It is not possible to classify As I Lay Dying as one of the two. The answer is much more complex than the question. As I Lay Dying is a tragicomedy. The mixture of comedic and tragic content is its best in the novel.
Any reader would have some specific events stuck in his memory. There are so many examples in the novel of such kind. For instance, Addie laying in her bed, and her head raised so that she can see her son, Cash, making her coffin, just outside the window-- Vardaman drilling holes in Addie's coffin so that his mother can breathe (page 69)-- Cash responding to when asked how far he fell from a church as: "Twenty-eight foot,