As I Lay, Dying follows Addie Bundren's funeral preparations and actual journey from the Bundren farm to a town forty miles distant. Several challenges arise during the journey. As a result, the narrative features a linear structure based on the funeral procession's journey from the Bundren farm to Jefferson, which spans forty miles. However, the book is structured so that the author is virtually absent from the narrative.

He gives his characters the freedom to tell their own stories. As a result, each of the novel's fifty-nine sections is narrated by one of the novel's characters. Even though numerous important narrators are not Bundrens, the majority of the units are provided by one of the Bundrens. Faulkner accomplishes a lot by having a different narrator for each segment. He invites the reader to participate in the story.

Faulkner does not use a linear narrative style to describe some story aspects because he has detached himself. We must enter the story more directly and determine the actual nature of each relationship or the significance of any particular event. Second, the technique allows us to learn about all of the characters' inner thoughts. We have immediate access to each character's thoughts and must assess what we find there.

As an author, Faulkner hasn't informed us anything about the characters; instead, he has shown us. We must investigate their inner thoughts and decide for ourselves what kinds of personalities they are.

Third, we can look at each event from several angles. We have numerous narrations when the coffin gets lost in the river, allowing us to see the same scenario from different perspectives. Darl tells us about the coffin's disappearance; Vardaman tells us about his mother swimming in the river; Cash tells us the coffin wasn't balanced, and Anse tells us that this is just one more weight we must bear until he can obtain his fake teeth. As a result of the many narrations of each incident, we get a different perspective on the event and can see what kind of importance each character places on it; this strategy allows us to learn more about nature. The novel's structure allows us to become a part of the narration by drawing us more intimately into the story.

However, Faulkner has added certain non-Bundren narrators. These narrators contribute to give the narrative a sense of objectivity. We might become too engrossed in the strange Bundren world if we don't have outside narrators. Therefore, Faulkner is careful to include external narrators to remind us that the Bundrens are not typical. For example, suppose the story was confined solely to the Bundrens. In that case, we might not realize that this dead body stinks so badly and that the Bundrens are violating all sense of decency by carting the body over the countryside. Thus, the outside narrators give us a touch of the natural world by measuring our reactions to the Bundrens.

Therefore, if a central problem involved Addie's request to be buried and why her family defies fire and water to fulfill it, then the novel's structure forces the reader to solve these problems by analyzing each character.

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