William Faulkner (1897-1962)

photo of William Faulkner by Carl Van Vechten, public domain photo

A selective list of online literary criticism and analysis for the twentieth-century American novelist and story writer William Faulkner, favoring signed articles by recognized scholars and articles published in peer-reviewed sources

main page | 20th-century literary criticism | modernist fiction and modernism | about literaryhistory.com

introduction

"William Faulkner." A biography of Faulkner, recommended reading about Faulkner, and short discussions of "Barn Burning" and "A Rose for Emily" from well-regarded critics. From academic publisher A.B. Longman.

"I decline to accept the end of man." William Faulkner's speech on accepting the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1950.

Kartiganer, Donald. "Remembering Faulkner." Transcript and audio of a 1997 PBS program on William Faulkner, with Prof. Kartiganer, who is a specialist in Faulkner, and author Lee Smith. Faulkner is discussed as both an innovative modernist and as a southern regionalist who created Yoknapatawpha county [audio may not function].

Kinney, Arthur F. "Faulkner and Racism." "The single most indelible fact about William Faulkner's work is his persistent concentration on observing and recording the culture and country in which he was born; what is most striking now, as we look back on his legacy from our own, is the enormous courage and cost of that task," says Professor Kinney. Responses to this article are available as well. Connotations 3 (1993-94).

"Faulkner Link to Plantation Diary Discovered." A childhood friend recalled Faulkner reading this slaveholder's diary and ranting about the pro-slavery and pro-Confederacy views it contained: "Faulkner became very angry. He would curse the man and take notes and curse the man and take more notes." NY Times 10 Feb. 2010 [registration required]. For the original interview, see "William Faulkner and the Ledgers of History," by Sally Wolff in The Southern Literary Journal 42, 1 (Fall 2009) pp 1-16.

"Absalom, Absalom!" An electronic chronology of Absalom, Absalom! by professor Stephen Railton at U of Virginia. "Our goal is to take as much advantage as we can of the capacities of electronic technology to help first-time readers orient themselves inside the stories William Faulkner is telling in Absalom, Absalom! while preserving some aspect of the experience of reading it.".

Padgett, John B. "Yoknapatawpha County: William Faulkner on the Web." A web site on William Faulkner from U of Mississippi has some useful resources, such as an annotated summary of the major critical treatments of some works.

Faulkner pronounces "Yoknapatawpha" and explains its meaning in this youtube snippet.

"A Rose for Emily" literary criticism

Allen, Dennis W. "Horror and Perverse Delight: Faulkner's 'A Rose for Emily.'" Modern Fiction Studies 30, 4 (1984) pp 685-96 [enotes subscription service, includes 10 more articles].

Curry, Renee R. "Gender and Authorial Limitation in Faulkner's 'A Rose for Emily.'" Mississippi Quarterly 47, 2 (1994) pp 391-402 [questia sub ser].

Heller, Terry. "The Telltale Hair: A Critical Study of William Faulkner's 'A Rose for Emily.'" Professor Heller discusses in clear, readable prose the questions critics and readers ask about "A Rose for Emily" in clear, readable prose. Arizona Quarterly 28 (1972).

Moore, Gene M. "Of Time and Its Mathematical Progression: Problems of Chronology in Faulkner's 'A Rose for Emily.'" Studies in Short Fiction 29 (1992) pp 195-204 [enotes sub ser].

Nebeker, Helen E. "Emily's Rose of Love: Thematic Implications of Point of View in Faulkner's 'A Rose for Emily.'" Bulletin of the Rocky Mountain MLA 24, 1 (March 1970) pp 3-13 [free at jstor, click "Preview" or "Read Online"].

O'Bryan-Knight, Jean. "From Spinster to Eunuch: William Faulkner's 'A Rose for Emily' and Mario Vargas Llosa's Los cachorros." Comparative Literature Studies 34, 4 (1997) pp 328-347 [free at jstor, click "Preview" or "Read Online"].

Skinner, John L. "'A Rose for Emily': Against Interpretation." The Journal of Narrative Technique 15, 1 (Winter 1985) pp 42-51 [free at jstor, click "Preview" or "Read Online"].

Stone, Edward. "William Faulkner." Professor Stone considers new approaches to reading "A Rose for Emily." In A Certain Morbidness: A View of American Literature [questia sub ser].

