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Essays in centennial celebration of William Faulkner and his achievement
With essays and commentaries by André Bleikasten, Joseph Blotner, Larry Brown, Thadious M. Davis, Susan V. Donaldson, Doreen Fowler, The Reverend Duncan M. Gray, Jr., Minrose C. Gwin, Robert W. Hamblin, W. Kenneth Holditch, Lothar Hönnighausen, Richard Howorth, John T. Irwin, Donald M. Kartiganer, Robert C. Khayat, Arthur F. Kinney, Thomas L. McHaney, John T. Matthews, Michael Millgate, David Minter, Richard C. Moreland, Gail Mortimer, Albert Murray, Noel Polk, Carolyn Porter, Hans H. Skei, Judith L. Sensibar, Warwick Wadlington, Philip M. Weinstein, Judith Bryant Wittenberg, and Karl F. Zender
William Faulkner was born September 25, 1897. In honor of his centenary the Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Conference of 1997 brought together twenty-five of the most important Faulkner scholars to examine the achievement of this writer generally regarded as the finest American novelist of the twentieth century.
The panel discussions and essays that make up Faulkner at 100: Retrospect and Prospect provide a comprehensive account of the man and his work, including discussions of his life, the shape of his career, and his place in American literature, as well as fresh readings of such novels as The Sound and the Fury, Sanctuary, Absalom, Absalom!, If I Forget Thee, Jerusalem, and Go Down, Moses.
Spanning the full range of critical approaches, the essays address such issues as Faulkner's use of African American dialect as a form of both appropriation and repudiation, his frequent emphasis on the strength of heterosexual desire over actual possession, the significance of his incessant role-playing, and the surprising scope of his reading. Of special interest are the views of Albert Murray, the African American novelist and cultural critic. He tells of reading Faulkner in the 1930s while a student at the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama.
What emerges from this commemorative volume is a plural Faulkner, a writer of different value and meaning to different readers, a writer still challenging readers to accommodate their highly varied approaches to what André Bleikasten calls Faulkner's abiding ''singularity.''
At the University of Mississippi Donald M. Kartiganer fills the William Howry Chair in Faulkner Studies in the department of English and Ann J. Abadie is associate director of the Center for the Study of Southern Culture.
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Faulkner at 100 FAULKNER AND YOKNAPATAWPHA 1997 This page intentionally left blank Faulkner at 100 RetrosDect and ProsDect FAULKNER AND YOKNAPATAWPHA, 1997 EDITED BY DONALD M. KARTIGANER AND ANN J. ABADIE UNIVERSITY PRESS OF MISSISSIPPI JACKSON www.upress.state.ms.us Copyright 0 2000 by University Press of Mississippi All rights reserved Manufactured in the United States of America 08 07 06 05 04 03 02 01 00 63 4 3 2 1 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Conference (24th : 1997 : University of Mississippi) Faulkner at 100 : retrospect and prospect / edited by Donald M. Kartiganer and Ann J. Abadie. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 1-57806-288-8(alk. paper)-ISBN 1-57806-289-6(pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Faulkner, William, 18g7-1g62-Criticism and interpretation-Congresses. 3. Mississippi2. Yoknapatawpha County (Imaginary place)-Congresses. I. Kartiganer, Donald M., 1937- 11. Abadie, Ann J. In literature-Congresses. 111. Faulkner, William, 1897-1962. IV. Title. PS35ii.A86Z78321186 1997 8 13’.5241221 00-027753 British Library Cataloging-in-Publication Data available For Evans Harrington 1925-1997 This page intentionally left blank Contents xi