JOe christmas is a christ figure by kelly snyder
Joe Christmas and Jesus Christ
At first glance Joe Christmas seems to be the complete opposite of everything Jesus stands for and is. Joe is violent, has sex with prostitutes and his all around attitude to everyone and everything around him. Joe is one of those people who doesn’t care about anyone or anything other than himself. He doesn’t want to be cared for because to him he has to care for others in return. Joe is mimetic; his subconscious tells him he needs to imitate someone in order to have a personality. He can’t form his own personality because he doesn’t know how. In the text Mimesis and Violence, Girard explains why Joe is violent. Joe tries to imitate other people and other people imitate him therefore becoming one in the same and their individual personalities hidden in their subconscious clash and lead towards the violence between Joe and other people. In all actuality, though it may not seem so, Joe is in an obscurely abstract way a resemblance of Jesus Christ, Joe is a Christ figure whether it seems like it or not.
Joe Christmas is miming someone though it is not clear who. Joe’s miming comes from his subconscious; consciously he doesn’t realize he is trying to be someone else. It is purely in his mind that he is his own person. Joe imitates Christ but, in an utterly and completely abstract way. Joe Christmas has many things about him that are seemingly similar to Jesus Christ. The first similarity between the two that most people would pick up right away is their initials J.C. Christmas is both the birth of Jesus and the finding of Joe. Joe Christmas was named for being found on Christmas Eve. Joe is representative of Christ. He and Christ bother flee because someone wants to hurt them, it is not of there on freedom that they flee it is because of their guardians. The guardian of Christ is Mary and of Joe is the janitor, his grandfather. Joe is a scapegoat for many people, everyone blames their problems on Joe because they need someone other than themselves to blame. Jesus is blamed foe just about everything that happens to people because the people of the bible need someone to blame their problems on. Jesus is the scapegoat because no one particularly likes him as is with Joe Christmas. Joe is the scapegoat for Bobbie to be able to leave town. He is also a scapegoat for just about everyone around him such as the dietician. Just as the janitor, Joes’s grandfather watches Joe’s persecution by the other kids at the orphanage for being different, black; God watches the persecution of Jesus both stand by and do nothing because ether can’t intervene. Just as the Janitor knows what is to happen to Joe Gods knows what is going to happen toy Jesus.
Joe Christmas therefore is a Christ figure.
Anh Nguyen - JC and Mimesis
Anh Nguyen
B
2/23/07
Joe Christmas and Mimetic Rivalry
Being violent, sleeping around, and rejecting all forms of prayer and religion, Joe Christmas seems as if he is the opposite of everything that Jesus Christ was. However, when one further analyzes Joe, one can see that Joe Christmas is actually like Jesus Christ and can be regarded as a Christ figure. Joe Christmas was, as stated above, violent, slept around, rejected religion, did not imitate anyone, died for no one, and acts on impulse. However, at the same time, he was a lot like Jesus Christ, other than the fact that both of them had the same initials. Joe had only cared for one person when he was young, Alice at the orphanage. She was like his mother, but never was married and did not give birth to him. Similar to Mary, who was conceived of the Holy Spirit, they were Jesus’ and Joe’s mother, except that Alice left Joe when she went and got married. This is where the mother similarities split. Jesus was born on Christmas and Joe was found on Christmas Eve, with father or grandfather watching them, respectively. Also, both of them fled from their homes, unwillingly, at a young age because someone wanted to get rid of them, for Jesus is was Harod and for Joe it is his grandfather, Mr. Hines. Another similarity is that they both have someone who knows what is going to happen to them in the time near their death, for Jesus it is God, for Joe it is his grandfather again. Jesus and Joe were both persecuted for who they were, Jesus for being the king of the Jews and Joe for being Black and a murderer. Jesus walked to his death to get crucified while Joe ran towards Hightower’s place and was killed. In Girard’s Mimesis and Violence, A imitates B and B imitates A, therefore the two vie to become the same person, thus causes violence between the two of them because they vie to become the same. Also, there are scapegoats who are always used by the scapegoaters as those in Jerusalem used Jesus and the people in Jefferson used Joe Christmas so that they would not be blamed. Jerusalem and Jefferson are the two places in which the stories take place; the similarity is that they both begin with the letter J as does Joe and Jesus’ names. At first glance, Joe is everything but that of a figure of Christ, but peering in closer and looking at how his life was in context, Joe was the figure of Christ in Light in August and the ironic thing is that he probably knows it and that’s why he hates himself so much for it. Joe had always hated religion because of McEachern and hates himself. Deep inside, Joe knew he was Jesus and that’s why he hated himself. Joe is Jesus, he is the Jesus of Light in August.
