Barn Burning Major De Spain Rug

He is abner s employer and landlord after the family leaves the first county.

Barn burning major de spain rug. Major de spain snopes s employer who sarty warns about the barn burning. Abner sets his two daughters to cleaning it and then dries it in front of the. Major de spain seems more surprised than angry which only underlines the rarity of someone in a position so far beneath him ever even being able to cause him harm. Major de spain is abner s arch nemesis in the story.

Sartoris escapes his mother s clutches and runs to the de spain house bursting in on the startled servant. Major de spain in barn burning. Breathlessly he blurts out the word barn. Fire is a constant threat in barn burning and it represents both snopes s inherent powerlessness and his quest for power and self expression.

Their economic statuses indeed are so radically distinct that the major struggles to find a punishment that might be fair for both as the rug in house costs more than abner will make in a lifetime. Major de spain seeks reparation for the damaged rug in the form of twenty. While sarty can admire de spain s beautiful house without envy abner views it with a ravening and jealous rage that prompts his actions. Major de spain s expensive imported rug has multiple layers of symbolism.

De spain has the rug dropped off at abner s shack. They visit the house of major de spain. De spain has the rug dropped off at abner s shack. Three shots ring out and snope is killed his plan to burn de spain s barn thwarted.

Gathers the kerosene and oil that he will use in burning de spain s barn. After abner defiantly steps in horse droppings and then drags his shoe across the rug s surface he orders his daughters to clean the rug which the major has dropped off at the family shack and he himself uses a rough jagged stone which. While barn burning is intolerable to sarty 20 bushels of corn as punishment for destroying a rug is excessive injustice as the justice of the peace will rule later. Barn burning is a short story by the american author william faulkner which first appeared in harper s in june 1939.

It represents wealth and prosperity something de spain has but abner does not. The rug at the entrance to the home of major de spain becomes the crux of one of the snopes family s numerous struggles with justice and authority. Abner tracks poop on de spain s rug takes him to court and burns down his barn all in a matter of four days. After the family has been run out of town because snopes burned a barn snopes steals a split rail from a fence and builds a small fire by the roadside barely functional and hardly suited to the large family s needs on a cold evening.

Barn burning summary barn burning set in about 1895 opens in a country store which is doubling as a justice of the peace court.