WILLIAM FAULKNER: The Yoknapatawpha Novels

Probably among the most important, certainly one of the most incisive introductions to the world of William Faulkner we have. The author explores the multifarious mythic landscape with surprisingly less contextual concern and more sheer delight in what the novels are about. Though unchronologically presented and confined in choice (it deals only with the Yoknapatawpha Country cycle) the study lights up the characteristic thematic twists and tensions in large, liberating terms. Brooks is insistent, along with Faulkner, that the encounter with evil engages the nature of reality. This is essentially an ""aristocratic"" reading, but an open one, outstandingly developed.