Date of Award
Spring 5-1-2025
Document Type
Honors Project
Degree Name
Bachelor of Arts
Department
English and Linguistics
Department Chair or Program Director
Jonathan Levin
First Advisor
Gary Richards
Major or Concentration
English
Abstract
In my essay, I examine how James Joyce’s A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and William Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury display how dysfunctional patterns of behavior by alcoholic fathers perpetuate intergenerational patterns of emotional immaturity and stunted individual development for their oldest sons. I explore parental alcoholism’s negative effect on a child through the characters of Stephen Dedalus in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and Quentin Compson in The Sound and the Fury. I investigate the similarities between Stephen and Quentin, who, just like Joyce and Faulkner, are each the oldest sons of alcoholic fathers in families facing social and economic hardship in response to national change. I analyze Stephen’s father, Simon Dedalus, and how his alcoholic behavior contributes to Stephen’s shame and worthlessness, fueling his obsession with defining his place in the world. Additionally, Quentin’s father, Jason Compson’s, alcoholic behavior feeds Quentin’s unstable sense of purpose through his desire to arrest time. Unable to cope with the decline of his family’s legacy, Quentin carries his grandfather’s watch, a symbol of his desire to arrest time. His unstable sense of purpose leads him to feel hopeless, ultimately reflected in his suicide. As products of intergenerational alcoholism, Stephen and Quentin’s perceptions and experiences reflect Joyce and Faulkner’s own struggles as children of alcoholic fathers.
Recommended Citation
Chamer, Haley, "Damaging Ramifications to Unprocessed Trauma: Intergenerational Alcoholism in James Joyce’s A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and William Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury" (2025). Departmental Honors & Graduate Capstone Projects. 617.
https://scholar.umw.edu/student_research/617