Mules

History of Mules in Southern Culture
Mules as depicted in Faulkner's novels, are an integral part of Southern culture, "symbolizing not the pomp and finery of southern civilization, but the "other" side of southern culture." (385) In Faulkner's novels, mules are utilized by blacks and poor whites, and represent the "other," the non-slave/plantation owning population.

As the cotton market exploded with the existence of huge plantations and slave labor, the use of mules exploded as slave owners opted for cheaper sources of labor. In 1925, a census shows that three-fourths of working animals in the South were mules. Many scholars argue the reason for the popularity of mules in Southern plantation labor. Kyle D. Kaufman most logically argues that "southern landlords were willing to pay for mules because they were a type of physical capital which could stand abuse." (383) Whites associated slaves with mules as both were "viewed as beasts of burden admirably suited for laboring in the Deep South." (387)

Furthermore, mules are especially important in Southern culture, because of the notion of "40 Acres and a Mule" in which each freed slave was promised 40 acres and a mule. This attempt for reparation in itself problematic because of the nature of mules -- they are a mixed species that are bred from a horse and a donkey; because they are a mixed species, they are almost always infertile. Mules are not a reliable source of sustainable labor, as they do not reproduce. Because of its mixed essence, the term "mulatto" also comes from mules. "Mulatto" is a derogatory term for someone that is considered "mixed race."

Zora Neale Hurston, (a black woman author who was contemporary to Faulkner) in her acclaimed novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, makes a profound analogy between the status of black women and mules in the South. She writes: "de white man is de ruler of everything as fur as Ah been able tuh find out...de white man throw down de load and tell de nigger man tuh pick it up. He pick it up because he have to, but he don’t tote it. He hand it to his womenfolks. De nigger woman is de mule uh de world so fur as Ah can see."[1] Black women, like mules, were expected to pick up the slack of the community without complaint. They were the uncredited, imperative backbone of Southern society.

Mules in The Sound and the Fury
The Sound and the Fury depicts the difference in the societal value between horses and mules. In Southern culture, mules were deemed unfit "for riding or pulling a carriage of those in authority." As such, the Compson family, who is hanging onto the last thread to their history of Southern aristocracy, only travels by a carriage pulled by a horse.

In a scene where Quentin Compson is returning to his home by train, he contemplates the difference between the "niggers" of the South and the "colored people" of the North. As he contemplates the difference in representation of black people between the North and South, Quentin sees a "nigger on a mule...[who] didn't have a saddle and his feet dangled almost to the ground." Quentin interprets this image of the black man on a mule "as if they had been built there with the fence and the road, or with the hill carved out of the hill itself, like a sign put there saying You are home again." To Quentin, the mule and black man both symbolize the South, and more specifically, a symbol that is everlasting, that is built into nature. The passage symbolizes the affects of a society built upon White Supremacy, in which the "nigger on a mule" is not an image that has been socially constructed by white men, but instead, is viewed as an image that is "carved" by God.

Mules in As I Lay Dying
The use of mules in As I Lay Dying is abundant. The Bundren family is one that represents the lower class of whites in Southern society -- the family line has never owned a plantation, slaves, and are the lowest rung of society besides the blacks of society. The only horse in the novel is one that Jewel buys separately from the family by saving up from work he does secretly in an adjacent farm. The horse separates Jewel from the rest of the family -- a symbol for how separated Jewel is from the rest of his siblings. While the rest of the family rides in a carriage pulled by beaten down mules, Jewel rides on his horse.

The mules are leading the epic journey to bury Addie Compson. Anse muses, “I promised my word me and the boys would get her there quick as mules could walk it, so she could rest quiet." (19) In this journey Anse trades off Jewel’s horse and Cash’s gramophone, representing these character’s greatest dreams, for a pack of worn out mules. When they reach Jefferson, the townspeople look upon these strangers with disgust – the pack of mules adds to this image of dysfunction and disintegration.

Mules in Light in August
Light in August explores the term "mulatto" and its historical connection with mules. In American history, "mulatto" has been the derogative term for those who are neither white, nor black, and instead are "mixed-race." Mules, "being a cross-breed between two different species, the horse and ass, are typically infertile when mated together. Edward Long, made the conclusion in 1774 that “the White and the Negroe are two distinct species” he also stated his belief that mulattos were like the mule, and would prove themselves infertile after generations of intermixing."

Joe Christmas is representative of a mule in that he is presumably a mix of two races and a being that has become extremely familiar with habitual physical abuse as per his foster father. Furthermore, the white characters in the book ride mules and not horses, revealing the reality of their status in Southern society, as that not so removed from the blacks they so abject. When Faulkner writes, "though the mules plod in a steady and unflagging hypnosis, the vehicle does not seem to progress. It seems to hang suspended in the middle distance forever and forever, so infinitesimal is its progress, like a shabby bead upon the mild red string of road..." it could be understood as the author's own doubts the progress of Southern culture's becoming less racist.

Mules in Absalom, Absalom! are seldom seen, but when Faulkner does employ them, it is to mark the status of a low-class white man, Wash Jones, and a black man, Luster. When Rosa Coldfield first learns of the murder of Charles Bon, it is through "Wash Jones sitting that saddleless mule before [her] gate, shouting her name...'Air you Rosie Coldfield? Then you better come on out yon. Herny has been shot that urn French feller. Kilt him dead as beef.'" (AA, 106) Faulkner, through his portrayal of Wash Jones on a saddleless mule and with an uncivilized dialect, shows that though Jones in his social status should be equated with a black man, he is seen as superior solely because of his white skin.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 12px;">Mules in Absalom, Absalom! **

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 12px;">Later, when Quentin is narrating the story to Shreve, a Canadian who is an outsider to the codes and conduct of the South, he learns that mules are representative, and are even placemarkers, for black men. As Shreve tries to recount the story back to Quentin, he says, "so you and your father got down and gave the reins to --- what was his name? the nigger on the mule? Luster." (AA, 152)

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 10px;">[1] Hurston, Zora Neale. Their Eyes Were Watching God. New York: J.B. Lippincott, 1937. Print.