William Faulkner Books

... if you like Faulkner. You'll enjoy the stories here; this is also a great starting point for someone just learning to appreciate the genius of this writer.

As someone who read Flannery O'Conner before ever getting near Faulkner, I must say that he does hold his own with these stories. For better or worse, Faulkner will always be near the top of great American authors. I say for better or worse, because some people can be greatly turned off by his novels, and the difficulty in reading them. While I've been greatly critical of him in the past, I'm still trying to learn and understand his modus operandi. It's been a rewarding learning experience, but one that hasn't been without some exasperation.....I still like O'Conner better!

This short story is twisted, but that's why it's so great. The story is dark and gloomy, but it is really interesting. A Rose for Emily recounts the story of an eccentric spinster, Emily Grierson. An unnamed narrator details the strange circumstances of Emily's life and her odd relationships with her father, who controlled and manipulated her, and her lover, the Yankee road worker Homer Barron. When Homer Barron threatens to leave her, she is seen buying arsenic, which the townspeople believe she will commit suicide with. Faulkner based the story upon a true incident. The rose indeed was for his friend, Emily Grierson. In the story, the townspeople's points of views on Emily actually reflect the society's value at that moment to some extent. Emily feels that she is released when her father is dead.
However, I do not recommend this book if you might get scared easily. The ending might come as a surprise, but that's suspense. Go read it, if you like it a bit twisted.

After reading "A Mule in the Yard," "That Will Be Fine," and "That Evening Sun" I was reminded of why this guy is one of the greatest storytellers ever. I know, his writing can be dense and even a times nearly unintelligible, but patience and concentration pays off with Faulkner. And his use of point of view is amazing.

Amasing, strong and powerful. What else can one say about one of the best writers of the world?

With Faulkner, and especially with The Sound and the Fury, you're in one of Three camps. You love it, you get it and you hate it, or you don't get it and you hate it. For the purpose of this review, I suppose I should note I fall in the first catagory.
Yes, a lot of (most?) people read it the first time in an English class, some of us get the pleasure of reading twice in separate English classes, and you would be hard-pressed to find an English major anywhere in America who doesn't, at the very least, say they've read it.
The first time through ain't easy. The Norton Edition helps greatly with that... I can't imagine trying to read any other edition the first time. And it's one of those 2 bookmark books... one in the novel, another in the reference section. Basically, you need a decoder ring to read it. Norton provides said decoder ring. Well, in book form. (a Faulkner decoder ring... now wouldn't that be neat?)
And, trust me, once you've gotten through it once, provided you can crack the spine again without crying, it gets better and better with subsequent reads. It's one of those "change your life" books, but without being preachy or even motivational... it's an honest and disturbing and heartbreaking and headache-inducing picture of family, community, an era, and existence as a whole.

Faulkner seems to be one of those authors you either love or hate. His stream-of-consciousness style can be hard to follow at times, but his stories are spot-on as far as the human condition is concerned. I never really got into this novel until grad school; now I can't get enough of Faulkner! Read it even if you aren't an English major!

I tried to read this book as a freshman in college, and it was utterly lost on me, I'm sad to say. At the time, I was in denial about my status as a Southerner; I just wanted to get out and move to NYC and pretend I was living in Andy Warhol's factory.

Now, as an adult, and as a writer with a forthcoming memoir about growing up in the South, TSATF is far and away my favorite book. I took it with me on a recent trip to Mexico and read it on the beach, completely unable to put it down. It's not straightforward until the third of the four sections; Benjy's section (though the most beautiful thing I have ever read) and Quentin's are stream-of-consciousness and difficult. This is where the Norton Critical Edition is so handy. The pages and pages of biographical info and criticism are compelling and insightful, and make a great companion to the book. If you buy this book, buy this edition. It's very well compiled and makes me proud that Norton is my publisher.

