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When Syntax Endures Man's Enduring Was... The Relevance of Faulkner’s ‘Octopus’ Sentence

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BAYA BENSALAH
BAYA BENSALAH

The document discusses William Faulkner's use of lengthy and complex sentences in his writing, known as "imbrications." It provides an example of one of Faulkner's imbricated sentences from his work describing the history and development of a town and its jail. The example sentence uses numerous clauses, appositives, participial phrases, and other syntactic structures to provide extensive detail in a single lengthy sentence. It also includes a diagram breaking down the mental representation of the structures described in the jail sentence. The document examines Faulkner's style of using such complex sentences to provide a great deal of information without punctuation through intricate syntactic embedding.

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Ms. Baya BENSALAH Kasdi Merbah University, Ouargla. Algeria bensalah30@gmail.com When Syntax Endures Man's Enduring Was... The Relevance of Faulkner’s ‘Octopus’ Sentence
THE JAIL
 Stringing out sequences of clauses  Long descriptions  Appositives within appositives Semi-colons  Parentheses within parentheses  Dashes  Reiteration  Participial Clauses  Subordination  Coordination  A Superabundance of words
Examples
And so, being older than all, it had seen all: the mutation and the change; and, in that sense, had recorded them (indeed, as Gavin Stevens, the town lawyer and the country amateur Cincinnatus, was wont to say, if you would peruse in unbroken—ay, overlapping---continuity the history of a community, look not in the church registers and the courthouse records , but beneath the successive layers of calcimine and creosote and whitewash on the walls of the jail, since only that forcible carceration does man find the idleness in which to compose, in the gross and simple terms of his gross and simple lusts and yearnings, the gross and simple recapitulations of his gross and simple heart);
(as a result of which, the town itself had moved one block south-or rather, no town then and yet, the courthouse itself the catalyst: a mere dusty widening of the trace, trail, pathway in a forest of oak and ash and hickory […] trading-post store and blacksmith's, and diagonal to all of them, en face and solitary beyond the dust, the log jail; moved--- the town---the complete and intact, one block southward, so that now, a century and a quarter later, the coaching-yard and […] brick by the land ((or anyway pocketbooks)) of Sartoris and Sutpen and Louis Grenier, faced not even on a side-street but on an alley);
Because there was no town until there was a courthouse , and no courthouse until (like some unsentient unweaned creature torn violently from the dug of its dam) the floorless lean-to rabbit-hutch housing the iron chest was reft from the log flank of the jail and transmogrified into a by-neo-Greek-out-of- Georgian-England edifice set in the center of what in time would be the town Square (as a result of which, the town itself had moved one block south-or rather, no town then and yet, the courthouse itself the catalyst: a mere dusty widening of the trace, trail, pathway in a forest of oak and ash and hickory and sycamore and flowering catalpa and dogwood and judas tree and persimmon and wild plum, with on one side old Alec Holston's tavern and coaching-yard, and a little farther along, Ratcliffe's trading-post store and blacksmith's, and diagonal to all of them, en face and solitary beyond the dust, the log jail; moved---the town---the complete and intact, one block southward, so that now, a century and a quarter later, the coaching-yard and Ratcliffe's store were gone and old Alec's tavern and blacksmith's were a hotel and a garage, on a main thoroughfare true enough but still a business side-street, and the jail across from them though transformed also now into two storeys of Georgian brick by the land ((or anyway pocketbooks)) of Sartoris and Sutpen and Louis Grenier, faced not even on a side- street but on an alley); And so, being older than all, it had seen all: the mutation and the change; and, in that sense, had recorded them (indeed, as Gavin Stevens, the town lawyer and the country amateur Cincinnatus, was wont to say, if you would peruse in unbroken—ay, overlapping---continuity the history of a community, look not in the church registers and the courthouse records , but beneath the successive layers of calcimine and creosote and whitewash on the walls of the jail, since only that forcible carceration does man find the idleness in which to compose, in the gross and simple terms of his gross and simple lusts and yearnings, the gross and simple recapitulations of his gross and simple heart) invisible and impacted, not only beneath the annual inside creosote-and-whitewash of bullpen and cell, but on the blind outside walls too, first the simple mud- chinked log ones and then the symmetric brick, not only the scrawled illiterate repetitive unimaginative doggerel and the perspectiveless almost prehistoric sexual picture-writing, but the images, the panorama not only of the town but of its days and years until a century and better had been accomplished, filled not only with its mutation and change from a halting-place: to a community: to a settlement: to a village: to a town, but with the shapes and motions, the gestures of passion and hope and travail and endurance, of the men and women and children in their successive overlapping generations long after the subjects which had reflected the images were vanished and replaced and again replaced, as when you stand alone in a dim and empty room and believe, hypnotised beneath the vast weight of man's incredible and enduring Was,…" (RFN: 183-184-185)
What is the Relevance of Faulkner’s ‘Octopus’ Sentence?
