Large 8vo. ix, 362 pp, acknowledgments, introduction, Textual collation of the Manuscript and the Published Book: Chapters I-IX. First Edition, 1971. Brown cloth with black tittle plate and gilt lettering to spine.

Faulkner's revision of Absalom, Absalom!: A collation of the manuscript and the published book

LANGFORD, Gerald

University of Texas

A collation of the galleys and the published work of Faulkner's most popularly successful novel. Acknowledgments, introduction, reference chart, complete textual collation. x, 125+ 1 pages. cloth. 4to..

Faulkner's revision of Sanctuary;: A collation of the unrevised galleys and the published book

Literature & Fiction

University of Texas Press

Faulkner’s Revision of Absalom, Absalom! is a study of the creative process as exemplified in one of the major achievements in twentieth-century fiction. Portions of the original handwritten version of the story are collated, line by line, with corresponding sections of the published version. In an introductory discussion the major changes are analyzed and evaluated.
It is particularly interesting to observe Faulkner revising not only his choice of words and the construction of his sentences but also the central design of the story. Most notably, he changed his mind about having it known from the beginning that Charles Bon was Sutpen’s part-Negro son, and he developed Quentin Compson into the pivotal figure who finally supplies this missing piece of information.
In the process of revision Absalom, Absalom! became a kind of detective story, and the reader is forced to join the quest and participate in the undertaking which is the basic subject of the book—the human attempt to comprehend and deal with the past.
To trace the process of this revision is to experience a sharp focusing of theme and to witness a demonstration of how the meaning of a fictional work can shape its structure and, in turn, stand revealed by what has become the outward sign, or form, of that meaning.

Faulkner's Revision of Absalom, Absalom!: A Collation of the Manuscript and the Published Book

History & Criticism

Was Sanctuary really a “cheap idea,” as Faulkner himself called it, a book “deliberately conceived to make money”? The question has teased the reading public since its publication. Many readers have had their worst suspicions about Faulkner’s work confirmed by his statement, but most serious critics have discounted the disparagement, emphasizing instead Faulkner’s further statement that when the galley proofs arrived from his publisher, “I saw that it was so terrible that there were two things to do: tear it up or rewrite it. I thought again, ‘It might sell; maybe 10,000 of them will buy it.’ So I tore the galleys down and rewrote the book.”Now that two sets of the original galleys are available for inspection, one can see just how Faulkner reworked the novel. In the collation provided here by Gerald Langford, using Faulkner’s own corrected galleys held by the University of Texas at Austin, the reader can reconstruct the first version for himself, noting the cancellations, the additions, and the rewritten passages. As Gerald Langford makes clear in his introductory analysis, neither of Faulkner’s statements is to be trusted. Through revision, Sanctuary became theatrically more effective but thematically less interesting than the original version. Particularly noteworthy is the experimental narrative method of the original version, which foreshadows the method of Absalom, Absalom! as opposed to the straightforward, easily accessible method to which Faulkner turned in the revised Sanctuary and Light in August.

Faulkner's Revision of Sanctuary: A Collation of the Unrevised Galleys and the Published Book

The Richard Harding Davis years: A biography of a mother and son

HOLT.