I read _The_Sound_and_the_Fury_ several years ago and have forgotten many of the details, but this book remains my favorite fictional work. The Norton Critical Edition provides readers with valuable insight into many of the passages, but some could probably do without the explanatory pages that follow Faulkner's actual book. Since I took an intensive course on Faulkner's work, I had help from a great professor. Even with the help of critical texts and analysis, I found _The_Sound_and_the_Fury_ to be difficult. I reread the book several times for a better understanding of certain sections.

Since other readers have provided summaries about this book, I'll just remark that this is a masterfully written book. I've read most of Faulkner's short stories and novels (except for _As_I_Lay_Dying_) and consider this to be his best work. Faulkner wrote each chapter according to the perspectives of four very different characters, and this is reflected in the form and substance of the chapters. Faulkner's long (many exceed one-third of a page), complex, and heavily detailed sentences demand concentration. It's certainly not a light read, although the book is relatively short. Overall, a beautifully haunting work that showcases Faulkner's idiosyncratic style.

This is perhaps the most difficult novel written that's worth the time to read. I'd STRONGLY suggest you buy Volpe's book on Faulkner's Novels to read along with it first. Volpe breaks down the points at which a different charecter takes over the narrative. After that, try it yourself, but Volpe is the best guide for the person new to Faulkner's harder(hardest)work. The Norton Edition has a great deal of helpful critical material which, though not in Volpe's ballpark, is very helpful. Buy this edition, but don't forget the Volpe on Faulkner's novel.

i,i,i, think the book is very goooood, it was like a nice juicy steak and not like just like dry kibble..... Beause i am her stalker and alien!
-TiffanyTheDog.com

I wrote this study guide ten years ago and, overall, I would say that books such as "Absalom, Absalom" are extremely difficult to read and should not be taught in high school or even in undergraduate school. Faulkner wrote a series that is easier to understand, humorous, and has his usual depth of spirit: "The Hamlet," "The Town" and "The Mansion." I think every time a teacher assigns "Absalom, Absalom" to anyone besides a graduate student majoring in English, you are doing Faulkner a disfavor (as well as the student). I suppose teachers assign "Absalom, Absalom" out of inertia - it's Modernism - it's always been taught - so let's keep teaching it . . .

Carol Siri Johnson is an expert and daring writer. She is the best writer I have ever read. Her book, whatever it's called, is so good that I cried when I read it. My teacher gave me an A+ for the whole year because of a book report I did about it. Carol is like the mother I have never had because I am an orphan. And oh, by the way, I love cows too.

This guide to Absalom, Absalom by William Faulkner stands head and shoulders above other published study guides of the same book and compares favorably to the best of contemporary scholarship on this complex and peculiar giant of American literature. The precision and clarity of Johnson's writing is second only to her incisive yet empathy-tempered insights into the cultural origins and psychological dynamics of of William Faulkner's creative genius. It might well be said that Johnson herself is guided by a daemon driving her to educate, illuminate and uplift the masses of the great unread, so vast is her talent for explication and exegesis, so graceful her dance through the hermeneutic spiral. Buy this book and you will be lead into undreamed of realms of knowledge and wisdom by an actual PhD.

This fine interpretation should be used by any person who endeavors to understand the body of Faulkner's work. I daresay even old W.F. himself would have benefited from reading this text. I only wish I had had assistance like this when I was in school.

This is a great pocket book for a quick review. Seller was prompt and book was in excellent condition.

This is great to use while your sitting at your scanner. Easy to read and understand.

Faulkner is easy to follow and understand. This book is just the right size to carry around with you to use as a reference,also.

Very useful, great supplement to MRI in Practice. Worth the price.

Beleive me this is THE best little MRI review book I have ever seen so far. It is very easy to undersand and very concise. IT covers everything in an easy to understand way. I really helped me.

This is a great set of classics that I intend to read again. It is from this prolific novelist that we have a countering view that the American good ol' days of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, especially in the South, were actually not so desirable after all.

It is by reflecting upon this perspective that I found "A Rose for Emily", "Barn Burning" and "Dry September" to be the most memorable stories. These particular three had a sequence of developments that focused and reflected upon ugly truths that were hidden behind public veneers of "Southern niceties". In essence, the outcomes were essentially America's fictional and somewhat factual answer to the rampant pornography throughout England during what was regarded as the pristine Victorian Era.