The Jail: Lemon Squeeze [Because there was no town (Subordinate Clause) until there was a courthouse, (Subordinate Clause) and no courthouse until (Subordinate Verbless Clause) ] A sentence fragment because these dependent clauses need to attach to another clause that is independent. [(like some unsentient unweaned creature (Comparative Subordinate Clause with Double Adj) torn violently (Past Participial Phrase) from the dug of its dam (Prepositional phrase)] Parenthetical Clause the floorless lean-to rabbit-hutch (Triple Adjs) housing the iron chest (Participial Phrase) was reft from the log flank of the jail (Double Prepositional Phrases) (Independent Clause) and transmogrified (Past Participial Phrase) into a by-neo-Greek-out-of-Georgian- England (Compound Adj) edifice [set in the center (Prepositional Phrase) of what in time (Prepositional Phrase) would be the town Square] (Modifying Clause) (as a result of which, (Ellipted Subordinate Clause) the town itself had moved one block south- (Subordinate Clause) or rather, no town then (Or Verbless Clause) and yet, the courthouse itself the catalyst: (Semi colon introducing a descriptive list of the town before the construction of the couthouse) a mere dusty widening of the trace, trail, pathway in a forest of oak and ash and hickory and sycamore and flowering catalpa and dogwood and judas tree and persimmon and wild plum, with on one side old Alec Holston's tavern and coaching-yard, and a little farther along, Ratcliffe's trading-post store and blacksmith's, and diagonal to all of them, en face and solitary beyond the dust, the log jail; moved (Verb whose subject is the town)---[end of the appositive that began in the town itself had moved one block south] the town [Repetition of the subject "town" ]---the complete and intact, (Double Adj) one block southward [Repetition reminding the movement of the Town], so that now, a century and a quarter later, (Appositive) the coaching-yard and Ratcliffe's store were gone (So Clause) and old Alec's tavern and blacksmith's were a hotel and a garage, (Dependant Clause) on a main thoroughfare true enough (Appositive) but still a business side-street, (But Clause) and the jail across from them (Prepositional Phrase) though transformed [also now (Though Clause) into two storeys of Georgian brick (Double Prepositional Phrase)] by the land (Agent of the Passive Voice Clause whose verb is transformed and the jail as its object) ((or anyway pocketbooks)) (Appositive within parenthesis within parenthesis) of Sartoris and Sutpen and Louis Grenier, faced not even on a side-street
Old Alec Holston's tavern Coaching-yard Trading-post Store Blacksmith's The Log Jail Judas TreeHickory Catalpa TreeDogwoodWild Plum The courthouse built here Mental Representation Of The Jail
Oxford Jail, Oxford, Mississippi (1871). …and here is how the jail really stood in 1871 (See Hines, T. S. 1997), solitary, impacted and remote; note that the logs are replaced by bricks:
Faulkner's imbrications Reader's 'de-imbrications' [CA1] who in all his life had owned but one object more than he could wear and carry in his pockets and his hands at one time, and this was the narrow iron cot and the stained lean mattress [CA2] which he used camping in the woods for deer and bear or for fishing or simply because he loved the woods; [CA3] who owned no property and never desired to since the earth was no man’s but all men’s, as light and air and weather were; [CA4] who lived still in the cheap frame bungalow in Jefferson [CA5] which his wife’s father gave them on their marriage and [CA6] which his wife had willed him at her death and [CA7] which he had pretended to accept, acquiesce to, to humor her, ease her going [CA8] but which was not his, will or not, chancery dying wishes mortmain possession or whatever, himself merely holding it for his wife’s sister and her children [CA9] who had lived in it with him since his wife’s death, holding himself welcome to live in one room [CI1] [Isaac lived in all his life had owned but one object more than he could wear and carry in his pockets and his hands at one time, and this was the narrow iron cot and the stained lean mattress]. [CI2] [Isaac used the narrow iron cot and the stained lean mattress camping in the woods for deer and bear or for fishing or simply because he loved the woods]. [CI3] [Isaac owned no property and never desired to since the earth was no man’s but all men’s, as light and air and weather were;] [CI4] [Isaac lived still in the cheap frame bungalow in Jefferson.] [CI5] [His wife’s father gave them the cheap frame bungalow on their marriage]. [CI6] [His wife had willed him the cheap frame bungalow at her death]. [CI7] [He had pretended to accept the cheap frame bungalow, acquiesce to, to humor her, ease her going] [CI8] [but the cheap frame bungalow was not his, will or not, [chancery dying wishes mortmain possession or whatever, himself merely holding it for his wife’s sister and her children]. [CI9] [Isaac had lived in it with him since his wife’s death, holding himself welcome to live in one room.]
