Thomas Sutpen Character Analysis

Sutpen’s attitude and values, which influence his lifestyle, have drastically changed due to the huge impact that events in his past have had on his upbringing. These events helped him to become who he aspired to be but they also played a huge role in his downfall. In order to exemplify how Sutpen’s past actions affect his attitude and values, Faulkner uses multiple points of view, visual imagery, and indirect characterization.
1807 in a small town in West Virginia, a child who was a virgin too much of the evils of the world was born, and his name is Thomas Sutpen. Sutpen was born blind to the idea that money was the source of leading a happy life because he grew up poor, and closed off to the harsh social hierarchy of life. “where he lived … few men … power of life and death and barter and sale” (Faulkner 179). Sutpen’s family traveled a lot, as his father tried to search for work, and along the journey Sutpen’s eyes were opened to the value of money, and the role it plays in society. “That’s the way he got it. He had learned the …show more content…
1861, Sutpen went off to war as second in command to General Santos. During the war he would eventually gain stature amongst the General and became Colonel. The civil war changed Sutpen, and when he returned home the change was evident. Upon returning home from the civil war Sutpen had learned of many events that occurred while he was gone that would change his whole life, and potentially be the cause of his death. When Sutpen returned he learned that his son, Henry, had killed his eldest, Charles. Not only did he learn that his son, whom repudiated his birthright, had killed the other, but he learned that his deceased wife’s sister, Rosa, had moved into Sutpen’s Hundred. Sutpen hated that he could not bore a son who could be half the man that Charles Bon was. He hated that Bon was everything he wanted to be, but was