Absalom, Absalom! was my first introduction to William Faulkner. It has become my favorite book. I rarely reread novels and I have read this novel twice and plan to read it again. Many readers find Faulkner very confusing. He often writes in stream of consciousness while jumping back & forth in time. However, it is for these reason that Absalom, Absalom! is my favorite novel. The story unfolds through the voices of several characters that are speaking from different years. If one presses through the initial confusion an intricate plot is revealed by dynamic characters. Faulkner's style and language are rich in meaning and depth. Absalom, Absalom! can be read as a mystery which helps bypass some of the confusion a reader may encounter. I have also read Faulkner's Sound and Fury which I found more confusing and did not engage with an much. However, I love Faulkner's style and hope to read all of his novels and short stories. Faulkner's works do require a lot of attention and time. One must be prepared to focus on the work, they are not books that can be set down for a few days and picked back up. So during a blizzard delve into the mystery and characters of Absalom, Absalom! ( )

There’s nothing like a good Faulkner novel[1] and this is my first, assigned in my Eng. 3336 Amer. Fict. 1930-ATM class @ Texas State Univ. (TSU) and as someone who regularly reads books from guys like Pynchon & Joyce & D.F. Wallace & c.—you know, regular authors of impenetrable voluminous tomes—and coming away from it I can only say that Faulkner is fucking hard. I am ashamed to admit what I expected was almost belletristic, that it’d be like, super easy compared to GR, and I’d be able to breeze through it despite the fact that the whole book is nearly one massive wall of goddamn’ s.o.c. text, and truthfully this made speed-reading easier (i.e., the s.o.c. written-in-two-weeks style), and yet left me missing huge parts of the story, incapable of following along, if you get what I’m saying—I even missed the super-obvious homosexual overtones b/w brothers[2] Henry Sutpen & Charles Bon[3], which I don’t know how especially after all the comparisons to Spartans and the billion times I read …and Charles loved Henry, and Henry loved Charles like really hard… and c., so thank you Mrs. Victoria Smith, prof. @ TSU, because without you—and even though you're not exactly my favorite professuh[4]—because without you I wouldn’t have understood a single part of this book, I wouldn’t have understood that it was some huge metaphor for the fall of the south, that it was told on a mythic level, heck, I wouldn’t have even noticed that this story was taking place not in Louisiana[5] but Mississippi, or that every character with a hint of an African lineage is never given a voice, or that most of the events recounted by Rosa, Mr. Compson, and especially those b/w college-mates Quentin and Shreve are likely complete crap, that large parts of this dusty, wisteria-filled southern history are based in the imagination of Quentin and Shreve, adding motivations, melodramatic sub-plots and whatever else to fill all the lacunae left by the sometimes conflicting non-linear accounts of the rise and fall of the enigmatic Thomas Sutpen[6] we (read: you, me & Quentin) are told in the first major chunk of the novel, which is largely about the stoical Quentin haunted by the south’s past history, pestering Rosa and his old man over and over again trying to unravel Sutpen’s life, and like I’m told this obsession with history he has as well as some unexplored (in this novel) incestuous desires he holds for his sister are the major causes for his suicide @ the end of The Sound and the Fury, which yes he’s also in, and t’wards the end of Absalom I’m starting to think, since the already-mentioned theory that most of Sutpen’s life is fiction even in the fictional eyes of the fictional Quentin, that a lot of the family melodrama, the homosexuality between Henry & Chuck, the incestuous relationship(s) b/w Henry & Judith & Charles, and cetera are really just Quentin projecting his own fucked up life on this history of the south, but whatever’s going on, it’s clear that the Sutpens never had any control over their lives, as it (their history) plays out like a fucking tragedy, that strings—the same strings—are holding every name tight and no matter what they do, no matter what their intentions and what their will desires, they can’t fight against these strings, their life’s set in clichéd stone to haunt future retarded generations incapable of dealing with this shit to kill themselves over, but really it’s because Sutpen (Thomas) is really just a dick, a really selfish dick and the embodiment of wisteria & the miasmatic 19th c. southern culture, and speaking of miasmas, you’ll see Faulkner use and overuse words like that (miasma) and death and dying and dusk and desolation and gaunt[7] and wisterias will be summoned at the very least 3 times per page for your imagination’s pleasure while Thomas sets up his property, to be known as Sutpen’s Hundred, completely without the help of anyone but his ‘wild niggers’[8], and like in doing this he’s escaping his past, rising up from nothing to something, which along with propagating his purely white and therefore perfect bloodline because that’s the thing to do in a southern home with traditional pre-Lincoln-ass-kicking values, yet is also the thing he keeps fucking up, e.g., Clytemnestra, appropriately-named daughter of Thomas & an unknown, unvoiced slave, and the already-mentioned Bon, whose mother like, totally deceived Thomas in keeping her partially-black background a secret from him even after they were married and had spawned lil’ Charles Bon, a totally uncool thing to do to a hip, brooding guy like Sutpen, and a guy like Sutpen always gets his way, so say Goodbye to Dear Wife #1 and Hello Ellen & 100% Aryan children Henry & Judith, whom with things work out swell until her death and you know all that incest and murder hoopla, &c., nothing else goes Sutpen’s way completely, the poor guy. There are numerous other subplots for the reader to delve into, and of course a tragic (fitting in with the whole Greek tragedy structure that I’m told and blindly believe like a good student) ending for Sutpen’s chivalric south—The South—and by God the ending is quite spooky, chilling, hair-raising, awesome, &c. when ye’re able to actually follow along with the s.o.c. mile-long sentences, and once again only about 5% of this, if that, I would have understood w/o the help of Prof. Smith of Eng. 3336’s help, and also thanks to her invaluable help, I’m looking forward to more Faulkner, and at some future date re-reading Absalom, Absalom!, because, seriously folks, this is not obviously a guy you get away with reading only once; his books demand much more of the reader, they demand to be studied at length over multiple perusals, &c., which is like, pain in the ass notwithstanding, way cool, so good luck, prospective/future readers; good fucking luck.

