103 But let's not forget actually that Hawthorne's a very 42:48.100 --> 42:51.570 important statement about multitude that runs completely 42:51.567 --> 42:56.697 contrary to our stereotypical vision of Puritans. 42:56.700 --> 43:00.730 "When an uninstructed multitude attempts to see with 43:00.733 --> 43:05.373 its eyes, it is exceedingly apt to be deceived. 43:05.367 --> 43:10.197 When, however, it forms its judgment, as it usually does, 43:10.200 --> 43:14.170 on the intuitions of its great and warm heart, the 43:14.167 --> 43:19.167 conclusions thus attained are often so profound and so 43:19.167 --> 43:23.227 unerring as to possess the character of truths 43:23.233 --> 43:26.233 supernaturally revealed." 43:26.233 --> 43:29.573 It's astonishing statement from The Scarlet Letter saying 43:29.567 --> 43:34.597 that in fact that the great and warm heart is not the 43:34.600 --> 43:37.530 attribute of a single individual. 43:37.533 --> 43:42.873 That in fact, the human heart in its individual embodiment 43:42.867 --> 43:45.867 is likely to have lots and lots of shadows in it. 43:45.867 --> 43:51.397 And the only way that those shadows can be relatively 43:51.400 --> 43:54.800 deactivated is when we think and aggregate. 43:54.800 --> 43:57.700 I think it's a really interesting theory. 43:57.700 --> 44:01.170 Just offering it to you as a possibility. 44:01.167 --> 44:05.667 But I do think that this is what Faulkner thinks in the 44:05.667 --> 44:10.397 use total strangers, doctors, people who have no relation to 44:10.400 --> 44:13.870 one another in Light in August. So basically, his 44:13.867 --> 44:17.397 notion of the multitude is that it's randomized, it's 44:17.400 --> 44:22.400 statistical, it's populational, it's chancy. 44:22.400 --> 44:26.270 And this is the moment, and I think this is the extreme 44:26.267 --> 44:30.327 moment in Light in August right before the killing, 44:30.333 --> 44:31.773 actually, of Joe Christmas. 44:31.767 --> 44:35.867 This, essentially what we get, is -- utterly doesn't go with 44:35.867 --> 44:38.067 the deed that follows, but this is what 44:38.067 --> 44:39.297 Faulkner gives us. 44:39.300 --> 44:42.900 "In the lambent suspension of August into which night is 44:42.900 --> 44:45.730 about to fully come, it seems to engender and surround 44:45.733 --> 44:48.373 itself with a faint glow like a halo. 44:48.367 --> 44:50.927 The halo is full of faces. 44:50.933 --> 44:54.803 The faces are not shaped with suffering, not shaped with 44:54.800 --> 44:57.830 anything, not horror, pain, or even reproach. 44:57.833 --> 45:02.373 They are peaceful, as though they have escaped an 45:02.367 --> 45:04.367 apotheosis; his own is among them." 45:04.367 --> 45:06.497 So I don't need to talk any more about that. 45:06.500 --> 45:10.170 Just that the halo is not the halo around a single face. 45:10.167 --> 45:13.927 It is full of faces. 45:13.933 --> 45:19.733 And that's the reason why he goes right back to how he 45:19.733 --> 45:23.703 starts up, by talking about the kindness of strangers. 45:23.700 --> 45:28.770 And this kindness of strangers is not even ironized by 45:28.767 --> 45:33.327 everything that has happened in between page one of Light 45:33.333 --> 45:38.303 in August and the last pages of Light in August. The 45:38.300 --> 45:42.530 kindness of strangers, yes, it has to recognize and take into 45:42.533 --> 45:46.333 account and fully acknowledge and put in the foreground the 45:46.333 --> 45:47.873 cruelty of one's neighbors. 45:47.867 --> 45:48.827 No question about it. 45:48.833 --> 45:50.873 It has to encompass all of that. 45:50.867 --> 45:53.467 But the kindness of strangers remains. 45:53.467 --> 45:59.067 So he's totally happy to bring in a person never before 45:59.067 --> 46:01.697 mentioned in Light in August in the last 46:01.700 --> 46:03.070 pages of the novel. 46:03.067 --> 46:06.067 "There lives in the eastern part of the state a furniture 46:06.067 --> 46:09.367 repairer and dealer who recently made a trip into 46:09.367 --> 46:12.297 Tennessee to get some old pieces of furniture which he 46:12.300 --> 46:13.500 had bought by correspondence." 46:13.500 --> 46:18.400 A completely extraneous detail at the end of the novel. 46:18.400 --> 46:22.900 And the reason this furniture dealer is in the picture 46:22.900 --> 46:26.970 suddenly is that he's there to witness this ongoing courtship 46:26.967 --> 46:32.697 between Lena Grove and Byron Bunch. 46:32.700 --> 46:37.330 So let's see what Faulkner thinks about marriage. 46:37.333 --> 46:41.603 And it turns out that he actually has given some 46:41.600 --> 46:42.670 thought to his rival. 46:42.667 --> 46:48.497 The relation between the two of them is not always cordial. 46:48.500 --> 46:51.130 So it is Faulkner writing to Malcolm Cowley. 46:51.133 --> 46:52.373 "I'll write to Hemingway. 46:52.367 --> 46:55.127 Poor bloke to have to marry three times to find out that 46:55.133 --> 46:56.533 marriage is a failure... 46:56.533 --> 47:00.533 Apparently man can be cured of drugs, gambling, biting his 47:00.533 --> 47:03.903 nails and picking his nose, but not of marrying." 47:03.900 --> 47:06.930 Saying this is what we're addicted to is marriage. 47:06.933 --> 47:10.803 It doesn't matter if you fail 1,000 times, you still want to 47:10.800 --> 47:11.970 get married. 47:11.967 --> 47:17.227 So given the fact, this totally clear-eyed evaluation 47:17.233 --> 47:19.533 of the outcome of marriage, but also the fact that it's 47:19.533 --> 47:24.633 just going to be an ongoing addiction, we should not be 47:24.633 --> 47:27.973 surprised by what comes of it at the end of Light in August. 47:27.967 --> 47:30.997 When we're talking about Hemingway I want to remind you 47:31.000 --> 47:33.830 that we've seen this kind of structure before. 47:33.833 --> 47:37.403 The ending of For Whom the Bell Tolls, "He lay flat on 47:37.400 --> 47:40.730 the brown, pine-needled floor of the forest, his chin on his 47:40.733 --> 47:43.373 folded arms." Beginning of the novel, end of novel, "He could 47:43.367 --> 47:46.367 feel his heart beating against the pine-needled floor of the 47:46.367 --> 47:48.567 forest." 47:48.567 --> 47:52.227 Light in August, at the beginning and ending. 47:52.233 --> 47:55.903 Beginning, "although I have not been quite a month on the 47:55.900 --> 47:58.900 road, I'm already in Mississippi." And ending of 47:58.900 --> 48:02.000 Light in August, "Here we ain't been coming from Alabama 48:02.000 --> 48:05.200 for two months, and now it's already Tennessee. 48:05.200 --> 48:10.730 So it is Lena Grove counting on the kindness of strangers 48:10.733 --> 48:15.473 and counting on the statistical fact that to every 48:15.467 --> 48:19.867 Lucas Birch, there will was always be a Byron Bunch. 48:19.867 --> 48:22.427 Because marriage is an addiction. 48:22.433 --> 48:25.233 So that's why it is comedy. 48:25.233 --> 48:27.233 Thank you very much.