-Anh Nguyen
Ellen Wagner - Joe Christmas Essay
Ellen Wagner B 2/23/07
Despite the fact that Joe Christmas’s initials are JC and his last name is Christmas, he is the antithesis of a Christ figure. Jesus was kind, loving, and non-biased. He taught, visited with the poor and sick, and in the end gave up his life willingly. Joe Christmas on the other hand is violent, impulsive, and biased against everyone (even himself). And in the end he died for no one, not even himself. Joe Christmas spends his life thinking things through, but ends up acting mostly on impulse. From a very young age, he learns the ways of the world, except he learns them all mixed up. Because of this, when he acts, it is from a skewed thought process. In the text by Girard Mimesis and Violence he says that two people (A and B) try to mimic each other, and eventually start to become each other, which only leads to violence. Because of Jesus being God (or saying he is), it leads to his being beaten and finally crucified. But who is Joe trying to become? He respects no one, and refuses to worship and god. In regard to the men in his life; the janitor (who turns out to be his grandfather) kidnaps him, Mr. McEachern beats him and tries to force religion on him, and Joe Brown turns out to betray him to the police. Each of these men he treats with cold indifference. During his childhood, he only allowed one person to care for him; Alice. Alice lived at the orphanage with him, but ends up getting adopted and leaving him. After this he allows no one, especially not women, to take care of him. The women in his life are equally not worthy of his respect (in his opinion); the dietitian, Bobbie, and then Joanna Burden all make him further hate women. Because of all these discombobulated relationships, he has no one to look up to, but himself. He has no parents, no god, not even a race to turn to, so he turns in on himself. Joe Christmas both wants to belong and wants to be rejected at the same time. Every time he starts to get close to some one, he forcefully pushes himself away, most often by violence. He turns in on himself, both halves of him trying to meld, to become a whole person, and it results in internal violence, which leaks out to those who get to close to him.
Chapter 10: Rebecca Hall
This is me taking a stab at how I interpret Chapter 10:
Faulkner is infamous for employing difficult literary devices in order to get his point across, such as grammatically incorrect sentences, liberal oxymorons and incongruous words.
In Chapter 10, Faulkner uses the "stream of consciousness" technique, allowing us into Christmas' innermost thoughts while purposefully neglecting to rearrange them in logical order. Irving Howe sums Faulkner’s approach up nicely: “In his densest paragraphs, he often lets his characters fall into reveries in which they perceive more deeply than their conscious minds possibly could.”
In order to so show us Joe Christmas’ semi-conscious mind at work after awaking on Bobbie’s floor, Faulkner incorporates snatches of partly audible conversation between Bobbie’s relatives that swim throughout his head, blurring distinctions between past, present and future.
Two years are covered rapidly in this novel and we discover that Joe has accomplished little, simply wandering the country in widening circles. The circle is a recurring symbol in Light in August; recall the circle of the urn Faulkner relates to Lena Grove.
Joe carries with him his anger towards the dietician, continuously unaware of who he really. He admits to each he sleeps his ethnicity in an attempt not to pay, and when one reacts by simply not reacting, he becomes violent. Joe Christmas is a Negro, this is all he is sure of and by denying him some sort of reaction the undermines his importance as a person. Joe Christmas simply is, though sometimes just being isn’t enough.
By Rebecca Hall
http://www.hotchkiss.k12.co.us/HHS/nobelnov/faulkner.htm
Chapter 10 Analysis- EMily Rew
In Chapter 10 Faulkner uses a literary technique called "stream of conciousness" to convey the thoughts that Joe Christmas continually experiences. He links the continuing experiences and moments of Joe's concsience into one long stream of thoughts and italicizes the continuos thought to show the reader when he is using it. This happens after Joe has been beat up and is lying on the floor. When someone has been knocked out and they wake up their mind is kind of distraught and they mix the outside senses with the inner thoughts that they are thinking. The conversation of Bobbie and her friends kind of stream together into one long sentence because Joe is recieving all this outside information combined with his physical condition like his throbbing head and it in some way distorts how his mind is interpreting it. Also the stream of conciousness is used when the image of the "road that goes on for 15 years" is used. This 15 year road is a metaphor for Joe Christmas' life, and he describes it as all the streets he has ever known and all the places he has been that run together into one long stream. This is because the experiences that Joe has in each city are one in the same to him. He eats the food out of tin dishes and "beds" with the women in each town telling them he is a "nigger." To Joe this changing of cities with the same continual experiences is just a way of finding his own identity. I liek how Faulkner uses this stream of conciousness in Chapter 10 and I can really understand how Joe Christmas must feel when he wakes up and has all these different thoughts coming into his brain and mixing around as if hsi mind is trying to make some logical order of them. All hsi past memories also come into mind like when he is smelling the food dishes. The past repressed memories come into his conscious mind and mix around with the current thoughts coming into hid mind. This helps to truly understand the thought processes of a character and helps the reader understand the current experiences of Joe.