F.V.: 95%

[2,850]

[1] (except perhaps a good or even better novel from Cormac McCarthy[1a] [at least after his first stumble (i.e., The Orchard Keeper)])
[1a] Something I’ve been told via Internet forums for ages and never could truly agree or dis- with any sense of certainty until now.
[2] (spoiler)
[3] Whose name even after 170 pgs and two in-class essays I was still reading as ‘Bom.’
[4] I’m sorry.
[5] I had just read Toole’s Confed. of Dunces.
[6] I.e., the ‘chivalrous’ pre-Civ. War South.
[7] Which is abused in one of my favorite scenes 1/3rd thru the novel when Mr. Compson—I think it’s him narrating to Quentin, but it may very well have been angry old Rosa—when Mr. Compson tells us the reader about the mythopoeic confrontation b/w Charles and Henry when Charles is like trying to marry their (Henry + Charles) sister even though they both are fully completely aware she’s their sister having recently found out about their own blood relation and the dooming factoid that Charles is like oh Jesus 1/16ths black or something, so Charles trots up looking gaunt on his gaunt horse and Henry’s all like You shall not pass! standing at the gate of Sutpen’s Hundred[7a] and Charles has the nerve—the jerk—to defy this command and attempt to lay his sister in revenge against Thomas or Henry, I honestly can’t really remember but there was some sort of imaginary confrontation during the Civ. War b/w Henry and Charles and Thomas on the field telling Henry about Charles’ blood connection to himself (Henry) but this isn’t something to celebrate, b/c this blood is tainted, or something along those lines, but yes Charles, face a-gaunt, steps forward and Henry, face matching Charles’ gaunt for gaunt[7b] and then some pulls out what I like to imagine was a minigun and just absolutely mows that boy down.
[7a] It’s 100 square miles, and belongs to Sutpen.
[7b] Doesn’t really make sense.
[8] I.e., French.

(N.B.: The ability to edit and control footnotes in any way on LT is nonexistent [as far as I know], so excuse the ugly execution.)

(N.B. x2: Since writing this I've written like multiple more essays on it and had to study it a lot more and have come to really understand the mythological aspects of it [as that's where my major interests lie] and even came up all pretentiously w/ my own theories on it as a Barthian metamythological prologue to postmodern fiction and the advent of television's influence on literature--/proud /proud /proud /superfuckingpretentious.) ( )

This was absolutely my favorite Faulkner book that I've read. It's very similar to other books of his that I've read in that rambling, stream-of-consciousness style, but I also found it very different in terms of the kind of story it was. It was actually... suspenseful, which is not something I generally associate with Faulkner's writing. I often felt guilty that I didn't have more time to devote to this novel, and so it took me a long time to read it. There was never a time when I wanted to put it down, however, and I think if you've never read Faulkner before, this would be a great place to start as it was a somewhat less difficult read than other of his novels. Absolutely superb. ( )

http://wheretheresallison.blogspot.co... ( )

I suggest reading The Sound and the Fury before reading Absalom, Absalom! so that you are familiar with the main character, Quentin Compson. When you are, you understand his love/hate relationship to the South and to his ancestry. A book about changing ideologies, overcoming (or being engulfed) by the past, and establishing a personal identity, Absalom, Absalom! is definitely a novel you want to spend some time on. Be prepared for tough reading, but completely worth it if you have a guide or a professor to help you realize the importance of recurring themes. ( )

