Submitted by crieger@semo.edu on Wed, 2015-12-02 10:29
Sam Fathers relates that he and his "mammy" (mother) were purchased as slaves by Quentin's "great-grandpappy" (344). The story says nothing more about this Compson, not even his name. But in the "Appendix" to The Sound and the Fury that Faulkner wrote in 1945, Quentin's great-grandfather Compson is listed as Quentin MacLachan Compson II.
Submitted by crieger@semo.edu on Tue, 2015-12-01 17:02
The narrator notes that his Grandfather "calls my name" twice at the end of the story (358, 359), though he never mentions the name itself. From the his siblings' names, however - Caddy and Jason - readers could be expected to know he is Quentin Compson. The eldest son of one of the leading families in Yoknapatawpha, Quentin is a major character in two of Faulkner's major novels, The Sound and the Fury(published in 1929, two years before the story) and Absalom, Absalom! (1936).
Lucius calls him "the aristocrat, the baron, the suzerain" (228). He does not appear in person until late in the story, but is invariably referred to as "Colonel Linscomb" by the other characters Lucius meets in Parsham. His plantation (which contains the track on which the horses race) and mansion (where the story unwinds after the races are over) are both extremely lavish and well-maintained. He is obviously an old friend of Grandfather Priest.
The man who owns Coppermine (i.e. Lightning) is named van Tosch. He is originally from Chicago, but on a trip to Memphis decided he liked it so much that he moved to Tennessee and became a breeder of race horses. It is because he is "a foreigner" (281) - i.e. from the North - that he does not behave correctly when his black employee, Bobo, asks for money to help him out of trouble. But the narrative treats him favorably as a friend of both Colonel Linscomb and Grandfather.
When Boon and Butch are taken to jail in Hardwich, Reba and Corrie stay in "the jailor's wife's room" (270). The phrasing suggests that, like the jailer in Jefferson in other fictions, this couple lives in the building that holds the jail.
Although he is not specifically mentioned, the jailer in the county sheriff's office in Hardwick can be inferred from the number of times the cells are locked and unlocked while Boon is there (270). The "jailor's wife," on the other hand, is mentioned, though not named (270). (According to the "Corrected Texts" that Noel Polk edited for Vintage International, Faulkner spelled "jailer" with an 'e' in "That Evening Sun," Intruder in the Dust and "An Error in Chemistry" but with an 'o' in "Monk," Requiem for a Nun and The Reivers.
This "white man" is the "blackguard" who takes advantage of Bobo's "country-bred" naivete to get him in debt, and then forces him to steal the horse named Coppermine (281).
