Quentin's Chapter

       Quentin's chapter is not quite as difficult to understand as Benjy's chapter, but it is still difficult. The different time changes, random rants, and weird obsession with clock talk throws the average reader off. This chapter actually interested me a lot because it is truly stream of consciousness. There is not correct punctuation everywhere sometimes, and other times punctuation is too prevalent. One of the things Quentin said was, "Roses. Roses." He used punctuation too much, but it really proved his point that Caddy did not smell like trees anymore at her wedding, so she was not innocent. He would start ranting and not use any punctuation at times, and what threw him back into a state of normalcy was the time on the clock. I am going to talk a lot about the clocks, but only because I believe that it is the most important theme of the book so far.
   
    This chapter pretty much started with talking of how "idle habits" can hurt you and that, "Christ was not crucified: he was worn away by the minute clicking of little wheels." Christ was even effected by clocks, so of course we are all effected by clocks. Faulkner is really trying to point out that a clock is part of the human life, and it is a downfall. Let's face it, we have all been stressed out while looking at a clock. Whether it's making it to an appointment on time or figuring out how you are going to finish a lot of work in a short period of time, we have all experienced stress from clocks.  Quentin always falls back to saying what time it was, and that is what gets him back from his crazy rants, that is what makes him human. Life can't be truly lived if you are focused on the time on the clock. Your stream of consciousness, just as Quentin's stream of consciousness, is disrupted by your next activity scheduled at a certain time. We are always distracted from what we are doing in the future and we look at our clocks to make sure that we won't be late for our next activity.
 
   The paragraph above probably sounded pretty repetitive, but I'm just trying to enforce the idea that time has ruined us. We no longer go about our days just being the best we can. Quentin's father claims that, "Clocks slay time." This is the reason that Quentin has tried to destroy his watch at the beginning, he is done trying to deal with time and the reminder of his father because his father, I assume, gave him the watch. The watch continued to tick, even after Quentin twisted the hands of the clock around. Quentin is unable to destroy time.


     Time not really organized throughout the book in an easy way to understand. I think this is Faulkner trying to explain that time is too important to people and they focus too much on having their schedules set out based on time. The book goes back and forth between time periods, which is confusing for people because they are so set on a linear time scale. He is trying to prove that you can get all the facts of a story, even if it's not in order, as long as you just use your brain.

     Quentin's voice was very hard to follow. He was confusing because he would talk as though he was another person and he would just go on rants using a voice that could not be his own. His voice is really random with rants and weird puntuacion, he doesn't have a strong sense of self. He doesn't seem to believe in himself, so how can anyone else be expected to believe him.