Also, Faulkner had an uncanny way of depicting how societies with unwritten rules of proper mannerisms would be unraveled thanks to a bullying, uncouth citizen or family. His writing style was that of using actions and events that set the transition from what each person was like at the surface to what he or she was really like all along and how those around him or her would be affected in the aftermath.

If you are interested in stories about how a person, individually, might have either gotten along or contrasted with the norms and tones of an immediate culture, especially in rural America, Faulkner is the ideal author. And again, this is an excellent collection for those who want to start reading Faulkner. A slight word of warning: some of you might find it shocking that there were troubles and prejudices that set parts of America on edge, especially if most of your exposure to U.S. History has been largely sanitized.

As a recommendation, if you enjoy the stories but find some of the terms unfamiliar or the endings ambiguous, I suggest purchasing William Faulkner A to Z as a reading companion.

This is a great collection for someone who hasn't read much Faulkner. Everyone needs to have at least read "A Rose For Emily" and "Red Leaves."

Faulkner scares readers. Before I read, re-read and loved "Light in August," I had tried books like "Absalom, Absalom" and "The Sound and The Fury" countless times only to get bogged down in the convoluted grammar and personal symbolism as well as the dialogue. For some reason, when I was ready to really read and concentrate, it was certainly not easy, but it was a great, distinct pleasure....one that has stayed with me. Faulkner is, as novelist and essayist Ralph Ellison calls him, "...the greatest artist the South has produced."

This Modern Library compilation of some of Faulkner's short stories is a perfect place to start to read this author, or to keep returning for his keen insights into the heart and nature of the Southerners he created from the Southerners he knew. There are thirteen stories here and they include one of Faulkner's most famous, "A Rose For Emily" a tale of great love and, perhaps, necrophilia. My personal favorite, depressingly sad though it is, is "Dry September" which tells of the extreme violence not only of small town whites to blacks but of whites to whites. Every one of these superb stories is a gem, masterfully written. Most were intended for magazines and so are much more straight forward and "simple" than the novels.

My only complaint and it is with Modern Library, is that, except in two cases, we are not told when Faulkner wrote the stories nor when they were published. Even so, HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

Since reading "A Rose for Emily" as a boy, I have been hooked on Faulkner. I kept a worn out copy on hand to show to my teachers who accused me of using run-on sentences (some of his sentences took an entire page.) He is a true master and when I feel homesick, after being too long in some foreign country, I read a Faulkner story and remember the South where I grew up.

"The past is not dead. In fact, it's not even past." --W. Faulkner

"Faulkner is the greatest artist the South has produced."
--Ralph Ellison

Just as most athletes excel in one particular event, so many writers find their greatest work in one genre , primarily. Faulkner is an impressive storyteller but the work he is most remembered for is his long- distance works, his novels, "The Sound and the Fury" " Light in August" "Absalom, Absalom" among others.
The stories here nonetheless provide a real sense of Faulkner as a writer. The unmistakeable Faulkner style with its complex and Latinate sentences , its cumulative enveloping rhythm, its penetration of the inner lives of its characters, in grotesque and often extreme relationships, including those in which there is often real violence, is here in these stories.
Among the stories in this collection are "A Rose for Emily" " Dry September" "That Evening Sun" "Lo" "Red Leaves".
Turnabout" .
I would say to truly know Faulkner at his best and fullest it is necessary to read the novels. But the stories too give the feeling and flavor of this great American master's work.

There are many great books, but I have read only two perfect ones, "As I Lay Dying" by Faulkner and Shakespeare's "King Lear." Lear's "howl" after Cordelia's death is (I think) the high point of English literature and Vardeman's internal dialoge (and chapter heading "My Mother is a Fish") is the purest form of writing expression and the high-water mark of American Literature. If you like to read, there are so many subtle threads that run through "As I Lay Dying." You'll recognize Chaucer, T.S.Eliot, and I think Shakespeare's "Lear." Like Gorky, Faulkner uses common people to expound upon universal themes like betrayal and unrequited love, but he does it better, and looks at it harder, than anyone has before or since.

