Jason's chapter was where I found
all the missing pieces to the puzzle. His narration was smooth, and easier for
my mind to grasp. With that being said what a strange character Jason is. He is
violent, sneaky, and uncontrollable. Reading this chapter my mind kept
wondering why he acted like this. To start to understand I tried to relate
Jason's situation into a present situation. I figured that Jason's outbursts
happen, because he, as the oldest, had to take care of the family. From a relatively
early age he had to take control of the house, and be the man of the household,
after his father's death of alcoholism. This is a huge role, especially one who
is not ready. Having a big family, with many family issues that had been
discussed earlier in the book, he had a lot riding on him. I believe this built
up resentment and bitterness, and therefore cause the outbursts, beatings, and
hatred towards his family. From Jason's perspective he never was able to be
reckless and free like his siblings, and had to grow up much faster than
anticipated. By no means am I justifying his behavior, because Jason is crazy
throughout the whole chapter, and takes his bitterness to a whole new level.
Reading the chapter I realized
there is a particular built up hatred towards Miss Quentin. This all started to
come together looking back into the family history. Caddy married Herbert Head.
Herbert Head offered Jason a banking job. This was Jason's ideal job. However
once Herbert Head found out that Miss Quieten was not his child, he divorced
Caddy. Caddy was now unaccepted by the family, however Mr. Compson and Dilsey
saw it was necessary to take in Miss Quentin to give her a home to be raised
in. But, as I mentioned earlier, Mr. Compson died, and that left Jason in
charge of Miss Quentin, and he also lost his dream job offer from Herbert Head.
It seemed to me that Jason gained a lot of responsibility here, and lost what
he wanted. This caused him to steal the child support money for him, to beat
and hate Miss Quentin, and have bitter outbursts toward the family. There is a
lot that went into Jason’s character development, especially into the back story
of it. Even though there might be a slight justification as to why Jason acted
as this he is still an uncontrollable, hated character.
I like how you said that Jason helped you to solve the missing pieces to the puzzle. It is true that even though he was the easiest narrator to understand, he was actually the most bitter character throughout the novel. Nice relation to the build up of Miss Quentin as well!
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