Dec 22, 2009

Absalom, Absalom! | Author Biography

William Faulkner was born on September 25, 1897, to a genteel southern family that had lost most of its money during the Civil War. Faulkner grew up in Oxford, Mississippi, which is recast as the fictional town of Jefferson in many of his stories. Jefferson is placed in fictional Yoknapatawpha County, the setting for fifteen of Faulkner’s novels and many of his short stories.

As a child, Faulkner was a capable but uninterested student. He left school in 1915, prior to graduating, and went to work in his grandfather’s bank as a clerk. A friend of Faulkner’s, Phil Stone, went...