Faulkner has a savage and beautiful voice, if you can call it his voice: it's like some linguistic force comes from nowhere and overwhelms his stories and takes them to places that the novel-form never went before. His writing is wildly modern yet full of ancient, mythic resonances - the Bible, the Greeks - which creates a very large sense of time and history in his work. Events traumatize, ripple across history. At his best (As I Lay Dying, The Sound and the Fury, Absalom! Absalom!), Faulkner is difficult but fascinating, worth our patient reading efforts. He invents new ways of writing for a modernizing world that needs some way to keep contact with the past and the dead, and this is both taxing and exhilarating.

There is nothing quantitative in this volume that you can't get in other editions of Faulkner's work; however, the Library of America copy is to be strongly commended for the clarity of its typeface, its sturdy cloth-bound hardcover, and its designed ability to *lie flat* at each page. The only fault I could find with this volume is that it would be nice to have _The Sound and the Fury_ included in a Library of America edition as well (currently, the Modern Library edition is the best that can be done). I strongly recommend this edition to the serious reader who, familiar with Faulkner, is looking for a reference copy of these works that will not deteriorate over time (did I mention acid-free paper and a cloth bookmark?). Considering the price of each of these titles in paperback, this volume's value to the casual reader speaks for itself; you, too, are advised to invest in this worthy tome.

Faulkner is, without a doubt, one of the South's best writers, and re-reading this collection of novels after many years affirms that belief for me. He was a master of words and I wish we had more Faulkner novels to feast on. Almost no one can measure up to him!

I am currently reading Sound and the Fury and it is not an easy read. Fortunately, I started out with this volume and read Sanctuary. If you want to get into Faulkner this is an excellent place to start. It is a great story, shocking though it may be, and gives a good idea of what's to come if you want to delve deeper into WF. Next I read Light in August which may be one of his best. Faulkner is a genius at creating characters and then going into the details of their psyche. Every now and then he gets a little over-indulgent in his wordsmithing but always seems to bring it back home before going too far afield.

Faulkner is the green tea of literature. He's a great story teller but still a bit of an aquired taste. Once you get into his work, though, you'll definitely want more.

The decline of a southern family is in view here. Most of the story is told through the eyes of Caddy Compson's three brothers Benjy, Quentin, and Jason. The first section called by readers and critics the Benjy section is told through the eyes of a 33 year old idiot. Benjy loved three things: his pasture, his sister Caddy, and firelight. Cared for by his sister (before she left home) and by the Compson's black servants, he could not speak and suffered from a strange sense of timelessness, in which the slightest sensory stimulus could trigger vivid past memories. He and the reader of this novel experience those memories as if they are still happening.
The Quentin section is about the day that Quentin Compson commits suicide while away at Harvard. The Jason section is told in a more straight forward style as we follow the evil and occasionaly funny doings of Jason Compson. Much of these sections center, in one way or the other, around their sister Caddy. The last section is usually called the Dilsey section after the Compsons black cook and housekeeper although the doings of Jason appear as well. Faulkner said "Dilsey is one of my own favorite characters, because she is brave, courageous, gentle, and honest. She's much more brave and honest and generous than me..." This is Faulkner's physical description of Dilsey "The day dawned bleak and chill, a moving wall of gray light out of the northeast which, instead of dissolving into moisture, seemed to disintegrate into minute and venomous particles, like dust that, when Dilsey opened the door of the cabin and emerged, needled laterally into her flesh, precipitating not so much a moisture as a substance partaking of the quality of thin, not quite congealed oil. She wore a stiff black straw hat perched upon her turban, and a maroon velvet cape with a border of mangy and anonymous fur above a dress of purple silk, and she stood in the door for a while with her myriad and sunken face lifted to the weather, and one gaunt hand flac-soled as the belly of a fish, then she moved the cape aside and examined the bosom of her gown.
The gown fell gauntly from her shoulders, across her fallen [...], then tightened upon her paunch and fell again, ballooning a little above the nether garments which she would remove layer by layer as the spring accomplished and the warm days, in color regal and moribund. She had been a big woman once but now her skeleton rose, draped loosely in unpadded skin that tightened again upon a paunch almost dropsical, as though muscle and tissue had been courage or fortitude which the days or the years had consumed until only the indomitable skeleton was left rising like a ruin or a landmark above the somnolent and impervious guts, and above that the collapsed face that gave the impression of the bones themselves being outside the flesh, lifted into the driving day with an expression at once fatalistic and of a child's astonished disappointment, until she turned and entered the house again and closed the door." Dilsey cares for everyone, keeps things going, and is the luminous hero of this novel.

