Examples: Geo rge Eliott (a feminist? really?), Longfellow, Virginia Wolff (a Lesbian?). I've come to realize that so many of the classics we read as youngsters weren't meant to be understood then, but to draw us back at a later age when we might comprehend.

I hadn't read Faulkner since high school and remembered virtually nothing of his work nor even reading it. One example that halted my progress for several days: Does thought come before memory, or the contrary? More: I found myself stopping several times a page to reflect on a thought that Faulkner had, it seemed, simply dropped into the text, almost sneaked it in lest he be caught in deeper thought than his lyrical writing might warrant. Then, from the first page, I fell captive to Faulkner's poetic style. Without much thought, I borrowed this book from a library and waited a couple of months to read it. If you want to know all you can about that heart and soul, the fiction where he put it is still right there.' -Eudora Welty 'Faulkner's greatness resided primarily in his power to transpose the American scene as it exists in the Southern states, filter it through his sensibilities and finally define it with words.' -Richard Wright

Thus we must turn to him for that continuity of moral purpose which made for the greatness of our classics.' - Ralph Ellison From the Hardcover edition., 'No man ever put more of his heart and soul into the written word than did William Faulkner. Thus we must turn to him for that continuity of moral purpose which made for the greatness of our classics.' -Ralph Ellison From the Hardcover edition., 'For all his concern with the South, Faulkner was actually seeking out the nature of man. If you want to know all you can about that heart and soul, the fiction where he put it is still right there.' -Eudora Welty 'Faulkner's greatness resided primarily in his power to transpose the American scene as it exists in the Southern states, filter it through his sensibilities and finally define it with words.' -Richard Wright, 'For all his concern with the South, Faulkner was actually seeking out the nature of man. 'No man ever put more of his heart and soul into the written word than did William Faulkner.

Light in August by William Faulkner