William Faulkner

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William Faulkner

William Faulkner photographed in 1954 by Carl Van Vechten
Born:	September 25, 1897 New Albany, Mississippi, U.S.A.
Died:	July 6, 1962 (aged 64) Byhalia, Mississippi, U.S.A.
Occupation:	Novelist, short story writer
Genres:	Southern Gothic
Literary movement:	Modernism, stream of consciousness
Influences:	James Joyce, William Shakespeare, Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, Nathaniel Hawthorne, T.S. Eliot
Influenced:	Flannery O'Conner, Cormac McCarthy, Harper Lee, John Grisham

William Cuthbert Faulkner (September 25, 1897 – July 6, 1962) was an American novelist and poet whose works feature his native state of Mississippi. He was regarded as one of the most influential writers of the twentieth century and was awarded the 1949 Nobel Prize for Literature.

Faulkner's writing is often criticized as being dense, meandering and difficult to understand due to his heavy use of such literary techniques as symbolism, allegory, multiple narrators and points of view, non-linear narrative, and especially stream of consciousness. Faulkner was known for an experimental style with meticulous attention to diction and cadence, in contrast to the minimalist understatement of his peer Ernest Hemingway.

Along with Mark Twain and possibly Tennessee Williams, Faulkner is considered to be one of the most important "Southern writers". He was relatively unknown before receiving the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1949, but his work is now favored by the general public and critics.^[1]

Contents 1 Life 2 Works 3 Awards 4 Personal 5 Later years 6 Bibliography 6.1 Novels 6.2 Snopes Trilogy 6.3 Short stories 6.4 Poetry 7 Discography 8 Listen to 9 References 10 External links

[edit] Life

Faulkner was born William Falkner (without a "u")^[2] in New Albany, Mississippi, and raised in and heavily influenced by that state, as well as by the history and culture of the South. His great-grandfather, William Clark Falkner, was an important figure in northern Mississippi who served as a colonel in the Confederate Army, founded a railroad, and gave his name to the town of Falkner in nearby Tippah County. Perhaps most importantly, he wrote several novels and other works, establishing a literary tradition in the family. More relevantly, Colonel Falkner served as the model for Colonel John Sartoris in his great-grandson's writing.

It is understandable that the older Falkner was influenced by the history of his family and the region in which they lived. Mississippi marked his sense of humor, his sense of the tragic position of blacks and whites, his keen characterization of usual Southern characters and his timeless themes, one of them being that fiercely intelligent people dwelled behind the façades of good old boys and simpletons. After being snubbed by the United States Army because of his height, Faulkner first joined the Canadian and then the Royal Air Force, yet did not see any World War I wartime action. The definitive reason for Faulkner's change in the spelling of his last name is still unknown. Some possibilities include adding an "u" to appear more British when entering the Royal Air Force, or so that his name would come across as more aristocratic. He may have also simply kept a misspelling that an early editor had made.

Although Faulkner is heavily identified with Mississippi, he was living in New Orleans in 1925 when he wrote his first novel, Soldiers' Pay, after being influenced by Sherwood Anderson into trying fiction. The small house at 624 Pirate's Alley, just around the corner from St. Louis Cathedral, is now the premises of Faulkner House Books, and also serves as the headquarters of the Pirate's Alley Faulkner Society.

Faulkner married Estelle Oldham (19 February 1896 to 11 May 1972) in June 1929 at College Hill Presbyterian Church just outside of Oxford, Mississippi. In 1930 Faulkner purchased Rowan Oak, where he and his family lived for some time. Still, today, one can find Faulkner's mysterious scribblings on the wall here.

On writing, Faulkner remarked, "Let the writer take up surgery or bricklaying if he is interested in technique. There is no mechanical way to get the writing done, no shortcut. The young writer would be a fool to follow a theory. Teach yourself by your own mistakes; people learn only by error. The good artist believes that nobody is good enough to give him advice. He has supreme vanity. No matter how much he admires the old writer, he wants to beat him," in an interview with The Paris Review in 1956.

