The Digital Yoknapatawpha Project

The principal of Jefferson's Negro school is a "college-bred man" and, according to Gavin Stevens, a person "of intelligence and devotion too" (247). In his role as narrator, Charles Mallison seconds Gavin's words, describing the principal as an "intelligent dedicated man with [a] composed and tragic face" (248). Along with the school's "senior woman teacher," he tries to explain to Linda Snopes Kohl why her plan to improve education for blacks is misguided (247).

After returning from Spain, Linda Snopes Kohl begins going into "the Negro grammar and high school" to try to improve conditions for "the pupils" (246). Like their teachers, these children are described as "startled" and "perhaps alarmed" by her presence (246).

The Negro who works for Jakeleg Wattman fetching liquor bottles to the customers wears "the flopping hip boots Jakeleg had worn last year" (245).

The reference to this character|these characters in The Mansion is a good example of how hard it is to create data entries for many of the inhabitants of Faulkner's imaginative world. As part of the novel's description of Jake Wattman's moonshine operation, the narrator refers to the "recurrent new reform-administration sheriff" in Yoknapatawpha who hopes to raid it (244). "Sheriff" is singular. "Recurrent," however, suggests more than one sheriff.

Wattleg is a moonshiner who sells his whisky out of a "little unpainted store" near Wylie's Crossing that he can take apart and move to avoid the law (244).

The "People" of Yoknapatawpha are organized around several different points of reference. For example, Gavin Stevens and his nephew, the narrator, sort them generationally: Gavin refers to "the ones of my age and generation" (133), and the narrator, to "the ones of my age and time" (134). The story is most interested in another group - the (white) people of Yoknapatawpha as voters.

The "Malraux" whom Linda tells about when she returns to Jefferson from fighting in the Spanish Civil War is Andre Malraux, the French novelist and socialist who fought for the Loyalists during the Spanish Civil War (241). Since he helped organize their small air force, Linda and Barton Kohl could have known him well.

Eugene V. Debs was the founder of the International Workers of the World (IWW), and a Socialist candidate for President.

Hugh Johnson was the head of the National Recovery Administration (NRA), one of the government agencies that Franklin Roosevelt created during the Depression. Charles puts his name on the list of the people "they called communists now" (237).

An American social worker who served in Franklin Roosevelt's cabinet and was one of the President's closest advisors.