Read about the other martyrs on the list.Cash Bundren (As I Lay Dying)
To save time here, Cash is William Faulkner’s Jesus-like character, right down to the carpentry. And in a book so darkly, tragically comic that it should have been a Coen brothers adaptation yesterday, Cash is the lone voice of reason. On the least-fun road trip since the Donner Party, the eldest Bundren is all business (the business of getting Ma in the ground, that is), allowing his broken leg to fester to the point of disuse and never complaining about it. But at least Vardaman doesn’t think he’s a fish.
As I Lay Dying is on Nicole Hill's list of five books that, like country and western songs, tell "stories of agony and ecstasy, soaring highs and mighty powerful lows, heartache and hard living," Laura Frost's list of the ten best modernist books (in English), Helen Humphreys's top ten list of books on grieving, John Mullan's list of ten of the best teeth in literature, Jon McGregor's list of the top ten dead bodies in literature, Roy Blount Jr.'s list of five favorite books of Southern humor, and James Franco's six best books list.
The “My mother is a fish.” chapter in As I Lay Dying is among the ten most notorious parts of famous books according to Gabe Habash.
--Marshal Zeringue
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