In "Foeticide, the conflict between Passion and Morals in William Faulkner's The Wild Palms, I am trying to explore the historically persistent and socially significant theme of abortion. Faulkner depicts the male protagonist's fear of female fertility and tackles the issue of abortion as a matter of individual choice with the withering of romantic love, wretched poverty, and maternal death corresponding with the popular discourse of a mid-twentieth-century U.S. that depicted abortion as tragic.

This paper aims to discuss and understand reproductive rights in a particular time and place in their societies. The paper tries to project the need for a society to havefacilities such as safe and dependable contraception, protection from sexual and sterilization abuse, sex education, health care, and prenatal care.

The theme of abortion in English literature often explores complex moral, social, and personal issues, including reproductive rights, female agency, and the societal impact of abortion laws, with diverse perspectives.This analysis will attempt to delve into the diverse arguments for and against abortion, examining psychological, social, and cultural factors that influence individual experiences and societal attitudes. Many notable writers have discussed this issue in their works on this theme. Judith Jarvis Thomson's influential essay "A Defense of Abortion" (1971) uses thought experiments, such as the famous "Violinist" analogy, to argue for the moral permissibility of abortion in certain circumstances. Mary Anne Warren presents the 'personhood' argument, claiming that a fetus does not possess the characteristics that justify moral rights in her work "On the Moral and Legal Status of Abortion" (1973). Hilary Mantel touches on themes of reproductive choice within a broader discussion of women's experiences and societal pressures in her novel 'Beyond Black'. Charlotte W. Perkins Gilman addresses the themes of women's autonomy and choice, indirectly referencing reproductive rights and mental health in her short story 'The Yellow Wallpaper'. In "The Bloody Chamber," Angela Carter explores feminine identity and autonomy, including discussions on motherhood and societal expectations, which are inherently connected to reproductive choices. 

In The Wild Palms, Faulknar portrays a story related to the reproductive rights in a particular time and place, which was challenging to their societies. In The Wild Palms, Charlotte Rittenmeyer's marriage with her well-to-do Catholic husband Francis "Rat" Rittenmeyer is described as a continuation of patriarchy in her early life: "She had a father and then four brothers exactly like him and then she married a man exactly like the four brothers" (70).¹ Women get married, have children, take care of their husband and children, and then die. Charlotte is apparently unhappy with her marriage and its byproduct, motherhood, so she elopes with her lover Harry Wilbourne, gives up the traditional family, and leaves her husband and daughters behind. At twenty-seven years old and four months away from being a full-fledged doctor of medicine, the penniless Harry is unable to shoulder the financial burden of his love affair. Rat's financial offer to help represents the impossibility of Charlotte’s full break from her traditional female role in her nuclear family.

Charlotte does not fit into the traditional image of a beloved, as she rather than her male lover is the "subject of the passion" (Gwin 147)², she breaks the bondage of a traditional marriage, and she pursues her sexual desires. By depicting Charlotte as a woman who has active female desire, Faulkner subverts the traditional model of male/active and female/passive sexuality. Charlotte's excessive sexual desire  threatens Harry's sense of safety. Charlotte is not only a sexual aggressor in her adulterous relationship with Harry but also the leader. Because Charlotte is the main breadwinner for the couple for a time, Harry considers her "not only a better man and a better gentleman than I am, she is a better everything than I will ever be" (113).

Her masculinity, particularly her willingness to make money, intimidates Harry, who is "always agonized by his entanglements with economic necessity" (Dobbs 828).³ Her rejection of motherhood is chiefly because of her belief in the purity of passion. She believes that romantic love will not die as long as lovers live in a perpetual honeymoon-like life and that only those who are unworthy of it will suffer from the deadening of love: "They say love dies, between two people. That's wrong. It doesn't die. It just leaves you, goes away, if you are not good enough, worthy enough. It doesn't die; you are the one that dies" (71).

Charlotte's and Harry's rejection of family bonding and of familiar surroundings is mirrored by their geographical wanderings through New Orleans, Chicago, Wisconsin, Utah, San Antonio, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Charlotte attempts to maintain their strong passion by telling Harry that children "hurt too much" (182), which lends a sense of foreboding since, the readers already know that she undergoes an abortion later. Her aversion to motherhood makes clear that her later abortion is her own choice. Charlotte pays the expensive price of death for maintaining the purity of passion. Charlotte is thus a character serving the purpose of advancing the character of Harry. Harry develops from the weak passive lover who is unable to take the initiative in a sexual relationship, even before his relationship with Charlotte, to a man who undergoes an epiphany after the failed abortion. When Charlotte tells him she is pregnant due to a contraceptive accident, he does not blame her. Then, rather than perform an abortion immediately after her request, Harry initially refuses and initiates their move to Texas so he can gain successful employment to support the child. In Texas, he continues to resist and offers to make whatever sacrifices are necessary for the child. Both Charlotte and Harry are unwilling to have a baby because they desperately fear the parental roles and economic responsibilities. Charlotte's stated motivation to make the choice of abortion is to prevent the baby from experiencing poverty like them. Harry at first refuses to perform the abortion because he abhors the idea of killing his own child. Therefore he takes the initiative to search for an abortion pill in a brothel, although in vain. He is then unsuccessful in finding a way to support a family.

