As I Lay Dying Lesson Plan

How does Anse's treatment of Cash's leg underline the poverty and ignorance in which he lives?

The horrific treatment of Cash's injury serves to highlight the total poverty in which the Bundrens live. Even among poorer folks, the family is at the bottom of the barrel. Have students imagine being a townsperson and seeing a man, lying on top of a stinking coffin, with a cement cast covering a rotting foot - yet another indignity the Bundrens must endure as they enter town.

The ordeal with Cash's leg also brings Anse's ineptitude as a leader back into focus. As Moseley chastises, "didn't none of you have more sense than that?" As the father and head of the family, Anse's...