Barn Burning

Why is it that so many people can be so greedy when they have more than what they need? In the book, “Barn Burning” by William Faulkner, There are two major themes. One of the themes is demand, the other theme which is racism. Both themes are present throughout most of the book. Even though life may be rough, enjoy what you got.

The first theme which is “demand” is shown when everyone is bossing around the black people. The father is always telling the boy to do things for him. He is always trying to make him do this work. Another example is when they are in the court and the black man is getting charged for “burning” the farmer’s barn down. He didn’t even do this but what made the farmer think it was him, was because the night before the black man had said “He say to tell you wood and hay kin burn.” That night the barn burned down and the man had thought it was because of the black man from what he had told him that very night. These series of events lead up to when the justice at the court had demanded he leave at once but was filed with no charges. These are examples regarding to “demand” in this book.

Although the first theme “demand” was important, the other theme racism is not to forget. In this book none of the black people are treated very well. Everyone uses foul, harsh language towards them in which cannot be said. For some odd reason no one seems to like people with different color of skin back in the old days. They always boss them around and talk bad about them. This is shown when in the book the white man says “he was a strange person.” (Person is not the real word put in this short novel) This is shown more than one time in this story. This is a main example of one of the major themes “racism”.

This book shows a lot of symptoms of racism and demand. This was a very exciting book and thrilling to read. I believe that the father was a little too demanding and that the farmer was very racist and mean towards the black man. I thought the author did a tremendous job writing this book. Even though life may be rough, enjoy what you got.