Identitarian Trauma of Joe Christmas in William Faulkner’s Light In August

Abstract

William Faulkner is confronted with the problem of identitarian trauma experienced by the characters of his novel Light in August. Ronald David Laing in his famous book The Divided Self provides an account of persons who suffer trauma in their life. William Faulkner’s characters in the novel Light in August suffer from cultural and psychological traumas “differentiated from the rest of the world in ordinary circumstances sp clearly that their identity and autonomy are never in question” (R.D. Laing, The Divided Self 41).