How Does Sarty Show Honesty In Barn Burning

In life one of the main people a son wants to keep happy and proud is his father, but sometimes throughout life a son may not agree with the same things his father does. In William Faulkner’s short story Sarty has to choose blood over honesty and justice. Barn Burning shows us how a boy grows into his own person through a chain of events. At the first part of the story Sarty begins to question his father and considers disobeying him. Sarty and his father, Abner were in court due to his father burning down a barn. Abner wanted Sarty to lie for him in court. Sarty has to at this point chose between blood or honesty. His father then says, “You’re getting to be a man. You got to learn to stick with your own blood or you ain’t going to have any blood to stick with you.” (Faulker 190) This statement shows that Abner is realizing that Sarty is becoming his own person so he says this also to appear as a threat to scare him from the idea of being honest with the court. This statement …show more content…
Sarty still has a slight hope his father will change in the eight months they are at their new home. His father proves him wrong by purposely ruining his new bosses white rug. The black man asks him to remove his shoes but Abner says, “Get out of my way n*gger.” (Faulkner 192) This shows how his father views what his new boss owns and what he thinks about his job. After this took place the farm owner asked the rug be cleaned or work off what it is worth and this fuels Abner anger and led him to burn down the barn on the farm. Abler told Sarty to get the oil and he paused and considered to himself to not get it and just run away. When the barn burned the owner shot and killed Abner, and Sarty ran away to a top of a mountain. As Sarty sat up on the mountain he realized his father was gone and he could finally be his own man and not worry about what his father