Stone, Edward. "Usher, Poquelin, and Miss Emily: The Progress of Southern Gothic." Georgia Review 14, 4 (Winter 1960) pp 433-43 [free at jstor, click "Preview" or "Read Online"].

Stronks, James. "A Poe Source for Faulkner? 'To Helen' and 'A Rose for Emily'" [and Edgar Allan Poe]. Poe Newsletter 1, 1 (1968).

Sullivan, Ruth. "The Narrator in 'A Rose for Emily.'" Journal of Narrative Technique 1, 3 (Sept. 1971) pp 159-178 [free at jstor, click "Preview" or "Read Online"].

Watkins, Floyd C. "The Structure of 'A Rose for Emily.'" Modern Language Notes 69, 7 (Nov. 1954) pp 508-10 [free at jstor, click "Preview" or "Read Online"].

West, Ray B. "Atmosphere and Theme in Faulkner's 'A Rose for Emily.'" Perspective, 1949 [enotes sub ser].

literary criticism

Altman, Meryl. "The Bug That Dare Not Speak Its Name: Sex, Art, Faulkner's Worst Novel, and the Critics" [on Faulkner's novel Mosquitoes]. Prize-winning critical article at the Faulkner Journal.

Dimino, Andrea. "Why Did the Snopeses Name Their Son 'Wallstreet Panic'? Depression Humor in Faulkner's The Hamlet." Studies in American Humor [gone].

Dussere, Erik. "The Debts of History: Southern Honor, Affirmative Action, and Faulkner's Intruder in the Dust." Faulkner Journal 17, 1 (2001). Prize-winning critical article at the Journal.

Folks, Jeffrey J. "Crowd and Self: William Faulkner's Sources of Agency in The Sound and the Fury." On the circumstances under which The Sound and the Fury was written. The Southern Literary Journal 34, 2 (Spring 2002) pp 30-44 [substantial extract, muse].

Harrison, Suzan. "Repudiating Faulkner: Race and Responsibility in Ellen Douglas's The Rock Cried Out." Harrison argues that Ellen Douglas reconsiders many issues central to the Southern Renascence, as that movement has been critically defined: "Explicitly engaging the shadow of Faulkner Douglas's novel [The Rock Cried Out raises questions about how the white southern writer confronts issues of race and guilt in a post-renascence, post-Civil Rights era South." The Southern Literary Journal 36, 1 (Fall 2003] pp. 1-20 [free at jstor, click "Preview" or "Read Online"].

Heller, Terry. "Intruders in the Dust: The Representation of Racial Problems in Faulkner's Novel and in the MGM Film Adaptation." Coe Review 8 (1977) pp 79-90.

Kartiganer, Donald M. "'So I, Who Had Never Had A War...': William Faulkner, War, and the Modern Imagination." MFS Modern Fiction Studies 44, 3 (Fall 1998) pp 619-45 [substantial extract, muse].

Llewellyn, Dara. "Waves of time in Faulkner's Go Down, Moses." Llewellyn notes that "readers of William Faulkner must sort through complex chronological developments when reading his stories." Studies in Short Fiction 33, 4 (Fall 1996) [questia sub ser].

Martin, Reginald. "Faulkner's Southern reflections: the black on the back of the mirror in 'Ad Astra.'" Says Martin, "William Faulkner's black characters are considered the strongest characters in his narratives." African American Review Spring 1993 [questia sub ser].

Peek, Charles A. "That Evening Sun(g): Blues Inscribing Black Space in White Stories." Southern Quarterly Spring 2004 [questia sub ser].

Sassoubre, Ticien Marie. "Avoiding Adjudication in William Faulkner's Go Down, Moses and Intruder in the Dust." Criticism 49, 2 (Spring 2007) pp 183-214 [substantial extract, muse].

Shiffman, Smadar. "Romantic, radical, and ridiculous: Faulkner's hero as an oxymoron." Style 29, 1 (Spring 1995 [questia sub ser].

Singal, Daniel J. Excerpt from William Faulkner: The Making of a Modernist (U of North Carolina P 1997).

Wainwright, Michael. "Coordination Problems in the Work of William Faulkner." Papers on Language and Literature, Winter 2007 [questia sub ser].

Zeitlin, Michael. "The uncanny and the opaque in Yoknapatawpha and beyond." Mississippi Quarterly 57, 4 (Fall 2004) [questia sub ser].

teaching guides

A Teacher's Guide to William Faulkner, ed. John Lowe. Lowe begins with an acknowledgment of the difficulties students have with Faulkner. He recommends approaching Faulkner as an interpreter of history--in the sense of the history of modernism, and of southern and American history--and exploring his portrayals of sex, social class, and especially race. From textbook publisher Heath.

