# Caroline Compson — The Sound and the Fury character guide

> Caroline Compson in The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner.

**Role:** supporting

**Also known as:** Mother, Mrs. Compson, Miss Cahline, Cahline

**First appearance:** 0000-april-seventh-1928

## Snapshot

The Compson matriarch who summons Dilsey with machinelike regularity from her bed, nursing grievances and ailments while her household quietly disintegrates around her.

## Who they are

Caroline Compson presides over the family from her quilted dressing gown, calling Dilsey's name from the head of the stairs and mourning the burdens her children have become. She clings to her Bascomb pride and her sense of herself as a woman wronged, even as she leans on the Black servants who actually hold the house together. Her self-pity and withdrawal set the emotional weather of the Compson home, making her children's loneliness and resentment legible from the first pages.

## Relationships

### [Jason Compson IV](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_sound_and_the_fury_se/characters/jason_compson_iv)

_family_

Caroline favors Jason as her only competent son, enabling his manipulative and cruel behavior toward the rest of the family.

### [Caddy Compson](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_sound_and_the_fury_se/characters/caddy_compson)

_family_

Caddy's relationship with her mother Caroline is cold and distant, as Caroline is self-absorbed and disapproving of Caddy's choices.

### [Dilsey Gibson](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_sound_and_the_fury_se/characters/dilsey_gibson)

_professional_

Caroline relies on Dilsey for household management and emotional support, but treats her with condescension and entitlement.

### [Caddy Compson](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_sound_and_the_fury_se/characters/caddy_compson)

_family_

Caddy's relationship with her mother Caroline is cold and distant, as Caroline is self-absorbed and disapproving of Caddy's choices.

### [Jason Compson IV](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_sound_and_the_fury_se/characters/jason_compson_iv)

_family_

Caroline favors Jason as her only competent son, enabling his manipulative and cruel behavior toward the rest of the family.

### [Jason Compson IV](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_sound_and_the_fury_se/characters/jason_compson_iv)

_family_

Caroline favors Jason as her only competent son, enabling his manipulative and cruel behavior toward the rest of the family.

### [Dilsey Gibson](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_sound_and_the_fury_se/characters/dilsey_gibson)

_professional_

Caroline relies on Dilsey for household management and emotional support, but treats her with condescension and entitlement.

### [Dilsey Gibson](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_sound_and_the_fury_se/characters/dilsey_gibson)

_professional_

Caroline relies on Dilsey for household management and emotional support, but treats her with condescension and entitlement.

## In the story

### [April Sixth, 1928](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_sound_and_the_fury_se/chapters/april-sixth-1928)

Jason's mother; argues with Jason about Caddy and Miss Quentin, and insists on protecting the family's reputation.

### [April Eighth, 1928](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_sound_and_the_fury_se/chapters/april-eighth-1928)

Mrs. Compson is querulous and helpless, wailing about the broken window and fearing the worst. She insists on finding a suicide note, drawing a parallel to her son Quentin's death.

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_sound_and_the_fury_se/characters/caroline_compson
- Book: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_sound_and_the_fury_se
- All characters: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_sound_and_the_fury_se/characters