William Faulkner - 1929-1932 POLL

Poll Closing Date: Monday, April 6, 2009 11:00 PM

LOL, good closing date for the poll

Part 3: April 6, 1928
The third portion is narrated by Jason, the middle child and Caroline's favorite. This section takes place the day before Benjy's section, on Good Friday. Of the three brothers who narrate a section, Jason's account is the most straightforward, reflecting his single-minded and calculated desire for material wealth. By 1928, Jason is the economic foundation of the family after his father's death. He supports his mother, Benjy, and Miss Quentin (Caddy's daughter) as well as the family of servants. This role has made him bitter and cynical, with little sign of the passionate sensitivity that defined his older brother or sister. He goes so far as to blackmail Caddy into making him Miss Quentin's sole guardian, then uses that role to steal the support payments that Caddy sends for her daughter.

but I went with As I Lay Dying

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/98/SoundAndFury.JPG

sanctuary or light in august, gonna have to think about it.

Sanctuary

Maybe the only one of the American Pantheon I don't read for pleasure. Even so, Light in August comes close to being the Great American Novel, esp the McEachern section.

The Sound & The Fury>Absalom!>As I Lay>Light In August>>>>most novels ever written by human beings.

boring answer, but true.

Jeepers, that's some cover.

Moral quandry: I've read only one of these, do I vote or not?

Having struggled to enjoy Faulkner in the past, I've just borrowed a copy of 'Sanctuary', and will report back.

I wouldve included 'Ad Astra' and maybe 'A Justice' Steve, but thats not a grumble, since this is prolley the awesomest poll ILX has had in a while...

I'm not sure I can choose...instinct says its between As I Lay Dying and Sanctuary, but theres just so much, and its all just so good...Ill prolley end up voting for That Evening Sun...its soooo brilliant...

jesus. in three years? jesus.

yeah that is blowing my mind into tiny pieces right now, unreal

well, published in three years, anyway. not sure how much of them had been worked over for a while, right?

Jean Stein's interview of Faulkner in the Paris Review (Spring 1956) has me hot to read some more Faulkner. http://www.theparisreview.org/viewinterview.php/prmMID/4954

INTERVIEWER
Some people say they can’t understand your writing, even after they read it two or three times. What approach would you suggest for them?

FAULKNER
Read it four times.

C'mon, I now this isn't I Love Counting, but surely this is a four-year stretch.

Sound & The Fury is great, but the only one I read. It's one of those books I was lucky to read before I'd heard it was supposed to be difficult. Knowing about difficulty gives me performance anxiety and ruins my normal naive reading experience. So uh, no vote, since I don't want to try reading all this in two weeks.

s/now/know

about the whole three years thing...that might even be five years...my copy of Flags in the Dust dates the manuscript as being finished on September 29, 9127 (four days after his 30th birthday). His publisher actually dropped him bcz they hated the book so much, and it took him a long time to find somebody who would put it out...I believe by the time Harcourt & Brace (?) agreed to put it out (albeit with a third of it cut out, and retitled as Sartoris), he already had The Sound and The Fury finished, and they bought the both of them...I used to have a copy of that book (S&F) with the manuscript date, but the copy currently in my possession does not have it. I would say though that that was finished towards the end of '28...That Evening Sun was written before S&F too..though it prolley didn't get bought until later...

but don't let that dampen what was an astonishing creative run for him...As I Lay Dying and Sanctuary I'm almost sure were written both in 1929...Sanctuary (legend has it) was written in three weeks, and AILD was definitely written in six weeks...

I've never read Earth, A Poem...any good?

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

wow stories got robbed...