Reading William Faulkner: How to Do It and Why

Learn about William Faulkner's creative writing, which helped him become one of America's most renowned authors.

William Faulkner is considered to be one of America's most remarkable and puzzling authors. He purposefully perplexed his audience by employing convoluted words, shaky narrators, and bizarre visuals. His body of work is surprising, original, funny, and difficult. So how do readers get through his literary mazes? Sascha Morrell conducted extensive research on how to read one of literature's most perplexing authors.

Halfway through one of the apparently best novels of the 20th century, nothing seems to make sense. The narrating characters present conflicting accounts of the same events and frequently appear to be confused about who, what, or when they are talking about. Intense emotional reactions that you don't understand are sparked by seemingly unimportant factors.

Additionally, the text is filled with illogical lines and bizarre imagery.

Confused? You're on the correct track, which is good. William Faulkner is regarded as one of America's most remarkable and perplexing authors. Thankfully, he wasn't merely playing a joke on his listeners. Faulkner purposefully used confusion to explore the most enigmatic facets of the human mind and urgent issues with regional, racial, and personal identity.

The end result is a corpus of work that is surprising, original, and frequently humorous—but above all, difficult. So what hints can readers look for to find their way through his literary mazes? The imaginary county of Yoknapatawpha, which serves as the setting for many of Faulkner's books, is a fantasy recreation of Lafayette County, Mississippi, where he lived for the majority of his life.

Faulkner, who was born in 1897, was raised in an oral storytelling tradition that included folklore, family histories, and local tales of Civil War glory. These lofty beliefs, meanwhile, were at odds with the complicated reality of the American South, which was torn apart by Jim Crow laws and afflicted by the lingering effects of slavery and colonial brutality.

Inside Yoknapatawpha, all of these conflicts come to life.

The unforgettable characters in Faulkner's works, which are full of horror, humor, and human sorrow, are the spurned bride who sleeps next to her dead husband or the deceived sharecropper who spends all of his time looking for imaginary pennies. These figures appear grotesquely absurd at first glance. However, beneath the surface, they all reveal his concern with how people interpret the past—what they obstinately cling to, unintentionally forget, and consciously falsify.

Many of Faulkner's stories are narrated from different points of view, giving the reader different interpretations of what happened. For instance, "The Sound and the Fury" weaves together the stories of three brothers named Benjy, Quentin, and Jason Compson who are all troubled by flashbacks to their sister Caddy. Sometimes one brother's narration will fill up the blanks left by another's, but just as frequently their versions can conflict. Benjy's narration is disconnected in time and abruptly switches between the past and present, which only serves to further complicate matters.

Quentin's segment, however, leaps backward in time from the day of his unexpected death and confounds reality and fiction. Only the aggressive, money-hungry Jason makes an effort to live in the moment, yet even he is frequently overcome with regrets from the past. It can be confusing to follow these links, but Faulkner wants the viewer to experience the characters' perplexity. This strategy enables readers to perceive the biases and blind spots of the characters.

Additionally, it enables Faulkner to examine his own concerns about the South because the historical revisionism of his characters frequently reflects broader denials of Southern history. For instance, he purposefully creates doubt about a character's ethnic background in his work "Light in August" to subvert strict Jim Crow laws. Additionally, the townspeople who are saying, "Absalom, Absalom!" say that "no one knew how" a local landowner acquired his land and that his mansion was "seemingly out of nothing."

Characters' desperation to hide the region's horrific history of slaughter and slavery is evident in their use of evasive language.

But even when delving into the most serious subjects, Faulkner's word gymnastics enthrall readers. A 1,288-word passage from "Absalom, Absalom!" that has people arguing over "violently-colored confectionery," a "cloudy swirl of hens," and a hard-drinking planter who is compared to both a worn-out cannon and a showgirl is particularly perplexing.

Even his jokes have the potential to cause greater misunderstanding, as when Benjy Compson confuses his sister Caddy with golf caddies. Even while reading Faulkner is rarely simple, it is immensely satisfying. He urges readers to reflect on how fallible history and memory are. Faulkner may also aid us in listening for hidden meanings in the noise and commotion around us by teaching us to appreciate chaos and understand the limitations of our perspective.