William Faulkner By Alexis Wilkie

The Early Years He was born William Cuthbert Falkner on September 25, 1897 in New Albany, Mississippi. The first of four sons named after his great-grandfather William Clark Falkner, the “Old Colonel.” Called the “Young Colonel” out of homage to his father, Faulkner decided to sell the railroad that his father began. His father found the First National Bank of Oxford in 1910.

The Early Years William demonstrated artistic talent at a young again, but around the sixth grade he began to grow bored with his studies. His earliest writings were romantic and greatly influenced by English poets such as Burns, Tomson, Housman, and Swinburne. He also met two other people that would later play an important role in his future: Estelle Oldham, a childhood sweetheart and Phil Stone, his mentor.

Growing Up A little after April of 1918, Faulkner went to stay with Stone in New Haven. Faulkner first took a job with the Winchester Repeating Arms Company. However, the job did not last long because he accepted an invitation to become a cadet in training in the Royal Air Force in Canada.

“Military Life” In his Royal Air Force application, Faulkner actually lied about numerous things. The reason he spelled his name with a U was so that people believed he was British. He went to training in Toronto but never saw action because the war ended.

Post-Military He was honorably discharged, bought an officer’s dress uniform, and a set of wings for the breast pocket even though he never flew solo. He exaggerated a lot and his stories were what influenced his first published novel Soldiers’ Pay in 1926.

Post-Military After returning to Oxford in December, he enrolled at the University of Mississippi under a special provision for war veterans. Faulkner helped fun a drama club called the “Marionettes” in 1920. He dropped out of “Ole Miss” in November of 1920 after only three semesters. At the recommendation of Stark young, he took a job in NYC as an assistant in a bookstore managed by Elizabeth Prall. His most notorious job was his stint as postmaster in the University post office.

Intereting Facts In 1905, he entered first grade but skipped to third grade in 1906. In 1914, he began eleventh grade but then dropped out of Oxford High School. In 1952, he goes on a one-month trip to France, England, and Norway. In 1960 he accepts appoints to the University of Virginia faculty. In 1962, he falls of a horse and is injured. He later falls off another horse and the injuries bring complications to his heart. On July 6, 1962 William Faulkner dies of a heart attack. He is buried in St. Peter’s Cemetery

Lifetime During his life, Faulkner would go on to publish many works: Land of the Pharoahs The Sound and the Fury Go Down, Moses The Wild Palms The Hamlet A Fable

Published Poetry Vision in Spring- 1921 The Marble Faun- 1924 The Earth, a Poem- 1932 A Green Bough- 1933 Mississippi Poems- 1979 Helen, a Courtship- 1982

A Renowned Man In the realm of American literature he is a “giant.” He was a Nobel Prize-winning novelist and short story writer. Many people regard him as a man who transformed his “postage stamp” of native soil into an apocryphal setting in which he explored, articulated, and challenged “the old verities and truths of the heart.”

If there be grief, then let it be but rain, And this but silver grief for grieving’s sake, If these green woods be dreaming here to wake Within my heart, if I should rouse again. But I shall sleep, for where is any death While in these blue hills slumbrous overhead I’m rooted like a tree? Though I be dead, This earth that holds me fast will find me breath.

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Blibliography www.mcsr.olemiss.edu/~egjbp/faulkner/faulkner.htm en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Faulkner nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/.../faulkner-bio.html