William faulkner biography summary examples

He is best known for his novels and short stories set in the fictional Yoknapatawpha County , Mississippi , a stand-in for Lafayette County where he spent most of his life. A Nobel laureate , Faulkner is one of the most celebrated writers of American literature and often is considered the greatest writer of Southern literature.

Returning to Oxford, he attended the University of Mississippi for three semesters before dropping out.

William faulkner writing style

He moved to New Orleans , where he wrote his first novel Soldiers' Pay He went back to Oxford and wrote Sartoris , his first work set in the fictional Yoknapatawpha County. In , he published The Sound and the Fury. The following year, he wrote As I Lay Dying. Later that decade, he wrote Light in August , Absalom, Absalom! The former film, adapted from Ernest Hemingway 's novel , is the only film with contributions by two Nobel laureates.

Faulkner's reputation grew following publication of Malcolm Cowley 's The Portable Faulkner, and he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature for "his powerful and unique contribution to the modern American novel. Faulkner died from a heart attack on July 6, , following a fall from his horse the month before. Ralph Ellison called him "the greatest artist the South has produced".

Faulkner spent his boyhood listening to stories told to him by his elders — stories that spanned the Civil War , slavery, the Ku Klux Klan , and the Faulkner family. Born into poverty, the elder Falkner was a strict disciplinarian and was a Confederate colonel.

William faulkner works

Tried and acquitted twice on charges of murder, he became a member of the Mississippi House and became a part-owner of a railroad before being murdered by his co-owner. Faulkner incorporated many aspects of his great-grandfather's biography into his later works. Faulkner initially excelled in school and skipped the second grade.