How do Go Down, Moses and Intruder in the Dust address racial injustice?

In his works, William Faulkner explored the complexities of racial injustice in the American South through the lens of his fictional Yoknapatawpha County.

• Go Down, Moses (1942) examines the interconnected themes of racial, sexual, and environmental exploitation. It focuses on the interactions between the white and Black branches of the McCaslin family, particularly through characters like Isaac McCaslin and Lucas Beauchamp. The collection addresses the legacy of slavery and the moral burden of white individuals in perpetuating the exploitation of their Black relatives.12
• Intruder in the Dust (1948) features the return of Lucas Beauchamp, who is falsely accused of murdering a white man. The narrative centers on a young white boy, Charles "Chick" Mallison, who works to prove Beauchamp's innocence to save him from a lynching.13

While Faulkner was deeply sympathetic to the oppression faced by Black people, his later works reflect an ambiguous stance, as he believed these systemic wrongs should be addressed by the South internally rather than through Northern intervention.1