Teaching Faulkner Newsletter. Many articles useful for teachers are available at the Teaching Faulkner Newsletter. The links below will not function, since the urls on the articles have all changed, but researchers can find these articles and others by searching from the Newsletter's main page.

Atsma, Helen R. "Calvinistic Visions of Time and Humanity in The Sound and the Fury." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Baker, Charles R. "A Certain Slant of Light: Teaching Light in August Through Hightower’s Epiphany." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Banerjee, Supurna. "Black vs. White and New vs. Old in Go Down, Moses." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Barloon, Jim. "A Rose for Homer? The Limitations of a Reader-Response Approach to Faulkner's 'A Rose for Emily.'" When the student-reader contends that Homer Barron is gay. Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Byrne, Mary Ellen. "Town and Time: Teaching Faulkner's 'A Rose for Emily.'" Assisting students on their "first foray into Yoknapatawpha." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Byrne, Mary Ellen. "'Barn Burning': A Story from the '30s." "Barn Burning" as a story of the Great Depression, and of poor whites in the South. Contrasted to the vision of the southern agrarian poets of the same period known as the Fugatives. Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Carvill, Caroline. "Narrative Complexity, Voice, and Paper Assignments." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Cass, Barbara Ann. "The Right Tools for the Job: Cash Bundren's Tool Box in Faulkner's As I Lay Dying." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Flaum, Morna. "Elucidating Addie Bundren in As I Lay Dying." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Friesen, Faye and Charles Peek. "What's in a Name? Etymology and As I Lay Dying."Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Frisch, Mark. "Teaching One Hundred Years of Solitude with The Sound and the Fury" [and Gabriel Garcia Marquez]. Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Frye, Allen. "Faulkner's Distorted Crucifix: Wood Imagery in Light in August. Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Hahn, Stephen. "'Life Is Motion': Keats and Faulkner in the Classroom." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Hamblin, Robert. "Faulkner's Map of Yoknapatawpha: The End of Absalom, Absalom!" Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Hamblin, Robert W. "'Did you ever have a sister?': Salinger's Holden Caulfield and Faulkner's Quentin Compson" [and J.D. Salinger's Catcher in the Rye]. Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Hamblin, Robert W. "'A Casebook on Mankind': Faulkner’s Use of Shakespeare." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Hearn, Pamela. "Teaching Faulkner: Meaning through Metaphor." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Heyde, William A. "Tragi-Comedy and Comi-Tragedy in 'Pantaloon in Black.'" Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Holtz, Dan. "Faulkner as a Framework for Studying the Civil War." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Kirkland, Karl. "'He Could Do So Much for Me if He Just Would': Teaching Faulkner to Medical Students." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Lester, Cheryl. "Fifteen Ways of Looking at the Bundrens." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Linnemann, Amy E.C. "The Decomposing Archetypes of Thomas Sutpen and Mr. Kurtz in the Motley Flag of Modernism" [and Joseph Conrad]. Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Longe, Laurel. "Lucas Beauchamp, Joe Christmas, and the Color of Humanity." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Makowsky, Veronica. A Review of MLA Volume on The Sound and the Fury. Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Peek, Charles A. "'Because if there is a God What the Hell is He for?': Frenchman's Bend and Its Piety in Faulkner's As I Lay Dying." Peek asks whether religious sentiments in As I Lay Dying were hypocritical. Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Peek, Charles A. "Teaching Faulkner's Go Down Moses." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Powell, Janice A. "Changing Portraits in 'A Rose for Emily.'" Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Saur, Pamela S. "Property, Wealth, and the 'American Dream' in 'Barn Burning.'" Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Seaber, Ruth K. "The Four of the Apocalypse: Addie and Cora, Sula and Nel and the Collapse of the Mythic." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Street, Anna J. "Untimely Loss: Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Vanderwerken, David. "Faulkner’s Underworld Communities in Light in August and Sanctuary." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Wannamaker, Annette. "Viewing Addie Bundren Through a Feminist Lens." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

Williams, John. "Dilsey, Shegog's Sermon, and the Meaning of Time." Teaching Faulkner Newsletter.

main page | 20th-century literary criticism | modernist fiction and modernism | about literaryhistory.com

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