The Sound and the Fury is such a wonder of book, that I give this publication 5 stars just for providing us, finally with this beautiful edition. I haven't read the first three of these books, because they seem to be by an author who hasn't yet found his voice. Just to throw this out there, but I'd love to have his complete short stories (with notes) in this format. Don't you agree, Faulkner lovers?

Although chronologicallly the four novels in this volume (which includes Faulkner's masterpiece The Sound and the Fury) are Faulkner's first, this is the last volume of his novels to come off the presses of the Library of America. This is a landmark event in the world of Belles Lettres, not just American literature! The first volume (Novels 1930-35) was published in 1985, making the publication of the definitive texts of the novels of William Faulkner a 21-year enterprise. Kudos to Library of America and editors Noel Polk and Joseph Blotner.

For those who haven't heard of them, the Library of America (LOA) is a non-profit venture with the mission of publishing the definitive texts of the best of American literature in uniform clothbound editions designed to last. (Google them to find out more about their mission and for a complete list of titles in print and forthcoming.) But these are not just handsome books or cheesy Franklin Mint style collectables. Establishing the best texts for the works selected for the series is a difficult and tricky enterprise, and the most qualified scholars are sought to take on the series' diverse authors. For Faulkner this editorial task fell to two of the most prominent Faulkner scholars around, Joseph Blotner (also his biographer) and Noel Polk. LOA does not clutter up its pages with footnotes and does not commission literary introductions for its volumes, so the casual reader may be unaware of the extensive amount of scholarship that goes on "behind the scenes." As noted in brief "Notes on the Text" to the Novels 1926-1929, "By preserving Faulkner's spelling, punctuation, and wording, even when inconsistent or irregular, the Polk texts strive to be as faithful to Faulkner's usage as surviving evidence permits. In this volume, the reader has the results of the most detailed scholarly efforts thus far made to establish the texts of Soldier's Pay, Mosquitoes, Flags in the Dust, and The Sound and the Fury" (p. 1175).

Since the publisher's own description of this volume here on Amazon.com doesn't point this out, it should be noted that the version of The Sound and the Fury published by LOA includes the "Appendix (Compson: 1699-1945)" which does not exist in all editions of the novel still in print. Although this Appendix was first published in 1945 as part of The Portable Faulkner (16 years after the novel itself was published), I always found it perverse and annoying that it was excluded from all but the Modern Library edition of the novel. (After all, if readers want the experience of reading the novel in the pristine form of the 1929 first edition, all they have to do is ignore the Appendix.)

I don't know what else, if anything, of Faulkner's output LOA intends to publish going forward (short stories, screenplays, speeches, letters, poetry?), but these five volumes of novels contain (arguably?) the best works of American fiction by any author. Each volume is a handy size (though some contain four novels, they are all the size of one of Faulkner's novels as orinally published), and set in large and readable type. Buy them all and you can own all of Faulkner's best work without giving up three bookshelves to store them!

We all owe the wonderful Library of America a great deal for publishing the volumes of William Faulkner's complete novels. It has taken more than twenty years to bring them out and now concludes with his first four novels. These were published from 1926 until 1929. This volume includes "Soldier's Pay", "Mosquitoes", "Flags in the Dust", and "The Sound and the Fury".

