Dry September by William Faulkner

William Faulkner
source: The Paris Review

 

Published in 1931, ‘Dry September’ is a short story by famous American writer William Faulkner. The story is a five-part narrative and is set in Jefferson, a region in Mississippi – American South. The story is an episode of mob lynching of an Afro-American man who had allegedly abused a white spinster lady.

The story focusses more on the manners and mores of the American south society where racial terrorism is unleashed on coloured people in order to enforce white supremacy. The story also digs deeper into the gender stereotypes imposed on women and the manner in which the society treats them when they fail to find a husband for themselves.

The whole ‘event’ of killing of Will Mayes has various dimensions where Faulkner implicitly criticises the white characters, McLendon and Minnie Cooper who were responsible for the event.

“Do you suppose anything really happened” is the bone of contention of the story. 

These were the closing lines of fourth part of the narrative, and were said by one of Minnie cooper’s friends while tending Minnie. The lines represent the sentiment or the state of doubt that people have regarding Minnie’s accusation of being attacked by the Black man. Here, they seem to question whether the rumour was reality or just a mere fragment of Minnie’s imagination.

Minnie’s social status is deeply rooted in the sexual role that has been ordained for her by the code and traditions of the society. Minnie used to be the center of social activity in Jefferson. She was a vivacious, popular girl in high school and used to “ride upon the crest of town’s social life”.  Presently, she’s in her forties, a spinster and is leading a futile life of her own inescapable fantasies. She has a deep and desperate desire to recapture her prestigious but dead past. 

She lets her needs corrupt her and, in the process, gets an innocent man killed. Her past shows us that she too has been a victim of the society where her womanhood is reduced to her inability to get married. Like the weather of Jefferson, she too lives in a suffocating state of mind which makes her an object of sexist ridicule.  It was just because of her color, that her words were revered before the black man’s.

 It was only after the tragedy that she was able to distinguish between reality and fantasy. Her hysterical fear is clearly visible in the later part. For most of her life, she has enjoyed the attention of the town but now that she has grown old and withered, even idol men never look at her.  After the event has taken place, Minnie returned to the days of her youth as she hanged out with her friends and all the men who before looked uninterested, now gave her attention but at the expense of a black man’s life.  

Minnie cooper is a promiscuous lady who was leading life of futility. She is bereft of adventure and attention in her life which she used to get early when she was young. She is also known to consume alcohol due to which she is able to delve deeper into the world of her imagination. She also uses alcohol to disconnect herself from her friends. She watched cinema too – “her idle and empty days, had a quality of furious reality.”

The ‘event’ is also significant for McLendon, the mob leader who looks at it as an excuse to satiate his blood lust. McLendon was a celebrated war-hero of the first world war. His sole identity too, lies in his past and tries to reignite its small portion by killing a black man, thus reinforcing social order and justice in the society.  He tries to express his dominance over the Afro-American by subverting a judicial enquiry and becoming a vigilante.

As Lulia A. Milica in her essay ‘Racial violence in Faulkner’s Dry September’ says,

“The much-appraised idea of southern lady is as shallow as that of white supremacy.”

Both Minnie cooper and McLendon live in the same frame, each struggling to reconquer their supreme achievement while Will Mayes is martyred in this attempt. The story focuses on race, class and gender. It exposes the southern ideologies of racism where the coloured people are detested and have futile existence. The narrative of the story is held within a central image of aridity, symbolizing the claustrophobic environment in which the characters dwell. 

Mclendon becomes the so-called hero of the story by  punishing the person accused of attacking a woman. However, on the other hand, the same McLendon thrashes her wife and abuses her.

 Faulkner dwells deep into the psychological construct of white American south people, which is usually reduced to violence and aggression against the black people. Even today, the scars of racial violence have not faded and these events continue to be a horrid part of American History.

Metaphors of dryness have been frequently used to identify the violent nature of southern white supremacy. In the story, the indifferent nature of white people towards black people have been justified because of presence of certain climatic factors like dryness in the air, lack of rain etc. Such factors cause white people to drive out of their mind due to which they commit horrid crimes. Weather is usually beyond human control but in the story the weather is controlling the actions of the people. The heat of their mind manifests by the heat experienced by their bodies. Phrases like vitiated air, stale pomade, stale breath, lifeless air, all of these words are associated with violence and death.

“Rumour of twice waxed moon” – the line is indicative of doom and death that has been evoked through the synonyms of twice waxed moon.

There’s a kind of uncertainty regarding the credibility of the event. Hawshaw is not in favour of what is happening with Will Mayes. The barber was ludicrously named as “nigger-lover” by other white people for supporting Will Mayes portrays the ill-formed prejudices of the southern white society towards black people.

 Faulkner writes about the oppressive society of south which is redolent of the black history in America. The American south has never accepted afro American people and hence, abjures them. They are not given any identity and are identified on the basis of their skin colour; they’re often called “niggers”.

 Ideas of racism and misogyny have been juxtaposed in the story where McLendon chooses to take a white lady’s word before a nigger’s.