Samsons' Farm (Location Key)

"Samson's" appears in As I Lay Dying and again in Light in August, both times in the Frenchman's Bend section of Yoknapatawpha, but in two different places. In the first novel Samson lives next to the river, in what seems to be both a store and a farm. The porch of the store is where Samson, MacCallum and Quick watch the Bundrens pass by in their wagon before they realize the bridge there is out - probably the same bridge as the 'Samson's Bridge' that is a Location in Flags in the Dust. The Bundrens stay the night in Samson's barn, which is why Samson's seems to be a farm too; there is also Samson's house up the hill from the barn. In Light in August Samson's may still be a store and a barn, but it isn't on the river and it is a lot further from the Bend, further even than Armstid's, which is a good bit northeast of the Bend on the map Faulkner himself drew in 1936. According to Armstid, "somebody down at Samson's" tells Lena Grove that Lucas Burch is working at the planing mill in Jefferson (16), making Samson's the first named Yoknapatawpha location that Lena passes when she arrives in the county from Alabama. Faulkner undoubtedly would not have been troubled by this kind of discrepancy, but it keeps us on our toes.