"Soldier's Pay" is a first novel and shows it. While it has some fine moments and shows Faulkner's style of presenting "reality" without context and focusing on emotional interiors and the aspects of life that we tend to hide even from ourselves, it is not a great work. However, it is still worth reading. The central figure is a disfigured and dying pilot brought home from the war by strangers into a complex family dynamic that is made much worse because the pilot was thought dead, but is now alive and horribly disabled.

I personally found "Mosquitoes" to be all but unreadable. It is too self-indulgent with a delight in talking about intimate things as if that were profound. No thanks.

"Flags in the Dust" was published in part as "Sartoris" in the late twenties. In 1973, Random House published the complete text as far as it could be restored. It reads much differently than his first two novels and it is here that the voice starts sounding like a mature and confident Faulkner. It concerns multiple generations that fester into ruin and misery of all kinds that seem to include perverse sexual relations and alcoholism. Yes, there is also racism in the books, but the books are not racist because the attitudes of the characters are consistent with their times and do not include any sympathy from Faulkner that I can find. And his is a worldwith living memories of the tragic Southern experience of the Civil War and the shock and loss of the Great War (WWI)for the living generation.

The volume ends with Faulner's first clear masterpiece, "The Sound and the Fury". While all Faulkner's prose is not easy to read and requires constant attention and often some re-reading, this book also has multiple unannounced perspectives and shifts in narrator. At the end of the book is an appendix that was first written by Faulkner for "The Portable Faulkner" edited by Matthew Cowley in 1946. You might want to read this first if you want to understand the story more clearly the first time through. However, it could be argued that you shouldn't because the confusion and disorientation is part of the reading experience that author wants you to have as you work through his story.

It is clear to me that Faulkner is a great master of prose and that his works are great treasures in the English language. However, his ethos is quite foreign to me. I do not find great value in reading about lives of misery, incest, adultery, perversion, ruin, and loss. Is that really all there is to human life? Not in my more than fifty years of experience. And since Faulkner was a young man when he wrote these works, what did he really know about life and what was just rumor and hearsay?

Still, the use of language is powerful and unique. Attempts have been made to copy aspects of his style, but none can come closer than mannerisms. Faulkner's was a genius that not only included his words, but in the way he conveyed reality. We don't experience our lives with chapter headings or with moments clearly delineated as part of this or that. We construct our filing system for events in retrospect. So, Faulkner presents us his stories in ways that require us to ask ourselves what is happening, what just happened, did anything happen? Where does this go? Who is this? Why the different names for the same people? Why the same names for different people? It is working through these and every other question that occurs to you that you come to an understanding of the work. And your understanding will almost certainly be personal and different from almost everyone else.

This is a fine volume with reliable texts for these important works, a chronology of Faulkner's life, notes on the texts, and a beautiful binding with materials and type that add to the quality of the reading experience.

Faulkner Novels 1926-1929 is The Library of America's exquisite hardcover collection of four of William Faulkner's classic literary works: "Soldier's Pay", "Mosquitoes", "Flags in the Dust", and "The Sound and the Fury". Like all volumes in this publisher's authoritative texts of literary classics, Faulkner Novels 1926-1929 is a compact hardbound volume with a ribbon for easy bookmarking sewn into the spine. A chronology and sections of notes on the text as well as Faulkner's life round out this definitive "must-have" edition, ideal for public and college libraries as well as private reading shelves.

The demise of The Oxford American magazine is a tragedy! Thank goodness a person can still sample its pages in this wonderful compilation of fiction, essays and reviews. Tony Earley's essay, Letter from Sister: What We Learned at the P.O., which concerns Eudora Welty's great short story, is probably the best thing in the book. It doesn't stop there however; there is a sample of John T. Edge's great writing on southern food, Hal Crowther's review of Erskine Caldwell, Donna Tartt's thoughts on Willie Morris and so much more. This book, like the old Oxford American itself, is pure bliss.

