1. William Faulkner, "On Privacy. The American Dream: What Happened to It," p. 61. All subsequent page citations are in the text.

2. William Faulkner, Absalom, Absalom! All subsequent page citations are in the text.

3. In Faulkner's Fictive Architecture , chapter 4, William Ruzicka links southern architecture to Greek not only in terms of its adaptation of the elements of style in "Greek Revival" but also in terms of the sensibility betokened in that style, which is centralized, exclusionary, geometric, symmetrical, and self-referential; communal and regional rather than imperial; and well suited to the insularity and self-sufficiency of the patriarchal plantation. Sutpen's design follows this pattern in most particulars, and certainly in spirit, though in every respect the virtues the design are intended to evoke and enhance are subverted, the meaning is undermined, and the dream becomes "something like a wing of Versailles glimpsed in a Lilliput's gothic nightmare" ( Requiem for a Nun , p. 40). Ruzicka also calls attention to the reiterated comparisons between the plan and scale of Sutpen's estate and the plan and scale of Jefferson itself; as Sutpen planned it, the place "would have been almost as large as Jefferson itself at the time" (38). And Sutpen's house, planned by the same architect who designed the courthouse in Jefferson, is described by Miss Rosa as "the size of a court house" (16) and by Jason Compson as ''the Spartan shell of the largest edifice in the country, not excepting the courthouse itself" (39).

4. Ibid., p. 46. break

5. See ibid., p. 50, for further discussion of the idea of "ontological poverty" as defined by Frederick Wilhelmsen and applied to Sutpen.

3. In Faulkner's Fictive Architecture , chapter 4, William Ruzicka links southern architecture to Greek not only in terms of its adaptation of the elements of style in "Greek Revival" but also in terms of the sensibility betokened in that style, which is centralized, exclusionary, geometric, symmetrical, and self-referential; communal and regional rather than imperial; and well suited to the insularity and self-sufficiency of the patriarchal plantation. Sutpen's design follows this pattern in most particulars, and certainly in spirit, though in every respect the virtues the design are intended to evoke and enhance are subverted, the meaning is undermined, and the dream becomes "something like a wing of Versailles glimpsed in a Lilliput's gothic nightmare" ( Requiem for a Nun , p. 40). Ruzicka also calls attention to the reiterated comparisons between the plan and scale of Sutpen's estate and the plan and scale of Jefferson itself; as Sutpen planned it, the place "would have been almost as large as Jefferson itself at the time" (38). And Sutpen's house, planned by the same architect who designed the courthouse in Jefferson, is described by Miss Rosa as "the size of a court house" (16) and by Jason Compson as ''the Spartan shell of the largest edifice in the country, not excepting the courthouse itself" (39).

4. Ibid., p. 46. break

5. See ibid., p. 50, for further discussion of the idea of "ontological poverty" as defined by Frederick Wilhelmsen and applied to Sutpen.

3. In Faulkner's Fictive Architecture , chapter 4, William Ruzicka links southern architecture to Greek not only in terms of its adaptation of the elements of style in "Greek Revival" but also in terms of the sensibility betokened in that style, which is centralized, exclusionary, geometric, symmetrical, and self-referential; communal and regional rather than imperial; and well suited to the insularity and self-sufficiency of the patriarchal plantation. Sutpen's design follows this pattern in most particulars, and certainly in spirit, though in every respect the virtues the design are intended to evoke and enhance are subverted, the meaning is undermined, and the dream becomes "something like a wing of Versailles glimpsed in a Lilliput's gothic nightmare" ( Requiem for a Nun , p. 40). Ruzicka also calls attention to the reiterated comparisons between the plan and scale of Sutpen's estate and the plan and scale of Jefferson itself; as Sutpen planned it, the place "would have been almost as large as Jefferson itself at the time" (38). And Sutpen's house, planned by the same architect who designed the courthouse in Jefferson, is described by Miss Rosa as "the size of a court house" (16) and by Jason Compson as ''the Spartan shell of the largest edifice in the country, not excepting the courthouse itself" (39).

4. Ibid., p. 46. break

5. See ibid., p. 50, for further discussion of the idea of "ontological poverty" as defined by Frederick Wilhelmsen and applied to Sutpen.

6. For a discussion of miscegenation as the divisive element in Sutpen's house and in Southern culture, see Eric J. Sundquist, Faulkner: The House Divided , pp. 96-130. Reading Sutpen's saga as historical allegory, Sundquist compares Sutpen in certain respects to Lincoln and the fate of his house, to that of the South, riven paradoxically by the fusions and confusions of miscegenation, and beyond that to the fate of the nation.

7. The two lines of legitimate and illegitimate heritage come together symbolically in Charles Bon's son, Charles Etienne de Saint Valery Bon, whom Clytie brings back to Sutpen's Hundred after the death of his mother. Until adulthood, he lives in Sutpen's house in the ambiguous position of an illegitimate child of miscegenation, sleeping first, ironically, in Judith's bedroom, then in the hall on an elevated cot to distinguish him from the slave, Clytie--Sutpen's child as well, but blacker than he and female, who slept on a pallet on the floor--and then in the attic, with its "spartan arrangements," until he was fourteen and left this home that was only half a home to discover the suppressed half of his identity.