Jewel Bundren

In As I Lay Dying, Jewel is Addie's third - and favorite - child, illegitimately conceived with Reverend Whitfield. We know he is "a head taller than any of the rest" of the family (17), and the other narrators often reference his eyes to describe the intensity of his nature; they "look like pale wood in his high-blooded face" (17). While the Bundren family has always had mules, he worked hard to acquire a horse, which he rides with pride and skill. Throughout the narrative he is quietly, though violently, angry. His sole monologue highlights his sense of estrangement from the family and the neighbors, from everyone except his mother.