William Faulkner

Contents

1. Birth & Death2. Youth3. Works4. Awards5. Summary

1. Birth & Death

1897-1962Mississippi

2. Youth

A Southern family with a fairly long traditionThe town of Oxford---- fictional Yoknapatawpha county Yoknapatawpha saga约克纳帕塔法世系小说The members of his family----fictional charactersA literary background

3.1 Occupation(1919–62)

Novelist----19The Sound and the Fury《喧哗与骚动》Light in August《八月之光》Absalom, Absalom!《押沙龙》Go Down, Moses《去吧，摩西》

Short story writer ----70+

All relating to the American South

3.2 Ambiguous attitude toward the southern “aristocratic” families:

①Criticism of their injustice to the African Americans

“a fallen monument” ----a glory gone with the windStubborn, asocial, out of step with modern life

②Pity & sympathy

“beneath a mass of bought flowers”----dignity, inspiring wonder & admirationThe golden era ---- an ideal to look back to

“A Rose for Emily“ (1931)

the reason for his choice of the title as:[The title] was an allegorical title; the meaning was, here was a woman who has had a tragedy, an irrevocable tragedy and nothing could be done about it, and I pitied her and this was a salute ... to a woman you would hand a rose.

3.3 Genre

a “ghost story” ---- Faulkner‘‘read variously as a Gothic horror tale, a study in abnormal psychology, an allegory of the relations between North and South, a meditation on the nature of time, and a tragedy with Emily as a sort of tragic heroine.’’ ---- Frank A. Littler

3.3 Genre

Paragraph 30 ---- “she had grown fat and her hair was turning gray……grayer and grayer……pepper-and-salt iron-gray……Up to the day of her death……still that vigorous iron-gray”Paragraph 41----“in the second pillow was the indentation of a head……a long strand of iron-gray hair”

3.4 Style

Stream of consciousness (interior monologues)Difficult language (no capitalization, no proper punctuation, long sentences, etc.)A variety of registers (colloquial —regional dialects — formal)Great imagination (a simple true story of human life—an elaborate mythology) “I am inclined to think that my material, the South, is not very important to me. I just happen to know it.”

4. Awards

The 1949 Nobel Prize for Literature"his powerful and artistically unique contribution to the modern American novel."

Two Pulitzer PrizesTwo National Book Rewards

5. Summary

William Faulkner (1897-1962)American SouthHuman nature & behaviourGothicComplex languageStream of consciousnessImaginationAmerica’s greatest novelist of the 20th century

In 1987, the US Postal Service issued a 22-cent postage stamp in his honor