As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner

The above section is an account passage. Vardaman’s relationship of his mother’s demise with the fish’s passing from the start is by all accounts an adolescent, counter-intuitive association. This relationship, alongside Darl’s connecting of the topic of presence to a matter of â€Å"was† versus â€Å"is,† permits these two uneducated characters to handle the exceptionally perplexing issues of death and presence. The peculiar idea of this trade represents the Bundrens’ powerlessness to manage Addie’s demise in an increasingly sane manner. For Darl, language has an impossible to miss authority over Addie’s presence: he accepts that she can't be a â€Å"is,† or a thing that keeps on existing, on the grounds that she is a â€Å"was,† or a thing that does not exist anymore. For Vardaman, objects that are like each other become compatible: he appoints the job of his mom to the fish, for instance, on the grounds that the fish is dead, as Addie. These to some degree consistent reactions to Addie’s demise show that Darl and Vardaman, similar to the remainder of their family, can't have a solid enthusiastic reaction to death.