Emily REw
Stream of Consciousness Ch 10
The stream of thought in literature is "technique that records the multifarious thoughts and feelings of a character without regard to logical argument or narrative sequenc." It reflects all the forces that are influencing the character's thought process at the given moment. http://www.bartleby.com/65/st/streamco.html The main storyline is periodically interrupted by Joe's unending stream of thought. Joe goes into the whorehouse consciously and with one last shred of hope that Bobbie will go with him but she takes that hope away from him and abandons him. He is left alone, physically and mentally beaten by the people protecting Bobbie. He lays on the bed watching them leave by the "final feet, the final door." Joe stops trying to amend his view of women permanently and is now completely alone, ending this chapter in his life. All his actions now are controlled by his past experiences, driven by his rejection by women and negative exposure to sex and punishment. His thought process is one long runon and he does not analyze the current situation, but rather reacts subconsciously to whatever his mind deems a threat. This stream of thought narrates the novel now, showing that Joe is no longer making his own decisions, and his life is dictated by his collection of memories.
Alissa Davis
Lindsay Miller- stream of consciousness + ch. 10
** Stream of consciousness format is when the author writes the main character's thoughts in just a rush of thought. Every little detail of what they are thinking is written and it is very random. They maybe thinking of the main story line but then suddenly switch to a memory or sudden action happening in the present. This format is often used to portray innocence, as a child's thoughts are often playful and fleeting. It may also be used for recurring memories that impact the story plot because in stream of consciousness, one's flashbacks of memory would come to mind most often.
** In Chapter 10, one finds Joe Christmas striking out on his own. He seems to be walking everywhere, loking for a place to stay, gain employment and food. He is just a fleeting passersby in every town and his memories are besieging him, enhanced by the stream of consciousness format used in this chapter. Eventually he arrives upon the home of Joanna Burden, and the past story line rushes up to meet the present plot with the conclusion of this chapter. Joe is realizing just what happened and how he is now on his own with little to no money, beaten up and hungry. Therefore, Joe is fully coming to terms with his present state of mind as well.
~LINDSAY MILLER
Merry (joe) Christmas!
So a basic synopsis of all the main events in chapter 10:
- Bobbie's family does not take Joe's money, only because Bobbie's 'mother' doesn't let them.
- Joe finds a bottle of something alcoholic, and then drinks the whole thing, which makes him drunk.
- He wanders around, having sex with random women and using his money which he had stolen so he could marry Bobby.
- This is ironic because he had saved it up for marriage, and instead uses it for having sex with random women.
- Tells all the women that he is black just to see their reaction .
- He starts to think of himself only as black.
- He gets angry at this woman who doesn't care that he is black.
- Then he goes and lives in a community of black people and marries a black woman.
- He's trying to become as black as he can.
- Then he leaves his wife, and goes to a town in Mississippi.
- He meets a random black boy and enquires about Joanna Burden's house.
- The kid says that no one would have a reason to harm her because she doesn't harm anybody.
- This catches Joe's interest.
- Joanna's first words to him involve food (food seems to be his connection with women).
Joe is trying to completely change from the person he was before. Mr. McEachern tried to make him a perfect white protestant, and so now he chooses to be black and sleeps with random women. He chooses to be black, even though he could pass for a white man, and tries to integrate himself with the black community because he ostracized himself from the white people.
Stream of consciousness is a technique which tells the reader what the character is thinking and feeling regardless of if it makes sense, or is chronological. For Joe Christmas, this is very relevant. His thoughts are often foreign to the common way of thinking, and so far the chronology has been skewed.