Not my favorite Faulkner. The narrative complexity seems inorganic and there is an elongated feel to the entire enterprise. The interplay between the two college chums is unconvincing, at least to me. On the plus side, there's Rosa Coldfied, a very fine invention and superbly characterized. ( )

Best opening paragraph EVER. ( )

1554 Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner (read 10 Mar 1980) I could not get interested in this for quite a while--found myself annoyed rather than impressed at times by Faulkner's convoluted style. But as I devoted more attention to it, I came to finally be interested in the story of Thomas Sutpen, born in West Virginia poverty, who went to Haiti and married a part-Negro woman and had a son, divorced her, went to Mississippi and married Ellen Coldfield, had a son Henry and a daughter Judith, and then when Henry went to the University of Mississippi he became a friend of Charles Bon, who was his half-brother! The war comes and after the war Henry kills Charles Bon to keep him from marrying Judith. Much of this is told at Harvard by Quentin Compson in 1910. Well, it was worth reading, but really it should be read with Faulkner's other Jefferson County works, so one would be used to what is really Faulkner's rather tortuous style. ( )

My favorite Faulkner novel. Gorgeous, overwhelming, utterly deranged.

Reading AA! Is like swimming in the sea, a rough sea... when you first dive in you need to struggle a bit to make it through the breaking waves. The going is slow and you’re getting tossed around from all directions, the oncoming crashing waves forcing you back, the receding water pulling you forward... but then you make it past the breaks and you only have the swells to contend with... it takes some effort swimming up the approaching hills of water but you’re rewarded with an easy coast down into the valley... then before you know a rip-tide or current grabs you and you’re pulled into the sea. And as you should know, you don’t fight the current; you just relax and let it take you out. Eventually it will slacken and let you swim back to shore.

Faulkner’s language is similar to the way my grandmother used to tell. It might start like this... "... your mother won’t let you go to that party because, well, I remember when she was just a little girl and your Uncle Bob had just shot the leg off of Mana’s cat thinking it was a fox; CT never got over that and said that if Mana would just let him sleep inside on his own bed and not on the porch things like that would never happen but it wasn’t Mana that made him sleep out there but her strong will, CT’s daughter, you know, Rosie always said that her Aunt Mana may be small in statue but her will was like one of those carved faces on... what are those rocks called, Mount Rushmore, but that was my sister, bow-legged though she was she stood tall and firm when it came to the way things should be run around the house; which is why your mother..."

It seemed my Grandmama could tell a story that encompassed not only the entire family but several generations of that family because it was all related to the actual story she was trying to tell. Maybe that’s what Faulkner was eluding to when he said there was no past. The past is just a part of the present.

Absalom, Absalom! is a book that examines the south’s relationship with the land, with blood relations, with slavery. Sutpen encapsulates the south at the end of the 19th century. This is a book bursting at the seams with a story densely told that at times is reminiscent of Edgar A. Poe. It left me shivering. ( )

William Faulkner is a glorified drunk and I for one will be happy when his tripe is tossed out of the Canon. Most of these positive reviews are the result of English majors being told what they should think is good by burnt out English professors who are just recycling the same garbage they were taught 30 years ago. ( )

Stor generationsroman fra sydstaterne ( )

I had to read this for a college class, and I must admit: I was bested by it. While the story held within the book had my interest, the convoluted style of Faulkner's writing beat me in the end. I got about 2/3 through the book, then skimmed over the rest, read the "ending" in full, and then looked over a plot synopsis online. I hated doing so, because I really wanted to finish it, but I couldn't bring myself to do so. Reading it was proving to be (for me!) unrewarding, and was more a chore than anything else.

Maybe I'll have another go at it a few years down the road, when I have as much time as I want to read it. In retrospect, I was trying to read it relatively quickly to be prepared for class, and perhaps that caused me to stumble over Faulkner's writing more than I would otherwise.

Absalom Absalom! is a book that over the years has become less bewildering and I appreciate more with each successive reading. It's outstanding on so many levels, and it might just be the greatest mystery ever written. I'm still not sure what is fact, what is fiction, and what the true story was. No sooner is one question answered (maybe) then another arises, and only in retrospect do certain pieces of information assume significance. It's definitely a book that makes me think like no other, that's for sure. ( )

What at first seemed indecipherable is now one of my favorite Southern novels. I had to study this in two different college classes and, after lots of study and rereading, I've (finally) come to recognize Faulkner's genius. His deconstruction of time and other standard elements makes for a heartbreakingly beautiful look at a doomed family's ugly secrets. ( )

En svår och fascinerande roman av William Faulkner.
Sydstatsmiljö. William Faulkner fick Nobelpriset i litteratur 1949.