Techniques used to imbricate clauses:
When Syntax Endures Man's Enduring Was... The Relevance of Faulkner’s ‘Octopus’ Sentence
When Syntax Endures Man's Enduring Was... The Relevance of Faulkner’s ‘Octopus’ Sentence
Sutpen Ellen Ellen's Father French Architect Indians Yoknapatawpha Matryoshka Dolls
YOKNAPATAWPHA TOWN CITY YEARS MONTHS WEEKS ONE SENTENCE CLAUSES WORDS Spatio-temporal Syntax
The Cognitive Principle of Relevance Effects Efforts
Small Efforts Large Effects Relevance Large Efforts Small Effects Irrelevance •Condition 1: an assumption is relevant in a context to the extent that its contextual effects in this context are large. •Condition 2: an assumption is relevant in a context to the extent that the effort required to process it in this context is small. This implicates that the opposite is true:
So what about the octopus sentence? The effort incurred in its process is immense and its effects are uneven Extra processing efforts Extra processing cognitive effects Relevance
- restructures the very skeleton of language to get the reader to restructure his reflection - sets the reader to the continuous 'scientific exercise' of critical reading and thinking. - strains conventional syntax, piling clause upon clause in an effort to capture the complexity of thought. - breaks the rules of English syntax, which confine his thought and forces the reader to perceive the complex interrelations of Blacks, Whites, Indians; women, men and children; villages, towns and cities. - Faulkner's syntax is one way of imitating a life-story captured within the Spatio-temporal dimension of overlapping generations. The overall structure of Faulkner’s texts works to achieve a precise communicative goal that is the proclamation of his overall theme of intricate interrelations:
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When Syntax Endures Man's Enduring Was... The Relevance of Faulkner’s ‘Octopus’ Sentence

  • 1. Ms. Baya BENSALAH Kasdi Merbah University, Ouargla. Algeria bensalah30@gmail.com When Syntax Endures Man's Enduring Was... The Relevance of Faulkner’s ‘Octopus’ Sentence
  • 3.  Stringing out sequences of clauses  Long descriptions  Appositives within appositives Semi-colons  Parentheses within parentheses  Dashes  Reiteration  Participial Clauses  Subordination  Coordination  A Superabundance of words
  • 5. And so, being older than all, it had seen all: the mutation and the change; and, in that sense, had recorded them (indeed, as Gavin Stevens, the town lawyer and the country amateur Cincinnatus, was wont to say, if you would peruse in unbroken—ay, overlapping---continuity the history of a community, look not in the church registers and the courthouse records , but beneath the successive layers of calcimine and creosote and whitewash on the walls of the jail, since only that forcible carceration does man find the idleness in which to compose, in the gross and simple terms of his gross and simple lusts and yearnings, the gross and simple recapitulations of his gross and simple heart);
  • 6. (as a result of which, the town itself had moved one block south-or rather, no town then and yet, the courthouse itself the catalyst: a mere dusty widening of the trace, trail, pathway in a forest of oak and ash and hickory […] trading-post store and blacksmith's, and diagonal to all of them, en face and solitary beyond the dust, the log jail; moved--- the town---the complete and intact, one block southward, so that now, a century and a quarter later, the coaching-yard and […] brick by the land ((or anyway pocketbooks)) of Sartoris and Sutpen and Louis Grenier, faced not even on a side-street but on an alley);
  • 7. Because there was no town until there was a courthouse , and no courthouse until (like some unsentient unweaned creature torn violently from the dug of its dam) the floorless lean-to rabbit-hutch housing the iron chest was reft from the log flank of the jail and transmogrified into a by-neo-Greek-out-of- Georgian-England edifice set in the center of what in time would be the town Square (as a result of which, the town itself had moved one block south-or rather, no town then and yet, the courthouse itself the catalyst: a mere dusty widening of the trace, trail, pathway in a forest of oak and ash and hickory and sycamore and flowering catalpa and dogwood and judas tree and persimmon and wild plum, with on one side old Alec Holston's tavern and coaching-yard, and a little farther along, Ratcliffe's