Product Description

Ever since the first furore was created on its publication in 1929, "The Sound and the Fury" has been considered one of the key novels of this century. Depicting the gradual disintegration of the Compson family through four fractured narratives, "The Sound and the Fury" explores intense, passionate family relationships where there is no love, only self-centredness. At its heart this is a novel about lovelessness - 'only an idiot has no grief; only a fool would forget it. What else is there in this world sharp enough to stick to your guts?'

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #7497 in Books
• Published on: 1995-01-19
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 336 pages

Review
Experimental in style (extensive use of the interior monologue), this study of the decaying aristocracy of Mississippi is possibly Faulkner's most successful book, before drink and Hollywood got him. (Kirkus UK)

About the Author
William Faulkner was born in 1897 in Mississippi. He left high school at fifteen to work in his grandfather's bank. Rejected by the US military in 1915, he joined the Canadian flyers but was still in training when the war ended. Returning home he studied at the University of Mississippi. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1950. He died in 1962.

Customer Reviews

Every man is an arbiter of his own virtues.
I'm not that familiar with American literature of this type,but I found it a compelling read.Although the work needs a short explanation via the introduction to set the reader on the right tracks, once you are aware of the basic timing and structure you should'nt find it that hard.It is basically a tale of a disfunctional middleclass southern American household in the 1920's and is a satisfying read.Its characters are vivid and their personnal situations are communicated in great style.

The end of an era
Fragments of thoughts, broken memories, lost and blurred pieces of imagination once lived and desired, are all we have to build a shattered picture of what was the tragic destiny of the Compson family.

Brief moments of the present and flashes of the past come and go constantly through the voices and thoughts of Benjy and Quentin Compson, in the first part of the novel; till here should be no worry on trying to find a common thread of speech since the spontaneous and fluent narration "comes directly" from the memories and recollections of the two brothers; in fact all the essence of the novel is here, through the form that Faulkner wisely understood that only could be told; all the weakness, fears, misconceptions, guilty and disgraces that strikes this family is all translate in matter of what in spirit was build upon a chaotic, deformed, distort and limited vision of life and its own propose. Symbolically it's in a physical and spiritual way that this concept is embodied: by Benjy that is mentally (and partially physically) disabled and by Quentin that build for himself so many moral barriers and social preconceptions that inevitably lead him to a tragic dead end. Both represent the inability (be that brought by bad fortune or by free will) to fully understand and embrace Life and all the beauty and tragedy in it, represented in the novel by their sister Caddy, that like life itself is the great secret and mystery, the driving force and the unknown voice that we only perceive and experience as a reflexion in the destiny of the others.

Unlike the first ethereal part of the book, the second one is the consistently, formal but not necessary pleasant narration of Jason, the younger of the Campson's brothers. Like the others, also Jason's obsession is centered on the figure of Caddy as a representation of reality through his eyes. Jason personifies the last and the lower level of the human spirit, in a mix of tyranny, petty, misery, villainy and foolishness, part given by heritage (his mother), part by an unstoppable ill will that its own nature and the consequences of his own acts will naturally lead him to a predictable destiny, that consolidates as well as promises, to carry on the chaotic nature of the family. And to carry all the sins and sadness of the world there is the pure and untouched soul of Benjy that cries out loud an understandable and violent sound, the ultimate glimpse of a raw fury that defies and resists all the logic, again in one more attempt to run out of time that will bring back to a place of distant and gentle old memories.

Simply wonderfull!
I was somewhat curious to see what the other reviewers made of this book, and I am somewhat surprised (not of the praise, that's of course expected) with comments that it isn't "enjoyable", and has to be read a number of times. Now please! I'm hardly some intellectual old English teacher unable to believe the "simple people" can't keep up, I really just scrapped through school but this book makes perfect sense, and I had no problems reading it at all. Seems a perfect beach book to me! To be honest I find someone like George Elliot more difficult!
The first part is written by a mentally handicapped man, but I found it both touching and real. The rest of the book rolls into your heart like a steam train, with an explosive climax you're never forget.
It is simply the best book ever written. Simple if you take it as it comes, don't re-read every sentence searching for the hidden meaning. Read it like a child and let the wonderful writing and story capture your imagination!