A powerful and stirring story about a southern family during the civil war. The book is narratologically complex, with looping chronology, and revised re-tellings, and questionable narrators. The narrative attempts to explain why the South lost the war and concurrently makes a moving comments on immortality, greed, and racism. ( )

A stupendous achievement in narration. I find it to be Faulkner's most difficult book, and I prefer several others to it, including Light In August and The Sound and the Fury, as well as Go Down, Moses, which includes "The Bear." ( )

Cyclical, complex, dense, controlled; a book you must teach yourself to read, but pure genius. ( )

One of the very best novels I have ever read, maybe even the very best; only "Lolita" and "Ulysses" come close. But Faulkner is undoubtedly the most incredible author I have ever read, bar none. Sheer genius; there is no one like him! ( )

Faulkner, William. Absalom, Absalom!. The Modern Library, New York, 1993. ( )

How I love this book! (Oh, yes, I love The Sound and the Fury, too.) That is hard for many people to comprehend. I fully understand that the difficulty of Faulkner's prose and his switching of perspective is enough to discourage even determined readers. I sympathize with the frustration of those who say he isn't worth the trouble, he's over-rated, etc. (I WON'T condone the person who said he must have been paid by the word--that just reveals that reader's ignorance of the most fundamental facts of Faulkner's life). But here's the thing: if you want to read Faulkner, enjoy and understand Faulkner, YOU DON'T BEGIN WITH THIS ONE. Yes, it is one of his masterpieces. It has all the elements he is known for, and they are honed to a fine point here. It is quintessentially Southern, quintessentially Faulkner, and a tough nut to crack. But if you have been introduced to the world of Yoknapatawpha County, Mississippi, perhaps by reading The Unvanquished, or The Hamlet, Sartoris or Intruder in the Dust, you will be much better prepared to plunge into Absalom, Absalom! or The Sound and the Fury. Or pick up a copy of his collected stories, and read "Barn Burning", "Wash", "A Bear Hunt". Grab Knight's Gambit and sample "Tomorrow", or "Smoke". You'll either be hooked, as I have been for 35 years, or you'll know he's not for you. In which case, you can say you gave him a fair trial, and leave him alone with a clear conscience. ( )

absalom, absalom! is one of the classics of American literature and I tackled it as a book club selection, but have to admit that I gave up on it. I liked parts of the writing, and the presentation and interpretation of events from different perspectives but overall I just can't get into Faulkner's convoluted prose style

The story of Thomas Sutpen, an enigmatic stranger who came to Jefferson in the early 1830s to wrest his mansion out of the muddy bottoms of the north Mississippi wilderness. He was a man, Faulkner said, "who wanted sons and the sons destroyed him."

Absalom! Absalom! is William Faulkner's major work--his most important and ambitious contribution to American literature. In the dramatic texture of this story of the founding, flourishing and decay of the plantation of Sutpen's Hundred, and of the family that demonic Stephen Sutpen brought into the world a generation before the Civil War, there rises the lament of the South for its own vanished splendor. From its magnificent and bold inception, when with his wild Negroes the founder of the great plantation appeared out of nowhere to seize his hundred square miles of land and build his mansion, through the destruction of the Civil War and its aftermath, and the drab beginnings of the new South, the narrative is colored by the author's glowing imagery, his command of a powerful and magical prose style. Beneath its brilliant surface and dark undercurrents, the novel sweeps backward and forward through time. The story in all its ramifications becomes crystallised in the mind of a relative of this strange family, young Quentin Compson, a Harvard student. At the terrifying and abrupt end of the tale there remain in the crumbling shell of the old house only the dying son of its builder, an ancient Negro woman who had been his slave, and the idiot mulatto youth who was to be the only direct descendant of the Sutpen blood.

Halfway through this book I found myself thinking Faulkner was an overrated hack writer. This is the third Faulkner novel I've read, and the first since high school, and they've all been near-impossible reading. Faulkner must have gotten paid by the word and the trip to the thesaurus by the editor, with deductions for periods. Some of the sentences in this book are over a page long, there are many obscure bits of language unfamiliar to me, and I can't count how many times I had to read a passage over again for understanding. But this story is actually pretty compelling, about an amoral plantation/slave owner who kicks out his first wife when he finds that she is an octoroon (one/eighth negro). Later the son of that union returns to court his half-sister, and the "demon" father encourages his favored white son to duel his half-brother to prevent the marriage, not on grounds of incest but of miscegnation. This leads to a series of events which bring his empire down around him, all in the midst of the Civil War. I can't believe that Faulkner is considered such a genius by the critics; it must be on the strength of his plots than his incomprehensible writing skills. ( )