trading-post store and blacksmith's, and diagonal to all of them, en face and solitary beyond the dust, the log jail; moved---the town---the complete and intact, one block southward, so that now, a century and a quarter later, the coaching-yard and Ratcliffe's store were gone and old Alec's tavern and blacksmith's were a hotel and a garage, on a main thoroughfare true enough but still a business side-street, and the jail across from them though transformed also now into two storeys of Georgian brick by the land ((or anyway pocketbooks)) of Sartoris and Sutpen and Louis Grenier, faced not even on a side- street but on an alley); And so, being older than all, it had seen all: the mutation and the change; and, in that sense, had recorded them (indeed, as Gavin Stevens, the town lawyer and the country amateur Cincinnatus, was wont to say, if you would peruse in unbroken—ay, overlapping---continuity the history of a community, look not in the church registers and the courthouse records , but beneath the successive layers of calcimine and creosote and whitewash on the walls of the jail, since only that forcible carceration does man find the idleness in which to compose, in the gross and simple terms of his gross and simple lusts and yearnings, the gross and simple recapitulations of his gross and simple heart) invisible and impacted, not only beneath the annual inside creosote-and-whitewash of bullpen and cell, but on the blind outside walls too, first the simple mud- chinked log ones and then the symmetric brick, not only the scrawled illiterate repetitive unimaginative doggerel and the perspectiveless almost prehistoric sexual picture-writing, but the images, the panorama not only of the town but of its days and years until a century and better had been accomplished, filled not only with its mutation and change from a halting-place: to a community: to a settlement: to a village: to a town, but with the shapes and motions, the gestures of passion and hope and travail and endurance, of the men and women and children in their successive overlapping generations long after the subjects which had reflected the images were vanished and replaced and again replaced, as when you stand alone in a dim and empty room and believe, hypnotised beneath the vast weight of man's incredible and enduring Was,…" (RFN: 183-184-185)
  • 8. What is the Relevance of Faulkner’s ‘Octopus’ Sentence?
  • 9. The Jail: Lemon Squeeze [Because there was no town (Subordinate Clause) until there was a courthouse, (Subordinate Clause) and no courthouse until (Subordinate Verbless Clause) ] A sentence fragment because these dependent clauses need to attach to another clause that is independent. [(like some unsentient unweaned creature (Comparative Subordinate Clause with Double Adj) torn violently (Past Participial Phrase) from the dug of its dam (Prepositional phrase)] Parenthetical Clause the floorless lean-to rabbit-hutch (Triple Adjs) housing the iron chest (Participial Phrase) was reft from the log flank of the jail (Double Prepositional Phrases) (Independent Clause) and transmogrified (Past Participial Phrase) into a by-neo-Greek-out-of-Georgian- England (Compound Adj) edifice [set in the center (Prepositional Phrase) of what in time (Prepositional Phrase) would be the town Square] (Modifying Clause) (as a result of which, (Ellipted Subordinate Clause) the town itself had moved one block south- (Subordinate Clause) or rather, no town then (Or Verbless Clause) and yet, the courthouse itself the catalyst: (Semi colon introducing a descriptive list of the town before the construction of the couthouse) a mere dusty widening of the trace, trail, pathway in a forest of oak and ash and hickory and sycamore and flowering catalpa and dogwood and judas tree and persimmon and wild plum, with on one side old Alec Holston's tavern and coaching-yard, and a little farther along, Ratcliffe's trading-post store and blacksmith's, and diagonal to all of them, en face and solitary beyond the dust, the log jail; moved (Verb whose subject is the town)---[end of the appositive that began in the town itself had moved one block south] the town [Repetition of the subject "town" ]---the complete and intact, (Double Adj) one block southward [Repetition reminding the movement of the Town], so that now, a century and a quarter later, (Appositive) the coaching-yard and Ratcliffe's store were gone (So Clause) and old Alec's tavern and blacksmith's were a hotel and a garage, (Dependant Clause) on a main thoroughfare true enough (Appositive) but still a business side-street, (But Clause) and the jail across from them (Prepositional Phrase) though transformed [also now (Though Clause) into two storeys of Georgian brick (Double Prepositional Phrase)] by the land (Agent of the Passive Voice Clause whose verb is transformed and the jail as its object) ((or anyway pocketbooks)) (Appositive within parenthesis within parenthesis) of Sartoris and Sutpen and Louis Grenier, faced not even on a side-street
