# Mr. Compson — The Sound and the Fury character guide

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

**Role:** supporting

**Also known as:** Father, Mr. Jason Richmond Compson, Compson

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

## Snapshot

The alcoholic, philosophical patriarch of the Compson family, Mr. Compson gives his sons a legacy of cynicism and a watch that measures only loss.

## Who they are

Mr. Compson is a lawyer who has stopped practicing, a father who lectures his sons on the futility of honor, and a husband who has long since retreated from his wife's anxieties into whiskey and quotation. He gives Quentin the grandfather's watch with a speech about time as a mausoleum of hope, and his voice echoes through Quentin's section as both comfort and poison. His death leaves the family without even the pretense of authority, and his children spend the novel trying to escape or fulfill what he taught them.

## In the story

### [June Second, 1910](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_sound_and_the_fury_se/chapters/june-second-1910)

Quentin's father, whose philosophical statements about time, virginity, and life are quoted throughout the chapter.

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_sound_and_the_fury_se/characters/jason_compson_iii
- 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