Lizzie

Character Key Number: 
549
Display Name: 
Lizzie
Sort Name: 
Lizzie
Ever Present in Yoknapatawpha?: 
Yes
Biography: 

Lizzie is the sister of Lennie Snopes, Abner's wife, who lives with the Snopes family in "Barn Burning." She and Lennie have a close relationship: on the night Ab sets out to burn down De Spain's barn, they "sit side by side on the bed, the aunt's arms around [Sarty's] mother's shoulders" (22). When Ab commands his wife to restrain Sarty to prevent him from warning De Spain, Lizzie sides against Ab, telling Lennie: "Let him go! . . . If he don't go, before God, I am going up there [to De Spain's] myself" (22). This sister briefly reappears in The Hamlet, but without a name; however, now she does have a (dead) husband - at least, the narrative's one reference to her calls her "the widow" (15).