-Ellen, Melissa, Anh, Kelly (is dumb)
Light in August by Libby Brett Mary Elaine
stream of conciousness writing- off the top of your head, free ideas, "to represent the mind at work," rambling
A Concrete Example from within the text:
'Which means either fortyone or fortynine, from the way she said it,' he thought
Joe Christmas and Miss Burden have a rather unusual relationship however not so different from the past relations Joe has grwon to accept. Joe comes in and out of the house throughout the day and creeps into her bedroom at night where she lies there waiting for him. Miss Burden represents male qualities that frighten Joe. A major recap of Joe's childhood is when he smashes dishes on the floor for the food placed in front of him just like he did when he was younger inspite of the hopsitality displayed by his foster mother, Mrs. McEachern. Despite of Joe and Miss Burdens distant relationship, deep pasts of Miss Burden are revealed while the general past of Joe is as well. Although Joe and Mr. McEachern are not blood related, Joe soon turns out to be like his foster father, through perhaps, enviornment. Key points throughout the chapter are exposed through trailing of thought, stream of conciousness. In a sense. stream of conciousness helps the reader to view things not obvious from a third person limited point of view. The reader is aware of the how firghtened Joe is to recieve love from Mrs. McEachern and his feeling of inability to return that love. The racial struggle continues to be revealed and his ongoing struggle of trying to find his identity. Stream of conciousness are the exact words that Joe thinks and requires little interpretation of what he meant other than the deciphering of exactly how his words fit in with the situation.
Written by: libby, mary elaine, and brett
Stream of Consciousness
Stream of Consciousness Writing is "A literary technique that presents the thoughts and feelings of a character as they occur". In Light in August, William Faulkner presents these thoughts and feelings, especially those of Joe Christmas. Joe, being the central character in Chapter 10, has all of his thoughts pretty much narrating the novel. These thoughts and streaming commentary (as well as what Joe hears other people saying) depict the events in this chapter, such as the beating he receives from Bobbie's friends, and what they are doing to get away. The primary method of narration is this stream of consciousness, which gives an insight into what is happening, not only externally, but internally in the characters. This "stream" is literally a stream. There is no distinction between thoughts, no structure in writing, and his thoughts run on and on. In this way, Joe's "consciousness" is almost like an unconsciousness. He doesn't grasp any concept of his thoughts, they just run on and on almost uncontrollably.
CAILIN LOYD
LISA ELIZONDO
MIKE CECERO
Ch.4 - Time - Patrick Collins
In chapter 4 of A Light in August, Faulkner introduced and gave background information on three main characters of the novel. The first two characters he introduces are Joe Christmas, a half white- half black man, and Joe Brown. They both come to the town of Jefferson Mississippi and end up working in the local saw mill, Christmas a few years longer than Brown. One day after years of working at the mill we find out that Christmas has quit, which is most likely because he has made enough money in his other job (bootlegging whiskey). We also learn aroung the same time that part of the reason Brown is in town is because he is in the bootlegging business along with Christmas. Together they live is the negro cabin behind a carpetbagger women named Joanna Burden's house. Brown accuses Christmas of having a relationship with Burden, and Christmas denies it. A few days later, the same day the Lena comes to town, Joanna Burden is found in her burning house. Brown is arrested because he was rumored to be seen at the crime sight. As he is telling the story to his accusers he tells a skethcy story the mixes up the time that he found out about the fire. He senses that his story is going to be a failure so he goes to plan B, which is accusing Christmas of doing it on the grounds that he is a negro. The main theme that can be drawn from this chapter is that no matter what the story people are going to disagree about what happened in the past. Since the present is really only a fraction of a second, and the past is actually the majority of our life, we are relatively uncertain about the events in our lives. This theme of past uncertainty is best illustrated in the case of Joe Brown attempting to recall the story of his experience with the Burden fire.
