"Dry September" by William Faulkner takes place in the early twentieth century.(1920-1930) This story portrays violence , which after the civil war lynching was huge, like we discussed in class on Friday. Lynching was a way for the whites to have "control" over the blacks.
"Dry September" takes place in a small southern town with a very low population. For example it states on page 439, "Through the bloody September twilight, aftermath of sixty-two rainless days, it had gone like a fire in dry grass-the rumor, the story, whatever it was", which means anything said in the town spread very fast to everyone. Which indicates it was a small town with very few people and they had a lot of extra time.
I think it's significant that they dont know what happened with the white female and the black man, they just assume the black man raped a white female. To me it shows the reader that they dont care what happened, they just want to punish the blacks due to hatred. It's an opportunity to get rid of a black man. I thought it was ironic that one of the Barbers were called "niggerlover" just because he did not believe Mayes was guilty and he was sticking up for a black man. This shows you how much peer pressure you have as a white man to hate and mistreat the blacks. Hawkshaw portrays how much pressure he had to mistreat and hate blacks. He was against the lynching and tried to stop it, but ironically he jumped into the car. He was dragged into the whole event due to peer pressure and being socially exepted. On page 444 it states" Whats the matter, Hawk"? the soldier asked "Nothing, the Barber said", so it shows you that he was not happy being involved with a lynching of a black man. He wanted to stop the event but he was powerless with out looking bad and being rejected from his peers.
The black man being accused of raping a white female was not very likely to be believed. First, the whites did not like the blacks so they were looking for anything to accuse a black man of and I think thats why it did not matter what he did. Second, white females were described as pure, innocent and repsected. People would believe a white female over a black male. So gender played a role in the story.
Minnie's girlfriends, I thought, were friends that felt obligated to hang out with her once in a while. They were not best friends, but they were distant friends. In class on Friday, we were dicussing how her friends wanted to know all about the situation so they could go back and gossip to other people. I really did not get that from the reading, i thought they wanted to know all the details and the"juicy" facts just for interest. But the more i read the store and the more i anaylze it, i kind of see where they would be asking all the questions, so they have them to go back to the town and gossip to the other people.
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I agree with you that it is very significant in the fact that they don't know what happened between Will Mayes and Minnie Cooper, nor do they care. I would imagine this is an accurate depiction of what it was like in the South Post-Civil War when it came to Black vs. White. It's so hard to wrap your mind around the hatred and racism that was so prevalent during this time.
I also think it's significant that they dont know what happened with Minnie Cooper and Will Mayes, they just assume that Will raped Minnie. I don't however think it shows the reader that they dont care what happened, that they just want to punish the blacks due to hatered although in real life that probably was the reason more then not. I think this whole situation happened because one man and one woman felt bad about their lives so she made up a story and he goes after and attacks whatever easy target comes along and their two independent acts converged to cause a devistating scene that ruins mulitple lives or at least ends Will's.
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