A Clown Car

        As a family, the Bundren are a preposterous group of people. When we look at them at an individual level, they are also all a bit absurd (some more than others) except for Dewey Dell. In the case of Dewey Dell, she seems a bit selfish since she cares more about her abortion than the death of her mother, but otherwise is a motherly character. However, the rest of the family would definitely leave me thinking are you ok? if I had an encounter with them. 

As the family slowly goes along their journey to bury their mother, they sacrifice and do things along the way that makes them more absurd each day. The first big moment is when they decide to cross the river. Despite many people telling them not to cross the bridge and just “bury her at New Hope” (86) their absurdity gets the better of them and they do it anyway. As they came to discover, trying to cross the bridge was very dangerous and stupid, and nearly cost them Cash’s life. The second odd thing is the smell from the dead body. In many of the perspectives of people outside of the family they mention the horrible stench. “It was like I could smell it in the field a mile away from just watching them, and then circling and circling for everybody in the country to see what was in my barn” (187). Yet for some odd reason they seem immune to the smell and only mention it once towards the end of the story. The last of many absurd things they do is not treat Cash leg. Despite being told that he should go to a doctor by the town folk, they decide to make their own makeshift cast. When they finally met the doctor he says, “I’d be damned if the man that’d let Anse Bundren treat him with raw cement aint got more spare legs than I have’” (239). He makes fun of Anse’s decision to make a cement cast, because only someone who wasn’t thinking straight would attempt something like that.

For that same reason, I would classify Cash as an absurd character. I understand if after a bad scratch or some other minor injury one would play it off, but not for major injuries. During the initial incident, he passes out and throws up a lot, later we learn his leg is broken, burnt and eventually turns black yet he continues to say “It don't bother none”. No normal person would be able to hold down that amount of pain no matter the situation. 

In Vardamen’s case the impact of his mom’s death changes something in him. He begins associating the fish with his mother, repeating the phrase “My mother is a fish” multiple times. The neighbors even say “He’s outen his head with grief and worry ” (70). He goes absurd from coping with the death of his mother. 

I was unsure whether to put Jewel as bizarre or normal, but after his encounter with Darl at the end I decided bizarre. When they send Darl away he says “Kill him. Kill the son of a bitch” (238) and not in a joking way. Throughout the story he never does anything that seems crazy, just little things that are odd. For example, the horse story where he would stay up every night to work the land for days on end seems like torture. His family thought he was sick at first because he took care of himself so poorly. 

With Anse he is such a lazy and hypocritical character that it’s hard not to judge him as being absurd. He doesn’t care about others' well being which we can see with the lack of care for Jewel, Addie and Cash when they have health problems. In addition to lacking basic empathy he is also extremely lazy. After Anse lazies his way through another problem Cash says “Sometimes I think that if a working man could see work as far ahead as a lazy man can see laziness” (236). Even people outside of the family classify him as “loving nobody, caring for nothing except how to get something with the least amount of work” (22). 

Last of the absurd people is Darl. He would always nag Jewel about Addie’s death and then later for his father and Dewey Dell about her pregnancy. However his most absurd act was when he lit the barn on fire in an attempt to end the journey. His whole family sends him away for setting the fire and there is talk of him being crazy; Jewel says they should “fix him” and Cash talks about if he could classify Darl as being crazy. 

As for the normal member, Dewey Dell is a bit absurd by association for being a part of the journey to bury Addie, however she’s not crazy when looked at from an individual side. Besides her lack of display of grief for her mother because of her abortion she exhibits motherly traits. For example “Dewey Dell stoops and wipes it with her away with the hem of her dress” (157) and she also helps Varadmen and his red train problems. 

All in all I hope they take some time to reflect on their journey and learn how to be more empathetic and aware people. Though knowing how they all act now, it’s hard to see a brighter future for them.