In some instances, as with young Bayard Sartoris, too much reliance upon the past prevents the character from securing a firm grasp on the present and leads ultimately to disaster. In previous novels, Faulkner's characters have struggled to achieve a significant and meaningful relationship with the past. In this novel, Faulkner also attempts to connect or show the relationship between man's present actions and those of the past. In Absalom, Absalom! Faulkner devotes his mature powers to a full spectrum examination of man's reliance on the past and of the extent to which man is responsible for the past. In Sartoris (1929) this question pervaded the entire novel. In most of Faulkner's earlier fiction, however, the question of man's relation to the past functioned as a minor theme. Bon's search for a father and Sutpen's search for recognition are further variations of ideas used in Light in August (1932) and the idea of man's relation to the past is of consequential importance throughout Faulkner's fiction. The novel also looks forward to Intruder in the Dust (1948) in that a fratricide is correlated with the question of the Negro's rights.

The use of Quentin, an already established character of sensitivity and feeling, as a central narrator adds unity to the entire Yoknapatawpha series. Compson in The Sound and the Furyis utilized and expanded upon in Mr. The philosophy of cynicism, detachment, and determinism advocated by Mr. Thematically, the novel looks back to Quentin Compson's dilemma in The Sound and the Fury (1929) in that the problem of incest in the Charles-Judith-Henry relationship bears directly upon Quentin's own behavior in the earlier novel. In relationship to Faulkner's entire Yoknapatawpha saga, Absalom, Absalom! with its maps, chronological time table, and cast of characters, solidifies the entire Yoknapatawpha series.

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