Charlotte's pregnancy and failed abortion serve as the stimuli for Harry to understand his personal limitations and realize the consequences of their illicit love. No matter how hard he and Charlotte try to escape social confines, they cannot fully cling to their pure passionate love. Yet, later in the novel, after Charlotte has died and he has been accused of murder, Harry refuses to commit suicide and makes the choice to grieve. Faulkner depicts in The Wild Palms highlights the theme of male characters' fear of female sexuality and fertility. Charlotte rejects traditional motherhood to pursue her own passion. The often incompetent lover Harry is overpowered by Charlotte's passion that he submits to her will to perform an abortion on her, even though it is illegal and even

though he had not completed his medical training, and thus instrumentally contributes to the tragic ending of their romantic love. His captivity in prison results from his incompetence in balancing romantic love and social reality.

The Wild Palms demonstrates Harry's inability to carve an equal role for himself within a romantic relationship. Faulkner describes two elements that effects on Harry's relationship with Charlotte: money and respectability. Harry is trapped not only in Charlotte's excessive love but also in the economic struggles of the 1930s. Economic necessities constantly intrude into the realm of their romantic love. Although the lovers try desperately to escape the social confines of life and struggle to enter "a transcendental realm of romantic love" (Dobbs 816), their aspirations are always thwarted by the grim reality. They cannot escape the worldly reality of a capitalist U.S. and are the victims of the economic crisis of the time. The problem of feeding and caring for a family mires Harry. While Charlotte works for a time dressing store windows, he is domesticated in his job: he stays home writing stories for pulp magazines, beginning his stories with "I had the body and desires of a woman yet in knowledge and experience of the world I was but a child," "if I had only a mother's love to guard me on that fatal day" (103), and "at sixteen I was an unwed mother" (104). Harry writes his fictional stories as if he were a woman.

Birth control is often interwoven with issues of love, marriage, and parenthood. In The Wild Palms, Faulkner discusses the individual lovers' plight through the discourse of abortion at the time as basically dangerous, unnatural, unethical, and above all illegal. Abortion in the U.S. at that time was unavailable due to few providers and high financial costs. In the 1930s, only therapeutic abortions were legal; that is, "abortion was legal when it was done by a qualified medical doctor, in a hospital certified by the American Hospital Association, and when it was done to prevent mental or physical damage to the women" (Eldred 144).⁴ Charlotte is no exception in turning to illegal abortion and putting her in  physical danger. Perhaps Harry is also no exception. After his unsuccessful search for a job, he realizes gradually that "to have the child would be to mock the very fiber of their defiance" (Galharn 143).⁵ By violating his moral principle and agreeing to perform the abortion, Harry discards an essential part of himself, "casting away the last vestiges of his personal and professional honor" (Harrington 82).⁶ Harry had ruined the Rittenmeyer's nuclear family and in Faulkner's poetic justice he, therefore, is prohibited from obtaining one of his own.

Faulkner's novel was originally titled If I Forget Thee, Jerusalem. Faulkner's original title alludes to the Bible's Psalm 137: "By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion. We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof. For there they that carried us away captive required of us a song; and they that wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion. How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land? If

I forgot thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth; if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy" (137.1-6). This rich Psalm expresses the agony of imprisonment in a strange land, signifying a common lament. Jerusalem is a symbol of the freedom that the Jewish captives in Babylon lost but one day might regain (King 506).⁷

Charlotte has no model to imitate, except an instinctive passionate love. Deceived by that idea, she ends up with a failed abortion. Harry, who decides to live grief over Charlotte's death, also chooses to end up in prison, maintaining the memory of her life and love: "If I become not then all of remembering will cease to be.—Yes he thought Between grief and nothing I will take grief" (273). Like the captives in Babylon, maintaining the memory of Charlotte is a way of redemption for Harry after Charlotte's death.

Many people talk about the rights of the foetus and the mother. The Wild Palms depicts that society and law are integral to reproductive rights. The debate on abortion involves not only common people's perceptions toward pregnancy and motherhood but also legal policies and social tendencies. Although Faulkner depicts the tragic consequences of abortion, he reflects on the social issues concerning reproduction based on different social contexts. Faulkner's discussion of abortion is based on the issues of love, female desire, and individual choice, affected by the social framework of marriage. Dealing with the theme of abortion, Faulkner compels readers to think about the dire consequences of excessive romantic love. He warns readers of the potential risks of falling into the trap of pure passion. He appeals to respect for life by projecting the effects on women, men, and society. He captures the readers' attention through his innovative forms and bold themes. The Wild Palms represents reproductive issues sensitively and courageously and highlights a society lacking facilities such as safe and dependable contraception, protection from sexual and sterilization abuse, sex education, health care, and prenatal care. Faulkner incites the thoughts of a conservative and impractical society.

1. Faulkner, William. The Wild Palms. 1939. New York: Vintage International, 1995.
2. Gwin, Minrose C. The Feminine and Faulkner: Reading (Beyond) Sexual Difference. Knoxville: U of Tennessee P, 1990.
3. Dobbs, Cynthia. "Flood: The Excesses of Geography, Gender, and Capitalism in Faulkner's If I Forget Thee, Jerusalem." American Literature 73.4 (2001): 811-35.
4. Eldred, Janet Carey. "Faulkner's Still Life: Art and Abortion in The Wild Palms." The Faulkner Journal 4.1-2 (1988-1989): 139-58.
5. Galharn, Carl. "Faulkner's Faith: Roots from The Wild Palms." Twentieth Century Literature 1.3 (1955): 139-60.
6. Harrington, Garry. Faulkner's Fables of Creativity: The Non-Yoknapatawpha Novels. Athens: U of Georgia P, 1990.
7. King, Vincent Allan. "The Wages of Pulp: The Use and Abuse of Fiction in William Faulkner's The Wild Palms." The Mississippi Quarterly 51.3 (1998): 503-25.