A Fable (novel)

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Title A Fable
Author William Faulkner
Country United States
Language English
Genre(s) Novel
Publisher Random House (1st edition)
Released 1954
Media type Print (hardback & paperback)
Preceded by Requiem for a Nun (1951)
Followed by The Town (1962)

A Fable was written in 1954 by William Faulkner and won him both the Pulitzer prize and the National Book Award in 1955. It can be seen as a precursor to Catch 22.

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

The book takes place in France during World War I and stretches throughout one week. It tells the stories of "Corporal Zsettslani", who is representative of Jesus. The Corporal orders 3,000 troops to disobey orders to attack in the brutally repetitive trench warfare. In return, the Germans do not attack, and the war is simply stopped when the soldiers realize that it takes two sides to fight a war. The Generalissimo has the corporal arrested and executed; he is representative of leaders who use war solely to make themselves stronger (he invites the German general over to discuss how to start the war again). Before he has him shot, the generalissimo tries to convince the Corporal that war can never be stopped because it is the essence of humanity.


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
Preceded by
no award given
Pulitzer Prize for Fiction
1955
Succeeded by
Andersonville
by MacKinlay Kantor
In other languages