Light In August essays

Light In August essays Throughout William Faulkners novel Light in August, the main character Joe Christmas is portrayed as a Christ figure. There are many similarities between the two. Most of the similarities are subtly mentioned, but there is some obvious resemblance as well. For example, Joe Christmas and Jesus Christ both have the initials J.C. Also, both Christ and Joe Christmas were killed when they were 33 years old. The likeness of the two is a large part of one of the apparent themes of the novel religious fanaticism. By portraying Joe Christmas as a Christ figure, Faulkner portrays him as the victim in the novel. Joe Christmas appearance is much like that of Christ. Jesus Christ was from the Middle East and most likely had darker colored skin. Christmas too had a darker colored skin, having partial African-American heritage. Being the son of a carpenter, Jesus did not have much money and dressed in low quality clothing. Joe Christmas also dressed in clothing like this. He is first described at the planing mill as, He looked like a tramp, yet not like a tramp either. His shoes were dusty and his trousers were soiled too. (27). There was a great similarity in appearance between Jesus Christ and Joe Christmas. Christ has several avatars, many of which also fit Joe Christmas. One avatar of Christ is suffering servant. Christmas is also a suffering servant. Not to one person in particular, but to all of society, as was Christ. In the period of Christmas life, society was still split into two separate divisions black and white. Because of Christmas mixed heritage, he did not fit into either of these. He suffered for this in both divisions. The blacks would not accept him because he looked like a white man and the whites would not accept him because he had black blood. Christmas was often times violent, but there were many situations where he did not strike...