I have really enjoyed reading a number of Faulkner novels this past year. In the last year I have tackled 'Absalom Absalom!,' Collected Stories, 'The Unvanquished', 'Go Down Moses', and later this summer 'Light in August'. Faulkner's use of the language is pretty special and I think he is a master of understanding characters by surrounding them with their personal fears and horrors and then watching their critical flaws expose themselves.
However and whenever you have the chance to dive into Faulkner you should do so. He is a hard nut to crack; the rhythm of his language is difficult until you add a slow drawl with a dry raspy voice. When you are reading Faulkner and find yourself asking yourself what is was that you just read, start reading out loud as if you were eighty-five, did not have enough spittle in your mouth to keep you tongue moist and continue forward, undeterred, not pausing to breath save in the ragged gasps that come with the need to express and define the limits of knowledge and unknown qualities that come in the brief moments of time spent, when driven by the ancestral shortcomings defining the nature of your quests and theirs, realizing it is the people and not the events that bring the moments of clarity, during the years of unremitting bewilderment we call the present, being drawn into the future while always, always, remaining the past.
Give it a try sometimes, and if you can, read it with a group. When you get five people together you can usually get a good idea of what is going on, but only in a joint effort. My final word of warning is that learning to read Faulkner has not assisted the development of my professional skills as a writer who is supposed to efficiently and succinctly summarize facts and argue there is only one way to view them. My clients don't often like me to explain the how the vagaries of fate have shaped their world in such a way that their greatest drives and desires leave them merely persevering, but not accepting of a future wrought of choices they did not make, but were born into. However as a tool to personal development, Faulkner sees, realizes, and sometimes explains the million shades of grey that supposedly only the truly color-blind can see.
