424. Go Down, Moses

Go Down, Moses
William Faulkner
1942
Around 385 pages

Are you tired of hearing me complain about William Faulkner? Me too, which is why I am thrilled to announce that this is the last Faulkner on the List. Usually I do a ranking, but I hated them all the same. That's not true, I hated The Sound and the Fury just a little bit more.

This isn't even really a novel, it's a collection of short stories that Faulkner considered later to be a novel. Whatever you say, Willy, let's just try to get through this. We start with an absolutely horrific story where two men gamble and bet over women and slaves. I don't really want to get into the plots of the rest of these. They are historically true to the South, and very upsetting in their racism.

Praise Farore, we are finally done with this guy. His subject matter is very disturbing to me, and I detest his writing style. Also, I have resentments against him that have to do with my English undergrad degree. Good riddance to bad luggage.

RATING: *----

Interesting Facts:

Faulkner was awarded the 1949 Nobel Prize in Literature for "his powerful and artistically unique contribution to the modern American novel."

UP NEXT: Embers by Sandor Marai

417. The Hamlet

The Hamlet
William Faulkner
1940
Around 410 pages

No, not that Hamlet. This is THE Hamlet. As in, another Faulkner, another 400+ pages of tedious prose. Let's get this over with.

This novel felt vaguely familiar when I read it, but I realized it's because William Faulkner took from his previous stories to write this, and I had already had the displeasure of reading "Barn Burning." I guess he went to the Raymond Chandler school of writing fiction, where you just slap a novel together with your previous short stories. It helps if you can only write one type of story. 

This is the story of the Snopes family, who live near the powerful Varner family. It's a pretty twisted bunch, including a mentally handicapped son who tries to fuck a cow. I hate this. Eula Varner also exists solely to be an object of male desire, which is truly a curse with this group. I don't like his style, his comedy falls flat, and he can't write women.

Some authors you just don't vibe with, and it is gets redundant to repeatedly knock them down. Of course, every once in awhile, they surprise you. But Faulkner hasn't surprised me yet.

RATING: **---

Interesting Facts: 

The movie The Long, Hot Summer, starring Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, is very loosely based on stories by Faulkner, primarily The Hamlet. 

Part of the Snopes Trilogy.

UP NEXT: Between the Acts by Virginia Woolf. Our last Woolf!

380. Absalom, Absalom!

Abasalom, Absalom!
William Faulkner
1936
Around 385 pages

Faulkner always takes me back to sitting in a hot classroom dissecting A Rose for Emily with a circle of sweaty undergrads. My next experience with dear William was trying to impress a guy with Faulkner tattoos by reading The Sound and The Fury. I don't think he was very impressed, as I haven't spoken to him in five years.

I thought I had seen the last of Quentin Compson, but unfortunately, he hath returned. He's telling his Harvard roommate about the rise and fall of Thomas Sutpen. As a narrative technique, this feels completely unnecessary to me, though I understand it contributes to Faulkner's bizarre style of unreliable narrations. Anyway Thomas Sutpen is a slaveowner in the 1830s, which is a uniquely unlucky time to be a slaveowner in human history.

Sutpen is a memorable tragic character destined to fail, but I get no joy out of untangling Faulkner's exhausting prose. The center of his work is a very ugly man you can't sympathize with, living in a doomed time. And I hate Quentin.

RATING: **---

Interesting Facts:

Along with The Sound and the Fury, this novel helped Faulkner win the Nobel Prize for Literature.

The 1983 Guinness Book of World Records says the "Longest Sentence in Literature" is a sentence from Absalom, Absalom! which contains 1,288 words. The sentence can be found in Chapter 6; it begins with the words "Just exactly like father", and ends with "the eye could not see from any point". The passage is entirely italicized and incomplete. Like give me a fucking break.

UP NEXT: Wild Harbour by Ian MacPherson

330. The Sound and the Fury

The Sound and the Fury
William Faulkner
1929
Around 325 pages

I once dated a guy who had Faulkner and Melville tattoos. Even though I hate both writers[', literary tats still do something for me. So I tried to impress him by reading Faulkner, but I couldn't stop talking about how much I hated it.  I haven't heard from him in a year, so I don't think he was very impressed. 

I can't believe this was adapted into film by James Franco of all people. It's like if Seth MacFarlane took on a Henry James novel. The story follows the Compson family, former southern aristocrats now on the brink of ruin. This wacky clan includes the intellectually disabled Benjy, and Quentin, who has an unhealthy relationship with his sister. A lot of that going around lately.

The frequent shifts in narration give me motion sickness. He does the stream of consciousness thing, and tops it off with terrible grammar and dialects just to make the novel as unreadable as possible. Put on your big boy pants and edit.

An incoherent story told by an idiot, signifying nothing.

RATING: *----

Interesting Facts:

Title is from Act V of MacBeth.

Only became popular after the success of his later novel, Sanctuary. 

UP NEXT: Harriet Hume by Rebecca West