[edit] Works

Faulkner's most celebrated novels include The Sound and the Fury (1929), As I Lay Dying (1930), Light in August (1932), Absalom, Absalom! (1936), and The Unvanquished (1938). Faulkner was a prolific writer of short stories: his first short story collection, These 13 (1932), includes many of his most acclaimed (and most frequently anthologized) stories, including "A Rose for Emily," "Barn Burning," "Red Leaves," "That Evening Sun," and "Dry September." In 1931 in an effort to make money, Faulkner crafted Sanctuary, a sensationalist "pulp fiction"-styled novel. Andre Malraux characterised "Sanctuary" as "intrusion of Greek tragedy in the pulp fiction". Its themes of evil and corruption (bearing Southern Gothic tones) resonate to this day. A sequel to the book, Requiem for a Nun, is the only play that he published, except for his "The Marionettes" which he 'self-published' as a young man. "Requiem for a Nun" includes an introduction that is actually one sentence spanning more than a page.

Faulkner was also an acclaimed writer of mysteries, publishing a collection of crime fiction, Knight's Gambit, that featured Gavin Stevens (who also appeared in Light in August, Go Down, Moses, The Town, Intruder in the Dust, and the short story "Hog Pawn"), an attorney, wise to the ways of folk living in Yoknapatawpha County. He set many of his short stories and novels in this fictional location, based on—and nearly identical to in terms of geography—Lafayette County, of which his hometown of Oxford, Mississippi, is the county seat. His former home in Oxford, Rowan Oak, is operated as a museum by the University of Mississippi. Faulkner wrote three volumes of poetry -- The Marble Faun (1924) and A Green Bough (1933), all of which were well received.

[edit] Awards

Faulkner's literary accolades are numerous. He received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1949 for "his powerful and artistically unique contribution to the modern American novel." Although Faulkner won two Pulitzer Prizes, they were not awarded for his most famous novels, but were both given to what are considered as Faulkner's "minor" novels. First was his 1954 novel A Fable, which took the Pulitzer in 1955, and then his 1962 novel, The Reivers, which was posthumously awarded the Pulitzer in 1963. He also won two National Book Awards, first for his Collected Stories in 1951 and once again for his novel A Fable in 1955.

In 1946, Faulkner was one of three finalists for the first Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine Award. He came in second to Manly Wade Wellman.[1]

[edit] Personal

From 1949 to 1953, he conducted an affair with a young writer who considered him her mentor. The relationship with Joan Williams (1928-2004) became the subject of her third novel, called The Wintering (1971). Williams' son, Matt Bowen, wrote a dramatic adaptation of his mother's novel in 2005.^[3]

[edit] Later years

In the 1930s Faulkner moved to Hollywood to be a screenwriter (producing scripts for Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep and Ernest Hemingway's To Have and Have Not, both directed by Howard Hawks). Faulkner became good friends with director Howard Hawks, as well as screenwriter A.I. Bezzerides. Faulkner also befriended actors Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. Also at that time, Faulkner started an affair with Hawks's secretary and script girl Meta Carpenter. In Hollywood, Faulkner was rather famous for drinking as well, and throughout his life was known to be an alcoholic. Faulkner's Hollywood experience is treated in fictionalized fashion in the Joel and Ethan Coen 1991 film Barton Fink. That film's supporting character, W.P. Mayhew, is intended as a composite of Faulkner and his Lost Generation peer, F. Scott Fitzgerald.

An apocryphal story regarding Faulkner during his Hollywood years found him with a case of writer's block at the studio. He told Hawks he was having a hard time concentrating and would like to write at home. Hawks was agreeable, and Faulkner left. Several days passed, with no word from the writer. Hawks telephoned Faulkner's hotel and found that Faulkner had checked out several days earlier. It seems Faulkner had been quite literal and had returned home to Mississippi to finish the screenplay.

Faulkner donated his Nobel winnings "to establish a fund to support and encourage new fiction writers," eventually resulting in the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction.

Faulkner served as Writer-in-Residence at the University of Virginia from 1957 until his death in Byhalia, Mississippi of a heart attack at the age of 64. He was a very close friend of fellow Mississippi writer Muna Lee.

