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Faulkner, William 1897–1962

An American novelist, short story writer, poet, and screenplay writer, Faulkner is one of the greatest writers America has produced. While his themes are many and have been subjected to conflicting interpretation, his major fictive concern is with the inevitability of individual responsibility and the absolute necessity of compassion and humanism. Faulkner's southern experience provided the material for the creation of his own fictive world, Yoknapatawpha County. An experimentalist, Faulkner wove together myth, oral tradition, symbol, and allegory in some of his most complex and admired works, including Absalom, Absalom!, The Sound and the Fury, As I Lay Dying, and Light in August. Yet he was also a very successful Hollywood screenwriter and several novels, such as Sanctuary, have been read as compelling thrillers. Faulkner was awarded both the Pulitzer and Nobel Prizes. (See also CLC, Vols. 1, 3,...

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1. Faulkner, William 1897–1962
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1. William Faulkner