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Teaching Light in August

Shine a Light.

  • Activities: 13
  • Quiz Questions: 105

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Published in 1932, William Faulkner's Light in August chronicles the life and death of Joe Christmas, a man of ambiguous racial ancestry living in Faulkner's own personal Lake Wobegon, Yoknapatawpha County. The so-called Yoknapatawpha novels are linked by their shared location, but they're also linked by certain themes and concerns, such as the legacy of slavery, the persistence of memory, and the South's struggle to come to terms with its defeat in the Civil War, among others. That's exactly why this story of lonely outcasts still matters. In the United States, we still wrestle with issues of who counts as an insider or an outsider. It's a lot to cover in one book—but with Shmoop's teaching materials by your side, you'll be set for the trickiest topics.

In this guide, you'll find

  • an examination of the characters' roles in their community…through job review cards.
  • imagined conversations between the novel's characters, to help students hone in on the novel's themes and underlying messages.
  • so many links and resources about why Faulkner's awesome and still important today that you can share with your students.

With Shmoop's teaching guide by your side, it'll be Joe Christmas every day—we promise.

What's Inside Shmoop's Literature Teaching Guides

Shmoop is a labor of love from folks who love to teach. Our teaching guides will help you supplement in-classroom learning with fun, engaging, and relatable learning materials that bring literature to life.

Inside each guide you'll find quizzes, activity ideas, discussion questions, and more—all written by experts and designed to save you time. Here are the deets on what you get with your teaching guide:

  • 13 – 18 Common Core-aligned activities to complete in class with your students, including detailed instructions for you and your students
  • Discussion and essay questions for all levels of students
  • Reading quizzes for every chapter, act, or part of the text
  • Resources to help make the book feel more relevant to your 21st-century students
  • A note from Shmoop's teachers to you, telling you what to expect from teaching the text and how you can overcome the hurdles

Want more help teaching Teaching Light in August?

Check out all the different parts of our corresponding learning guide.



Instructions for You

Objective: For an awful long time Light in August is all about immorality and wrongdoing. People kill others and run away, have children and run away, fight and run away. We sense a pattern.

However, people's misdeeds eventually catch up with them. We knew Faulkner wouldn't give us total misery and despair. Eventually, the characters who act badly get a good old dose of karma to show that you can't just do whatever you want all the time.

In this sixty-minute activity, the students will bring the gavel down and decide how Reverend Hightower should be punished for his wrongdoing.

Materials Needed: A copy of the text and/or Shmoop's summary page

Step 1: Everyone's probably heard of karma, but it's important the students know what it means. Have a class discussion about karma, getting the students to discuss what it is and give examples.

Step 2: Ah, Reverend Hightower, where did it all go wrong? He had it all: good job, marriage, living in a great town (well, sort of). Then he threw it away, becoming consumed with family issues and allowing it to affect his work performance.

Have the students break into groups of four to five to begin considering whether Hightower should be punished for his recent wrongdoings, creating a list of five or so good and bad deeds that he has committed.

When the groups are done they can present their findings to the rest of the students. We can then total up all the different deeds noted by the class. This will help the class come to a conclusion: is the reverend really a good guy at heart, or simply a rotten apple?

Step 3: Bad deeds probably won, which isn't a huge shock. Punishment must be meted out.

It's been decided that the reverend will lose his wife and his job, while also enduring indefinite societal exile. We can't just do this willy-nilly, though; there has to be explanation and justification.

Have the students independently write out a list of all that happens to punish the reverend, focusing on the loss of his job, the decline of his marriage, and his societal exile. They should mention how each of these consequences is a form of karma; Hightower deserves these "punishments" due to his earlier wrongdoing.

Step 4: To sum things up, have the students write out a short passage of three to four paragraphs (of about 300 words), recommending what should happen to Hightower now that he has admitted his wrongdoing. This could lead to an interesting discussion; now that he's recognized that his behavior wasn't ideal, should he be forgiven? Can someone's karma change?

Instructions for Your Students

People are always running away in Light in August. They run away when they fight someone, or kill another person, or have a child and won't face up to their parental responsibilities.

However, in the end everyone gets their comeuppance for doing wrong, and Faulkner's dark and dreary text eventually gets that bit of light mentioned in the title in the form of karma.

In this activity, you're going to take control and decide how Reverend Hightower should be punished for his wrongdoing. Wield the power wisely.

Step 1: Talk to your teacher and classmates about karma, telling them what it is and where it happens. You can mention instances from real life or times where you've seen it play out in novels or movies.

Step 2: Let's touch base with Reverend Hightower, who's been up to no good recently.

Break into groups of four or five students and think about whether Hightower should be punished for his recent actions. You're going to come up with a list of five or so good and bad deeds that Hightower has committed. Does one list outweigh the other? Depending on the results we'll know which way karma will strike.

When your group is done, you can present your findings to the class, and the teacher will add up all of the class's findings, so as to have an overall total of the reverend's good and bad deeds. We can't be completely sure yet, but we're pretty sure the bad deeds are going to outnumber the good. Just a hunch.

Step 3: Whaddya know? It's been decided that the reverend will lose his wife and his job, while also enduring indefinite societal exile. We can't just do this willy-nilly, though; there has to be explanation and justification. You'll independently write out a list of all that happens to punish the reverend, focusing on the loss of his job, the decline of his marriage, and his societal exile. You should mention how each of these consequences is a form of karma; Hightower deserves these "punishments" due to his earlier wrongdoing.

Step 4: To sum things up, you'll write out a short passage of three to four paragraphs (of about 300 words), recommending what should happen to Hightower now that he has admitted his wrongdoing.

This could lead to an interesting discussion; now that he's recognized that his behavior wasn't ideal, should he be forgiven? Can someone's karma change? Get deep.