Ernest Cotton

Character Key: 
Display Name: 
Ernest Cotton
Sort Name: 
Cotton, Ernest
Race: 
White
Gender: 
Male
Class: 
Lower Class
Rank: 
Major
Vitality: 
Alive
Occupation: 
Farming
Specific Job: 
Farmer
Biography: 

Ernest Cotton is a bachelor and an unsuccessful farmer whose hapless attempt to avenge himself against a more prosperous neighbor is at the center of this story. The narrator describes him as "a mild man in worn overalls, with a gaunt face and lack-luster eyes like a sick man" (157). He is also a murderer and would-be suicide, though unsuccessful at those as well. (When Faulkner revised this story for inclusion in The Hamlet, he made Cotton's character a cousin of Flem named Mink Snopes.)

Individual or Group: 
Individual
Character changes class in this text: 

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