Patrick Collins
Chapter 4 and Joe Christmas analysis - Nathan Sheptock
Joe Christmas, in connection with most all other major characters within the novel, has particular influence on nearly all events as well as characters throughout the continuing story line; influence which is revealed from what is both said and suggested about his character and his actions. His real influence stems from the book's perception of him as an outsider, one who came from nowhere and calls nowhere his home. People right away see him as more than likely a foreigner who is better off keeping to himself, which is exactly what he does, until he meets Joe Brown. The relationship which soon grows between them allows Joe C. to for possibly the first time in his life to let his guard down, enough to the point where he reveals to Joe B. his deepest secret, that he has Negro blood in him. This without a doubt is the major cause of his deep separation from society throughout his life up to this point. Ever since he has known of his biracial heritage, he has struggled to find peace, as he says, with those who will accept him for who he is. Belonging fully to neither the white or black societies, he is in a sense entirely isolated from everyone he has ever known, even those whom he has grown close to. This can obviously be primary grounds for his tendency to result to violence when placed in conflict with threats to the secrecy which he holds (like when Joe B. calls him a damn niggerblood, and also his eventual murder of Mrs. Burden- sort of ironic). This isolation, although seemingly mostly influential on him alone, is in fact most influential in its power to relate his character to nearly all the other major characters in the novel (so far). Although they have very contrasting backgrounds, mindsets, motives for actions, and present situations, they are all inherently tied to each other through the feeling of isolation which they are bound to: Lena in her being an unwed, very young expectant mother, to which nearly everyone looks down upon; Rev. Hightower, in past instances of his wife’s death and his departure from the Church, and in his refusal to leave town so as to become the town recluse; Joe Brown in his hiding from Lena, obvious drinking problem, and suspicion in the death of Mrs. Burden; even Byron Bunch, in his secret love for Lena, weekend choir-services in the country, and his being the only frequent visitor to Hightower’s house. This isolation binds these characters together in a way that cannot easily be explained, and without a doubts influences that actions they each take, even those which they do not wish to take. This can also be noted as another very influential theme, irony, at work in this novel also- what separates them from the rest of society is in fact what brings them all together, their sense of isolation. This interconnectedness brought forth through separation and isolation will hopefully continue to influence, to a great extent, these character’s lives as they progress with time and bring their personal stories to a juncture when they will meet to achieve a truly fulfilled outcome.
Through reading chapter four, it now becomes more evident that the pasts of the characters in the story are not pasts in a personal sense. They are pasts which seem incomplete, not whole in tsenseese in which they fit and describe one single character aleadaed that single character to their present situation. They appear to unfold more as pieces of a much larger whole, rather than whole in themselves. These pasts can only make sense and can only truly fit the characters to which they belong when they are interconnected with those pats of other characters. This can, without a doubt, be in direct correlation with the characters' present as well as their futures (since the present and future are merely pasts of those future's future, other, further futures). These major characters' lives as a whole-each of their pasts, present situations, and futures-are interconnected and as a whole are dependent each otherher.
Chapter Four Reflective Reading
Joe Christmas is an interesting character. He seems to have difficulty accepting things (facts or truths) about himself which he has no control over. Joe appears to be disturbed, or at least, extremely self conscious about being half black, also, he appears to be "scarred" from his orphanage experience. Joe Brown, lived with Joe Christmas and together they murdered Joana Burden. They never really knew themselves untill right before the murder of Burden. As far as time goes, the past does determine the present, if Joana Burden hadn't have invited Joe Christmas to live with her, she wouldn't be dead, so the past does determine the future, and so does the present.
Reflection from 12/4-Jessica Huff
Out of all of the events and people that we have met so far in the book, I feel that I can relate best to Lena Grove. Lena is currently on a quest to better her life. She thinks that by finding Burch her life will be better. At times, I feel like I am on a quest to make my life better. Additionally, Lena is extremely naive in believing that Burch really was planning on finding her. Additionally, I can be extremely naive and always expect the best in others, even when I shouldn't. She it seems as if she believes that he will receive her warmly, which the reader from an outside perspective knows otherwise. I can relate that at times I get so caught up with life that I do not see things that are obvious to others. Additionally, when I do come upon these realizations, I am crushed, which is likely going to happen to Lena.
-Jessica Huff
Chapter 5 reflection-Alissa Davis
The recurring themes regarding the senses recur as Faulkner describes the sounds and smells of black women that Christmas cannot see, but notices that they have a distinct smell. Christmas has a hatred toward women apparent in his annoyance with the buttons for unknown reasons, but this adds to his mysterious nature as he is surrounded by the images of darkness. Christmas feels isolated and alone in his search to find his inner self since he does not seem to fit in in black or white towns after he is rejected by both. This chapter has a foreboding sense of something that is going to happen to Christmas, revealed later in the novel. The mentioning of the buried whiskey and the verb "exhume" associated with it foreshadows some future events. This chapter takes place right before Christmas and Brown murder Joanna Burden with Christmas' razor and burn her house down. Faulkner does not reveal why Christmas has this hateful nature about him, or what will become of it in the future, adding to the unfinished storyline.