[edit] Bibliography

[edit] Novels

• Soldiers' Pay (1926)
• Mosquitoes (1927)
• Sartoris (Flags in the Dust) (1929)
• The Sound and the Fury (1929)
• As I Lay Dying (1930)
• Sanctuary (1931)
• Light in August (1932)
• Pylon (1935)
• Absalom, Absalom! (1936)
• The Unvanquished (1938)
• If I Forget Thee Jerusalem (The Wild Palms/Old Man) (1939)
• Go Down, Moses (1942)
• Intruder in the Dust (1948)
• Requiem for a Nun (1951)
• A Fable (1954)
• The Reivers (1962)
• Flags in the Dust (1973)

[edit] Snopes Trilogy

• 1. The Hamlet (1940)
• 2. The Town (1957)
• 3. The Mansion (1959)

[edit] Short stories

• "Landing in Luck" (1919)
• "The Hill" (1922)
• "New Orleans"
• "Mirrors of Chartres Street" (1925)
• "Damon and Pythias Unlimited" (1925)
• "Jealousy" (1925)
• "Cheest" (1925)
• "Out of Nazareth" (1925)
• "The Kingdom of God" (1925)
• "The Rosary" (1925)
• "The Cobbler" (1925)
• "Chance" (1925)
• "Sunset" (1925)
• "The Kid Learns" (1925)
• "The Liar" (1925)
• "Home" (1925)
• "Episode" (1925)
• "Country Mice" (1925)
• "Yo Ho and Two Bottles of Rum" (1925)
• "Music - Sweeter than the Angels Sing"
• "A Rose for Emily" (1930)
• "Honor" (1930)
• "Thrift" (1930)
• "Red Leaves" (1930)
• "Ad Astra" (1931)
• "Dry September" (1931)
• "That Evening Sun" (1931)
• "Hair" (1931)
• "Spotted Horses" (1931)
• "The Hound" (1931)
• "Fox Hunt" (1931)
• "Carcassonne" (1931)
• "Divorce in Naples" (1931)
• "Victory" (1931)
• "All the Dead Pilots" (1931)
• "Crevasse" (1931)
• "Mistral" (1931)
• "A Justice" (1931)
• "Dr. Martino" (1931)
• "Idyll in the Desert" (1931)
• "Miss Zilphia Grant" (1932)
• "Death Drag" (1932)
• "Centaur in Brass" (1932)
• "Once Aboard the Lugger (I)" (1932)
• "Lizards in Jamshyd's Courtyard" (1932)
• "Turnabout" (1932)
• "Smoke" (1932)
• "Mountain Victory" (1932)
• "There Was a Queen" (1933)
• "Artist at Home" (1933)
• "Beyond" (1933)
• "Elly" (1934)
• "Pennsylvania Station" (1934)
• "Wash" (1934)
• "A Bear Hunt" (1934)
• "The Leg" (1934)
• "Black Music" (1934)
• "Mule in the Yard" (1934)
• "Ambuscade" (1934)
• "Retreat" (1934)
• "Lo!" (1934)
• "Raid" (1934)
• "Skirmish at Sartoris" (1935)
• "Golden Land" (1935)
• "That Will Be Fine" (1935)
• "Uncle Willy" (1935)
• "Lion" (1935)
• "The Brooch" (1936)
• "Two Dollar Wife" (1936)
• "Fool About a Horse" (1936)
• "Vendee" (1936)
• "Monk" (1937)
• "Barn Burning" (1939)
• "Hand Upon the Waters" (1939)
• "A Point of Law" (1940)
• "The Old People" (1940)
• "Pantaloon in Black" (1940)
• "Gold Is Not Always" (1940)
• "Tomorrow" (1940)
• "The Tall Men" (1941)
• "Two Soldiers" (1942)
• "Delta Autumn" (1942)
• "The Bear" (1942)
• "Afternoon of a Cow" (1943)
• "Shingles for the Lord" (1943)
• "My Grandmother Millard and General Bedford Forrest and the Battle of Harrykin Creek" (1943)
• "Shall Not Perish" (1943)
• "Appendix, Compson, 1699-1945" (1946)
• "An Error in Chemistry" (1946)
• "A Courtship" (1948)
• "Knight's Gambit" (1949)
• "Nobel Prize Award Speech" (1949)
• "A Name for the City" (1950)
• "Notes on a Horsethief" (1951)
• "Mississippi" (1954)
• "Sepulture South: Gaslight" (1954)
• "Race at Morning" (1955)
• "By the People" (1955)
• "Hell Creek Crossing" (1962)
• "Mr. Acarius" (1965)
• "The Wishing Tree" (1967)
• "Al Jackson" (1971)
• "And Now What's To Do" (1973)
• "Nympholepsy" (1973)
• "The Priest" (1976)
• "Mayday" (1977)
• "Frankie and Johnny" (1978)
• "Don Giovanni" (1979)
• "Peter" (1979)
• "A Portrait of Elmer" (1979)
• "Adolescence" (1979)
• "Snow" (1979)
• "Moonlight" (1979)
• "With Caution and Dispatch" (1979)
• "Hog Pawn" (1979)
• "A Dangerous Man" (1979)
• "A Return" (1979)
• "The Big Shot" (1979)
• "Once Aboard the Lugger (II)" (1979)
• "Dull Tale" (1979)
• "Evangeline" (1979)
• "Love" (1988)
• "Christmas Tree" (1995)
• "Rose of Lebanon" (1995)
• "Lucas Beauchamp" (1999)

