摘 要

作为美国著名小说家威廉.福克纳的一篇经典小说，《干旱的九月》讲述了一起由于一位白人女性散布谣言导致一伙白人男性杀死黑人的凶杀案。象征手法的运用不但向读者展现旧南方社会不同阶层人面临精神危机以及美国旧南方社会面临瓦解的主题，而且为读者呈现一篇精彩的文学佳作。本文试图从标题，自然物和实物方面分析小说中的象征物。最后通过揭露旧南方社会的衰落的问题，作者试图唤醒读者意识到战后南方社会充满犯罪和冲突。

关键词：威廉福克纳；《干旱的九月》；象征；美国旧南方；

Contents

1.Introduction………………………………………………………………………1

2.Demonstration……………………………………………………………………2

2.1.The title Dry September as the symbol…………………………………………3

2.2. Natural symbols………………….……………………………………………..4

2.2.1.The dust—crime………………………………………………………………4

2.2.2.The moon—hope……………………………………………………………...5

2.3.Physical symbols………………………………………………………………..7

2.3.1.Miss Cooper’s new voile—decay of the myth of southern lady……………...7

2.3.2.Will Mayes’ ice plant—purification…………………………………………..9

2.3.3.McLendon’s pistol—overt violence…………………………………………11

2.3.4.Hawk’s razor—instinctive violence………………………………………....13

3.Conclusion……………………………………………………………………....14

Works Cited……………………………………………………………………......16

Bibliography……………………………………………………………………….17

An Analysis of the Symbols in Dry September

1. Introduction

Awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1949, William Faulkner (1897-1962) is best known for his novels and short stories set in the fictional Yoknapatawpha County, based on Lafayette County, Mississippi, where he spent most of his life. During his lifetime, he finished 19 novels and 75 short stories primarily disclosing a vivid picture of the Southern America, by which the whole world is mirrored with his humanistic understanding and sympathy expressed in his works.

Based on the exemplary fictional Yoknapatawpha County, Dry September, first published in William Faulkner’s collected stories These 13 in 1931, narrates a murder on a hot Saturday night in September. Four white residents of Jefferson, Mississippi, controlled by McLend, a veteran, murdered the black man Will Mayes for the rumor that Will raped the white woman Miss Minnie Cooper. But in fact Miss Minnie Cooper fabricated the rumor of the Raped Case.

Praised by Arthur F. Kinney as “one of his most powerful stories of racial myth and racial violence” (266), Dry September is very popular with many experts and scholars at home and abroad all the time. And the international scholars quest to analyze this story from the perspective of feminism, symbolism, Non-linear Time Series, hetero image and so on. For instance, Arthur L. Ford has pointed out: “One of the important techniques by which Faulkner attaches great importance to the separate identities of the two parts while retaining the basic unity of the story is the selection and repetition of key images” (219). The usage of symbolism is undoubtedly an important feature in Faulkner’s works, but no insightful study on symbols about this novel especially in groups can be found in the Chinese database. Therefore, this thesis is an attempt to analyze the application of symbols in William Faulkner’s Dry September in terms of its title, natural symbols and physical symbols to further unveil the theme and highlight the aesthetic value of this novel. By analyzing the classified application of symbols, this thesis will better demonstrate Faulkner’s central theme and aesthetic value of this novel.

Divided into three parts, the body of the thesis will concentrate on the title, natural symbols and physical symbols of this work. The first part is the analysis of the symbolic meaning of title Dry September, which not only implies the terrible environment in Jefferson but also discloses typical characters facing the dilemma of individual life. The second part emphasizes the natural symbols expressing the dilemma of southern people through the images of the dust and the moon,which play an important role in revealing the theme of racial violence and tragic southern life. The third part quests about the physical symbols elaborately arranged by Faulkner, enhancing the tragic atmosphere in terms of Miss Cooper’s new veil, Will Mayes’ ice plant and Miss Cooper’s ice, McLendon’s pistol and Hawk’s razor.
In a word, the analysis of symbols in this thesis can further enhance the understanding of William Faulkner’s Dry September, helping to highlight the theme and disclose the southern people of different classes facing spiritual crisis due to the degeneration of the Old South in America.