UPDATE: Spring 2005. "The Oxford American" is back!! I suggest that everyone with an interest in the American South spend some quality time with an issue!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The only element lacking in this collection are re-issues of the prized "Southern Music" CDs which appeared with the annual "Music Issue" of the Oxford American. Otherwise, for those who have not archived each issue of the magazine, this is an excellent selection.

Sadly, the Oxford American's precarious financial situation perpetually places it in the southern `lost cause' cliché. Would that some subscribers of other moribund New York-based `literary' magazines, which perpetually lurch around the elite graveyard of memory for its existence, abandon the shell and support the living, and the future. Intelligent readers will both want to own this volume, and subscribe to the Oxford American.

The idea of "the best of the Oxford American" brings out a lot of expectations. This magazine has been the home for a lot of special writing. This book provides some of those moments. I especially enjoyed the narrative of the small town photographer burdened by the unwelcome insights of his coworkers and the blank misunderstandings of his Disney World roadtripping friends. I think that the criticism by Tony Earley would have made just as good an introduction to this book as did Rick Bragg's more metaphorical observation that this writing is "heavy on the salt."
I would recommend this book for anyone that wants to read about the South as it actually is -- unique, history-addled, and genuinely "salty".

This collection of works--fiction, nonfiction, poetry, reportage--by the biggest names writing in or about the South is a real treasure. For those already familiar with "the New Yorker of the South" it will remind those what have made the magazine so special for so many years, and for those who have not discovered the magazine, BOA will be a great introduction to the best in Southern belles lettres. The book, like the magazine itself, is a little trad and not good on commenting on the lives of blacks, gays/lesbians, and immigrants to the South, but there is much for everyone to enjoy here.

Among Faulkner's best work, The Bear is more than a simple story of the hunt for an ellusive bear. Faulkner uses the backdrop of the hunt in 19th century Mississippi to show the progress his protagonist, Ike McCaslin, makes towards the unltimate achievement of man. Faulkner was convinced of the godd that man is capable of; Ike, the typical Faulkner youth seen in other works, shows this idea in full detail.
Ike begins his hunt as a young man, growing to accept the ways of nature as taught to him by a fallen Indian chief. The connotations of a fallen race abound in the story, yet they are no more obvious than in the detailed fourth chapter. Readers are advised not to merely skim this section; it remains one of the best testaments to Faulkner's ability to create some of the most complex material of the 20th century.

Three Famous Short Novels gathers together three long and diverse works by America's greatest writer (that's my opinion, others my contest it, I will only agree to disagree). Spotted Horses is a humorous tale culled from the pages of The Hamlet, the first novel in the famous Snopes Family Trilogy. The Bear is the expanded version of the somber and mythic hunting story about the killing a legendary bear that means so much more than just that. The final story is the exciting adventure yarn Old Man and was one half of the two conjoined novellas that made up The Wild Palms (aka If I Forget Thee, Jerusalem). Although each story has more power than many writers have in their entire output, they acheive even more when woven into the wide fabric of Faulkner's far reaching, generations spanning Jefferson, Mississippi. Required reading.

If you expected Faulkner's "The Bear" to be as difficult as "Pat the Bunny" you will be deeply disappointed. High school teachers may assign it in segments to English classes, but it is at heart an adult story, with deep seams of place and poetry. In this coming of age novella, the relationship between the boy Isaac and Old Ben the bear takes place against the backdrop of threatened forest land. Faulkner's passionate writing about the value of the woods rings true for nature conservationists today. The lengthy section on Civil War ghosts and the equivocality of inheritance, often considered an intrusion within the main narrative, also rewards careful reading. As for Faulkner's infamous run-on sentences -- well, here they are on full steam ahead, and even Faulkner's machismo is forgiveable in the context of his marvellous sentences.