[edit] Poetry

• Vision in Spring (1921)
• The Marble Faun (1924)
• A Green Bough (1933)
• This Earth, a Poem (1932)
• Mississippi Poems (1979)
• Helen, a Courtship and Mississippi Poems (1981)

[edit] Discography

• The William Faulkner Audio Collection. Caedmon, 2003. Five hours on five discs includes Faulkner reading his 1949 Nobel Prize acceptance speech and excerpts from As I Lay Dying, The Old Man and A Fable, plus readings by Debra Winger ("A Rose for Emily," "Barn Burning"), Keith Carradine ("Spotted Horses") and Arliss Howard ("That Evening Sun," "Wash"). Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award.
• William Faulkner Reads: The Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech, Selections from As I Lay Dying, A Fable, The Old Man. Caedmon/Harper Audio, 1992. Cassette. ISBN 1-55994-572-9
• William Faulkner Reads from His Work. Arcady Series, MGM E3617 ARC, 1957. Faulkner reads from The Sound and The Fury (side one) and Light in August (side two). Produced by Jean Stein, who also did the liner notes with Edward Cole. Cover photograph by Robert Capa (Magnum).

[edit] Listen to

• William Faulkner reads the 1949 Nobel Prize acceptance speech and excerpts from As I Lay Dying, The Old Man and A Fable.

[edit] References

1. ^ *New York Times, October 12, 2006: http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/arts/AP-Nobel-Literature.html.
2. ^ *David Wallechinsky & Amy Wallace: The New Book of Lists, p.5. Canongate, 2005. ISBN 1-84195-719-4.
3. ^ "Her, too: Play depicts Faulkner relationship", Hook weekly, 2005-07-29. Retrieved on 2006-12-24. 

• William Faulkner: Novels 1930-1935 (Joseph Blotner and Noel Polk, ed.) (Library of America, 1985) ISBN 978-0-94045026-4
• William Faulkner: Novels 1936-1940 (Joseph Blotner and Noel Polk, eds.) (Library of America, 1990) ISBN 978-0-94045055-4
• William Faulkner: Novels 1942-1954 (Joseph Blotner and Noel Polk, eds.) (Library of America, 1994) ISBN 978-0-94045085-1
• William Faulkner: Novels 1957-1962 (Noel Polk, ed., with notes by Joseph Blotner) (Library of America, 1999) ISBN 978-1-88301169-7
• William Faulkner: Novels 1926-1929 (Joseph Blotner and Noel Polk, eds.) (Library of America, 2006) ISBN 978-1-93108289-1

[edit] External links

• William Faulkner on the Web
• Faulkner literary criticism
• William Faulkner at the Mississippi Writers Project
• The Paris Review Interview
• Nobel Prize in Literature 1949 Acceptance Speech (text and audio)
• Machine translation or Faulkner?

v • d • e William Faulkner Novels
Soldiers' Pay | Mosquitoes | Sartoris | The Sound and the Fury | As I Lay Dying | Sanctuary | Light in August | Pylon | Absalom, Absalom! | The Unvanquished | If I Forget Thee Jerusalem (The Wild Palms/Old Man) | Go Down, Moses | Intruder in the Dust | Requiem for a Nun | A Fable | The Reivers | Flags in the Dust
Snopes Series: The Hamlet | The Town | The Mansion