  • 10. Old Alec Holston's tavern Coaching-yard Trading-post Store Blacksmith's The Log Jail Judas TreeHickory Catalpa TreeDogwoodWild Plum The courthouse built here Mental Representation Of The Jail
  • 11. Oxford Jail, Oxford, Mississippi (1871). …and here is how the jail really stood in 1871 (See Hines, T. S. 1997), solitary, impacted and remote; note that the logs are replaced by bricks:
  • 12. Faulkner's imbrications Reader's 'de-imbrications' [CA1] who in all his life had owned but one object more than he could wear and carry in his pockets and his hands at one time, and this was the narrow iron cot and the stained lean mattress [CA2] which he used camping in the woods for deer and bear or for fishing or simply because he loved the woods; [CA3] who owned no property and never desired to since the earth was no man’s but all men’s, as light and air and weather were; [CA4] who lived still in the cheap frame bungalow in Jefferson [CA5] which his wife’s father gave them on their marriage and [CA6] which his wife had willed him at her death and [CA7] which he had pretended to accept, acquiesce to, to humor her, ease her going [CA8] but which was not his, will or not, chancery dying wishes mortmain possession or whatever, himself merely holding it for his wife’s sister and her children [CA9] who had lived in it with him since his wife’s death, holding himself welcome to live in one room [CI1] [Isaac lived in all his life had owned but one object more than he could wear and carry in his pockets and his hands at one time, and this was the narrow iron cot and the stained lean mattress]. [CI2] [Isaac used the narrow iron cot and the stained lean mattress camping in the woods for deer and bear or for fishing or simply because he loved the woods]. [CI3] [Isaac owned no property and never desired to since the earth was no man’s but all men’s, as light and air and weather were;] [CI4] [Isaac lived still in the cheap frame bungalow in Jefferson.] [CI5] [His wife’s father gave them the cheap frame bungalow on their marriage]. [CI6] [His wife had willed him the cheap frame bungalow at her death]. [CI7] [He had pretended to accept the cheap frame bungalow, acquiesce to, to humor her, ease her going] [CI8] [but the cheap frame bungalow was not his, will or not, [chancery dying wishes mortmain possession or whatever, himself merely holding it for his wife’s sister and her children]. [CI9] [Isaac had lived in it with him since his wife’s death, holding himself welcome to live in one room.]
  • 18. The Cognitive Principle of Relevance Effects Efforts
  • 19. Small Efforts Large Effects Relevance Large Efforts Small Effects Irrelevance •Condition 1: an assumption is relevant in a context to the extent that its contextual effects in this context are large. •Condition 2: an assumption is relevant in a context to the extent that the effort required to process it in this context is small. This implicates that the opposite is true:
  • 20. So what about the octopus sentence? The effort incurred in its process is immense and its effects are uneven Extra processing efforts Extra processing cognitive effects Relevance
  • 21. - restructures the very skeleton of language to get the reader to restructure his reflection - sets the reader to the continuous 'scientific exercise' of critical reading and thinking. - strains conventional syntax, piling clause upon clause in an effort to capture the complexity of thought. - breaks the rules of English syntax, which confine his thought and forces the reader to perceive the complex interrelations of Blacks, Whites, Indians; women, men and children; villages, towns and cities. - Faulkner's syntax is one way of imitating a life-story captured within the Spatio-temporal dimension of overlapping generations. The overall structure of Faulkner’s texts works to achieve a precise communicative goal that is the proclamation of his overall theme of intricate interrelations: