William Faulkner

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For other persons named Faulkner, see Faulkner (disambiguation).
William Faulkner
Born September 25, 1897(1897-09-25)
New Albany, Mississippi, United States
Died July 6, 1962 (aged 64)
Byhalia, Mississippi, United States
Occupation Novelist, short story writer
Genres Southern Gothic
Literary movement Modernism, stream of consciousness
Notable work(s) As I Lay Dying, The Sound and the Fury, Light in August
Notable award(s) Nobel Prize in Literature
1949
Influences
Influenced

William Faulkner (born William Cuthbert Falkner), (September 25, 1897–July 6, 1962) was an American author. He is regarded as one of the most influential writers of the twentieth century, and was awarded the 1949 Nobel Prize in Literature.

Faulkner is known for an experimental style with meticulous attention to diction and cadence. In contrast to the minimalist understatement of his peer Ernest Hemingway, Faulkner made frequent use of "stream of consciousness" in his writing, and wrote often highly emotional, subtle, cerebral, complex, and sometimes Gothic or grotesque stories of a wide variety of characters—ranging from former slaves or descendents of slaves, to poor white, agrarian, or working-class Southerners, to Southern aristocrats.

Most of Faulkner's works are set in his native state of Mississippi, and he is considered one of the most important "Southern writers," along with Mark Twain, Flannery O'Connor, Eudora Welty, and Tennessee Williams. While his work was published regularly from the mid 1920s to the late 1940s, he was relatively unknown before receiving the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1949. Critics and the public now favor his work,[1] and he is widely seen as among the greatest American writers of all time.

Faulkner's fame and acclaim stem from his novels, novellas, and short stories. He was, however, a published poet and a sometime screenwriter as well.

Contents

[edit] Life

Faulkner was born William Cuthbert Falkner in New Albany, Mississippi. He was raised in and heavily influenced by the state of Mississippi, as well as by the history and culture of the South as a whole. When he was four years old, his entire family moved to the nearby town of Oxford, where he lived on and off for the rest of his life. Oxford is the model for the town of "Jefferson" in his fiction, and Lafayette County, Mississippi which contains the town of Oxford, the model for his fictional Yoknapatawpha County. Faulkner's 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. He also wrote several novels and other works, establishing a literary tradition in the family. Colonel Falkner served as the model for Colonel John Sartoris in his great-grandson's writing.

The older Falkner was greatly 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 characterization of Southern characters and timeless themes, including fiercely intelligent people dwelling behind the façades of good old boys and simpletons. After being snubbed by the United States Army because of his height, (he was 5' 5½"), Faulkner first joined the Canadian and then the British 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. Faulkner himself may have made the change in 1918 upon joining the Air Force or, according to one story, that a careless typesetter made an error. When the misprint appeared on the title page of Faulkner's first book and the author was asked about it, he supposedly replied, "Either way suits me."[2]

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 to try 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 in June 1929 at College Hill Presbyterian Church just outside of Oxford, Mississippi. They honeymooned on the Mississippi Gulf Coast at Pascagoula, then returned to Oxford, first living with relatives while they searched for a home of their own to purchase. In 1930 Faulkner purchased the antebellum home Rowan Oak, known at that time as "The Bailey Place". He and his family lived there until his daughter Jill, after her mother's death, sold the property to the University of Mississippi in 1972. The house and furnishings are maintained much as they were in Faulkner's time. Faulkner's scribblings are still preserved on the wall there, including the day-by-day outline covering an entire week that he wrote out on the walls of his small study to help him keep track of the plot twists in the novel A Fable.

[edit] Writing

In an interview with The Paris Review in 1956, 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". Another esteemed Southern writer, Flannery O'Connor, stated that, "The presence alone of Faulkner in our midst makes a great difference in what the writer can and cannot permit himself to do. Nobody wants his mule and wagon stalled on the same track the Dixie Limited is roaring down."

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 also 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," "Red Leaves", "That Evening Sun," and "Dry September." Faulkner set many of his short stories and novels in Yoknapatawpha County—based on, and nearly geographically identical to, Lafayette County, of which his hometown of Oxford, Mississippi is the county seat.

Additional works include Sanctuary (1931), a sensationalist "pulp fiction"-styled novel, characterized by André Malraux as "the intrusion of Greek tragedy into the detective story." Its themes of evil and corruption, bearing Southern Gothic tones, resonate to this day. Requiem for a Nun (1951), a play/novel sequel to Sanctuary, is the only play that Faulkner published, except for his The Marionettes, which he essentially self-published -- in a few hand-written copies -- as a young man. Faulkner also wrote two volumes of poetry which were published in small printings, The Marble Faun (1924) and A Green Bough (1933), and a collection of crime-fiction short stories, Knight's Gambit.

[edit] Awards

Faulkner received the 1949 Nobel Prize for Literature for "his powerful and artistically unique contribution to the modern American novel". Faulkner won two Pulitzer Prizes for what are considered as his "minor" novels: his 1954 novel A Fable, which took the Pulitzer in 1955, and the 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

Much has been made of the fact that Faulkner had a serious drinking problem throughout his life. As Faulkner himself stated on several occasions, and as was witnessed by members of his family, the press, and friends at various periods over the course of his career, he did not drink while writing, nor did he believe that alcohol helped to fuel the creative process. It is now widely believed that Faulkner used alcohol as an "escape valve" from the day-to-day pressures of his regular life, including his never-ending and maddening financial straits, rather than the more romantic vision of a brilliant writer who needed alcohol to pursue his craft[citation needed]. From 1949 to 1953, he conducted an affair with a young writer, Joan Williams, who considered him her mentor. The relationship with Williams became the subject of her third novel, titled The Wintering (1971).

[edit] Later years

William Faulkner's Underwood Universal Portable typewriter in his office at Rowan Oak, which is now maintained by the University of Mississippi in Oxford as a museum.
William Faulkner's Underwood Universal Portable typewriter in his office at Rowan Oak, which is now maintained by the University of Mississippi in Oxford as a museum.

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. 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 a portion of his Nobel winnings "to establish a fund to support and encourage new fiction writers", eventually resulting in the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. He donated another portion to a local Oxford bank to establish an account to provide scholarship funds to help educate African-American education majors at nearby Rust College in Holly Springs, Mississippi.

Faulkner served as Writer-in-Residence at the University of Virginia from 1957 until his death at Wright's Sanitorium in Byhalia, Mississippi of a heart attack at the age of 64.

[edit] Selected Bibliography

[edit] Novels

[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

[edit] References

  1. ^ New York Times, October 12, 2006:
  2. ^ Nelson, Randy F. The Almanac of American Letters. Los Altos, California: William Kaufmann, Inc., 1981: 63–64. ISBN 086576008X

Secondary Literature:

  • Blotner, Joseph. Faulkner: A Biography. New York: Random House, 1974. 2 vols.
  • Blotner, Joseph. Faulkner: A Biography. New York: Random House, 1984.
  • Sensibar, Judith L. The Origins of Faulkner's Art. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1982.
  • Sensibar, Judith L. Faulkner and Love: The Women Who Shaped His Art. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2008.

[edit] See also

Literature Portal


[edit] External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:
v • d • e
Novels by William Faulkner
Novels:
v • d • e
Nobel Laureates in Literature

Grazia Deledda (1926) · Henri Bergson (1927) · Sigrid Undset (1928) · Thomas Mann (1929) · Sinclair Lewis (1930) · Erik Axel Karlfeldt (1931) · John Galsworthy (1932) · Ivan Bunin (1933) · Luigi Pirandello (1934) · Eugene O'Neill (1936) · Roger Martin du Gard (1937) · Pearl S. Buck (1938) · Frans Eemil Sillanpää (1939) · Johannes Vilhelm Jensen (1944) · Gabriela Mistral (1945) · Hermann Hesse (1946) · André Gide (1947) · T. S. Eliot (1948) · William Faulkner (1949) · Bertrand Russell (1950)
Complete roster · 1901–1925 · 1926–1950 · 1951–1975 · 1976–2000 · 2001–present