The main focus of the story is on the moral dilemmas confronting the young boy Sarty, who is torn apart between his loyalty to his violent and anti-social father and the tendency to abide by the norms of the society at large. But, around that scaffold, Faulkner builds his statements depicting serious discords within the American society. These aspects of the story are easy to miss if we pay attention only to the central theme of the story. There is also a tendency on part of a reader not to delve into uncomfortable issues and concepts. The remainder of the essay is an attempt to bring to the reader’s notice those apparently peripheral and implicit messages about the social realities of this era in American history. Though the story was set in the last decades of the 19th century, Faulkner wrote it following the Great Depression. So bringing to awareness the oppressive labor system and the suffering of underclass white workers who sold themselves in contracted servitude is an important motivation for the author. This is besides the primary theme depicting the mental conflict of Sarty Snopes.
The class distinction between the families of Major de Spain and Abner Snopes is illustrated by the material imagery that the author presents. A crowded grocery store/courthouse for a place of justice and an unpainted two-room cabin for a home contrasts sharply with the splendor of the grand mansion. Such differences are more telling in the possessions in those abodes. While the de Spain mansion is manifest with symbols of opulence – glittering chandeliers, gleaming gold frames, and curving carpeted stairs, the expensive French rug, etc., the Snopes’ possessions are what is rightly described as the “sorry residue of the dozen or more movings”. This includes a broken clock, a battered stove, beds and chairs that could collapse anytime, a worn-out broom and a battered lantern.
The oppression and cruelty to black Americans through the centuries had been well documented in Literature, but not so the equally deplorable conditions of the poorest of white Americans. Abner Snopes comments on the mansion as a product of “n***** sweat” and sl*** labor. He suggests that the status of poor whites is equal to that of blacks, if not on occasion worse, as in this particular case. He says, “Maybe it ain’t white enough yet to suit him. Maybe he wants some white sweat with it”. We can also trace contempt for blacks in his words, without any grounds to base such an attitude. This is obvious when he rebukes: “Get out of my way, n*****”. Ironic as it is, he also at times feels superior to them in spite of the pathetic condition of his own life. In fact, the black sl*** owned by de Spain wore better clothes and rode better horses than Snopes.
At the time period when the story was set, the concept of “owning people” was quite common, though it would appear on the outside as a mutual agreement. This is evident in Abner Snopes’ description of Major de Spain as the “man that aims to begin tomorrow owning [my] body and soul for the next eight months”. While Snopes being physically and economically oppressed is one side of the story, the other side is that he is also an oppressor. He treats his wife and children harshly and endangers their survival due to his anti-social behavior. Here then is a case of what in sociology is called “the cycle of violence”. The perpetrator and the victim of violence are embodied in the same person.
Special treatment is meted out to the wealthy and the privileged class. When Major de Spain was sued by Snopes for claiming excess compensation for damaging the rug, de Spain “wore on his face an expression. . . of amazed unbelief . . .at the incredible circumstance of being used by one of his own tenants”. Snopes’ daring act had breached an implicit order of the society, and thus raised many an eyebrow, including that of the accused. This proves how wealth is more powerful than justice and the wealthy expect not to suffer any judicial retribution.
The concepts of “sharecropping” and “tenant farmer” were extremely disadvantageous for the workers. The economic and legal control exerted by the owners in this system of feudal privilege is highly repressive and leaves the tenants, in most cases “poor whites”, with no choice but to accept the imposed condition.
Another proof of the inequality and injustice prevalent at the time is the verdict given by the justice of peace. Though the justice knows that monetary compensation would be nearly impossible for Snopes to pay, he goes ahead with it nonetheless. The loss suffered by the plaintiff is relatively much lower than the compensation imposed on the guilty. And this is a clear case of flawed justice.
Abner Snopes is associated with such group of words as “bloodless”, “stiff”, “ruthless”, “ironlike”, “cut from tin”, etc. They suggest a mechanical, indifferent and inhuman character for Snopes. The humanity in him is completely squeezed out and in its place lingers a “frozen ferocity” and a “cold, dead voice”. Through such qualifiers Faulkner tries to convey what dehumanizing effects the economic and social conditions of a society can inflict on an individual. It is important to note that Mississippi (where this story was set) was a very backward state during the 1930, with rampant racial atrocities and economic turmoil. Keeping this background in mind helps us to understand the causes and conditions that shaped Abner Snopes’ character.
Thus, the long standing class distinctions between the propertied and tenant whites; the racial discrimination between blacks and whites; the ironic assumption of racial superiority by the white trash over the blacks are all brilliantly captured in the narrative. The author tries to portray the reality of America as it was and the human toll of such a brutal reality on the individual and his community. A careful study of the text persuades and disillusions the reader about the “land of opportunity”. Alongside the American Dream lurks the American Nightmare.