This was a challenging story, like all works of Faulkner. But also a very rewarding story. When you finish this one you feel like you have been somewhere... truly immersed in a time period... truly immersed in a family.
No author, ever... has had the knack of creating a world of ordinary people so expertly intertwined throughout his novels. Faulkner either by design or accident (I doubt that??) has created a rich tapestry in his books, of characters subtlely connected by time and circumstance.
I have read The Sound and the Fury and most of Light in August; and it is not difficult to see the connections in just these two books plus the short story The Bear. Everything I have chanced to read by this amazing author has had careful, deep, intricate connections to the other works.
I know this is a well known fact... but the way in which Faulkner executes it, leaves me amazed each and every time I encounter it.
The Bear is a coming of age story about Ike McCaslin. It traces his development to a young man through several vingettes. Each time we see him he is involved in a hunt. That is until the last 2 sections in which we see him at age 21 looking back on his family history and discussing his right to the land. Once we see him as a young boy and then onward into his teenage years.
The story revolves around an aged bear who roams the forests and swamps where they hunt. It is interesting to see Ike develop as a hunter and man, as the hunters get closer and closer to the old bear.
There are many rich characters in this story.... far to many for me to touch on in this short review.
A big theme that impressed me in this one was how our personal history is inexticably tied to the land we grow up on. Ike McCaslin was, "who" he was because of where he was from, and he could never escape that fact.
Faulkner was an author unafraid to delve into the scriptures in developing his ideas. I believe his use of scriptural narratives only serves to strengthen his work. What he says, rings with authority when he uses Abraham, Adam and Eve as illustrations. He expertly uses the story of Abrahams travels to the promised land to show how his characters have squandered their "rights" to the land they grew up on... their "promised land".
There is no doubt William Faulkner knew how to put a story together. Any of his works, beg to be read again and again. I will surely be picking this one up again... I recommend it to anyone who loves books! William Faulkner is a giant in the world of literature!

(. . .) I highly recommend this book to any student or fan (what's the difference, though?) of Faulkner's writings, and especially to any writers out there, and most of all, any Faulkner teachers. Faulkner is asked any question you can think of in this book, from certain meanings in his, "The Bear", to the long time controversy about the order of sections in "The Sound and the Fury", to the Adlers in "As I Lay Dying", all the way to why he prefers the Old Testament to the New. He even puts down Henry James in this book, and talks about his greatest influences on his writing, his favorite books (such as Cervantes' Don Quixote) and even puts in some good advice to aspiring authors, and how they should take writing, and even advice on how to write in the traditional Southern Gothic style. Truly a magnificent book that deserves top priority to any fan or teacher of Faulkner, or any writer in general! A masterpiece!!!

Faulkner, I think, understands more clearly than anyone else the craft of writing. That's why I bought this book, to enlighten myself on some of his opinions as to the direction, goals, and duties of literature. This book works because here Faulkner is at his most candid and while his responses to the students' questions are indeed eloquent, they at least do not sound rehearsed. And this is not just a book of Faulkner's thoughts on literary craft. Here we see his opinions on all facets of life. Faulkner was such a successful writer because he concerned himself primarily with telling engaging stories in ways no one has ever tried before, and he humbly acknowledges such. Beyond his novels, this is the first book you should add to any Faulkner library.

I must say, that when I first picked this book up, I was a bit skeptical. It was wrapped in plastic giving me no idea of what was in it, and it was by some publishing company I never heard of. But, being an impulse buyer, I paid for it, and brought it to a coffee shop where I continued to read and read, on the way home, while watching television, and even when I went to bed, and did not put it down until I read the whole thing. As a writer and fellow fan of Faulkner, I highly recommend this book to any student or fan (what's the difference, though?) of Faulkner's writings, and especially to any writers out there, and most of all, any Faulkner teachers. Faulkner is asked any question you can think of in this book, from certain meanings in his, "The Bear", to the long time controversy about the order of sections in "The Sound and the Fury", to the Adlers in "As I Lay Dying", all the way to why he prefers the Old Testament to the New. He even puts down Henry James in this book, and talks about his greatest influences on his writing, his favorite books (such as Cervantes' Don Quixote) and even puts in some good advice to aspiring authors, and how they should take writing, and even advice on how to write in the traditional Southern Gothic style. Truly a magnificent book that deserves top priority to any fan or teacher of Faulkner, or any writer in general! A masterpiece!!!