The "big family" of the young woman's aunt in Vicksburg is not described, except for the "cousin" who accompanies her to the hunting camp (343). When the chapter reveals that the young woman is the granddaughter of James Beauchamp, this family becomes part of the extended McCaslin-Beauchamp-Edmonds family, and so kin to Ike McCaslin - though neither he nor the text make any direct acknowledgement of that relationship.
In "Delta Autumn," this woman, Ike McCaslin's "dead wife's niece," lives in his house in Jefferson with her children and looks after him during the fifty weeks of the year he is not in the woods (274). In Go Down, Moses this same woman is called his "dead wife’s widowed niece" near the end (335), but in the first mention of her, in the very beginning of the novel, she is "his wife's sister" and his "sister-in-law" (6). Faulkner either mis-remembered the story when he wrote "sister" or forgot to change "niece" to "sister" later.
All we know about the father of the young woman who has given birth to Don Boyd's child in "Delta Autumn" is that he lived in Indianapolis and died "two years ago" (278). (When Faulkner revised the story for inclusion in Go Down, Moses he made the young woman's family part of the extended McCaslin-Beauchamp-Edmonds family, and so although he made no changes in the way this father is described, radically re-positioned him in the larger Yoknapatawpha narrative; for that reason we have a separate entry for him in the database.)
Ike McCaslin refers to the men who led the Confederacy in the Civil War as the "group of men . . . inside" the U.S. who "tried to tear the country in two with a war" (322). He calls these men "better men" than "Hitler" "or Roosevelt or Wilkie," but seems glad that "they failed" (269, 322).
In "Delta Autumn" and again in Go Down, Moses, McCaslin refers to the men who led the Confederacy in the Civil War as the "group of men . . . inside" the U.S. who "tried to tear the country in two with a war" (269, 322). He calls these men "better men" than "Hitler" and "Pelley" (in the story, 269) or "Hitler," "Roosevelt or Wilkie" (in the novel, 322), but seems glad that "they failed" (269, 322).
"Delta Autumn" and the chapter with that title in Go Down, Moses describe the "forgotten aboriginals" of Mississippi as the ancestors of the Indians who lived there until the 19th century (271). According to the narrative, the mounds on which the Indians buried their dead were originally built by these aboriginals as a refuge from the annual flood water. These aboriginals were the first humans who entered the wilderness and altered it. (See also the entry for Unnamed First Aboriginal in the index.)
"Yokohama" is the name of a city in Japan rather than a person (269). When in "Delta Autumn" Boyd adds the name to the list of dangers the U.S. faces along with, for example, "Hitler," he seems to be using it as a generic (and somewhat racist) way to refer to 'someone from Japan' (269).
"Smith and Jones" are generic American surnames (322). Roth Edmonds uses them to suggest how widespread are the contemporary political threats to the U.S.
"Smith and Jones" are generic American surnames. In "Delta Autumn," Don Boyd uses them to suggest how widespread are the contemporary political threats to the U.S. (269). In the revised version of the story that appears in Go Down, Moses, the character who mentions them is Roth Edmonds (322).
Mentioned by a character in "Delta Autumn" as one of ominous signs on the horizon of contemporary events (269), William Dudley Pelley was a journalist, a novelist, a screenwriter and publisher before making a name for himself a fascist and a religious leader. In 1936 Pelley ran for president as the candidate for the Christian Party, preaching antisemitism and socialism as staples for a new Christian Commonwealth. He supported Hitler's ideology regarding Jews.
