what if.

1. Who reflects on the past the most? The least?

A very long time ago, I stumbled upon a very cheesy, rather cliché John Greenleaf Whittier quote that read, "Of all the words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these: it might have been." It's nothing too deep, well worded, beautifully phrased or anything, but as I think back to it now...it's true. As humans, we constantly play this "What If" game with ourselves. We run through scenarios over and over and over, "What if I'd done this," "What if I'd said that," only to snap back to reality to realize that there is absolutely nothing we can do about it now. The feeling of helplessness that comes with such a realization can suffocate anyone. But the "What If" game is never over. For Quentin, the Sound and the Fury character most influenced by the past, this oppressive inability to change and be the past leads to his death. "And all our yesterdays have lighted fools the way to dusty death." Benjy's chapter makes many references to the past, but these are not so much conscious memories as past experiences recollected because of present happenings. His chapter does not give the reader an intellectualized portrait of the Compson family's past. Jason's reflections, on the other hand, are not much more than skewed justifications for his despicable actions. The past drives him to impotent fury, but the past drives Quentin to death. In his chapter, his obsession with the past, specifically Caddy, is evident in the constant intermingling of present experiences with foregone memories. He cannot escape the memories, much like no member of the Compson family can escape the vicious cycle in which they spin. Quentin views time as his mortal enemy, and as much as he "What Ifs" his past experiences regarding Caddy, he cannot help but envy the way that the past just rests, frozen in time. The "petty pace" for Quentin is a labor, a painful, reluctant move forward and, he recognizes, backwards at the same time. Quentin's focus on yesterday leads him to a dark, still death at the bottom of a river. An untimely death – one last slap in the face to his most trying adversary.
Dilsey, on the other hand, is, in a fairly literal sense, out of the loop. She is the heart and soul of the Compson household, but she has not become trapped in the vicious cycle that consumes the family members for whom she works. Her strength stems from the fact that she does not focus on the past. Her eyes face forward. In her chapter, she claims to have seen the end – the future of the family. Quentin could only focus on the past. Faulkner could not end The Sound and the Fury with a memory. He had to illustrate the future of the Compsons, not reiterate the past. Dilsey, old and withered, stands a glorious pillar of strength, resistance to foolish "What If" games, and bravery in the face of time. The reader ends the book not running backwards but taking small, deliberate steps forward – creeping in that petty pace towards the inevitable extinguishing of the candle.