William Faulkner very recently became one of my favorite Southern writers. I somehow managed to complete all of high school and three years of college in Mississippi without encountering Faulkner. My first taste of his writing finally came during my senior year of college in a survey of contemporary American literature. It came in the form of The Sound and the Fury, easily one of the most difficult texts I’ve studied because of the stream of consciousness technique used in the first three parts. Needless to say I had to make detailed notes of character names, which events happened in which years, which of Benjy’s caretakers were present for different events in his life, etc. It amounted to the most tedious note-taking of my college career.
But you know what? At the end of the class I chose The Sound and the Fury as the novel for my final research paper. I loved it. For me, Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury is a beautifully tragic story in which the Compson family clings to the deteriorating aristocracy of the Old South, and their daughter Caddy’s boldness, sexual awakening and self –sufficiency collide with her family’s languishing Southern ideals.
What’s your favorite piece of Faulkner writing?
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-Kaycie
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