by Honi A.

Created on: October 15, 2009

The voice that says: "[...] I am not a man of letters. I am nothing but a farmer who likes to tell stories" builds in the American literature of the last century a myth of the South, which brings him in 1949 a Nobel Prize for Literature. William Falkner (the name of his grandfather, a legendary figure) is born on September 25th 1897 in New Albany, Mississippi, later chancing his name to Faulkner (some say it was just a typing mistake from when he joined the aviation forces). The World War I determines him to go through some rough experiences fighting as a pilot of the Canadian aviation. His literary career starts in 1924, under the sign of lyricism, by publishing "The Marble Faun", a volume of poems written in a pastoral tradition.His recognition as a writer came along with the success the novel "Sanctuary" had, published in 1931.

The piece of resistance of Faulkner's prose it is the creation of an imaginary world - the Yoknapatawpha County - after the laws of the real and based on the effects of the verisimilitude. "Sartoris" or "Flags in the Dust" is the first novel of the cycle. The action takes place in the immediate period after World War I and depicts the decline of the Southern aristocracy caused by the industrialization. The same year is published "The Sound and the Fury" where Faulkner follows the dramatic fate of the Comson's in the same county. The title comes from a well known quote from "Macbeth": "Life is a tale/ Told by an idiot/ Full of sound and fury/ Signifying nothing".Next one "As I Lay Dying" (1930) narrates the sad story of the Bundren's in a mixture of comic and tragedy, of romantic heroism and naturalism.

Most of Faulkner's writings are novels of atmosphere, the author depicting exactly the environment and the relationships between classes. So, "Sanctuary" (1931) is the image of the underworld of smugglers, of call houses and of criminals to whom the existence of a sanctuary is inconceivable. "Light in August" (1932) stops over one episode from the life of the town Jefferson, whose vitiated atmosphere is full of racist prejudices and violence. The great cycle ends with "The Reivers" (1962), a symbolic novel about the thieves of consciousness of the South.

Because I began with one of Faulkner's statements I will end with another one. In an interview from 1956 Faulkner says: "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." We all should learn something from it.

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