William Faulkner 00 Faul
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Books by Carvel
Collins
The American Sporting Gallery Literature
in
the Modern World (With Others)
Editor
Frank Norris: McTeague (Rinehart Edition) William Faulkner: New Orleans Sketches William Faulkner: The Unvanquished (Signet Classics Edition)
Erskine Caldwell's
Men and Women
Faulkner's University Pieces William Faulkner: Early Prose and Poetry
William Faulkner: Early Prose and Poetry
William Faulkner: Early Prose and Poetry
Compilation and Introduction
by .
(fcSL-Hfcs
Carvel Collins
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS
An LITTLE,
Atlantic Monthly Press Book TORONTO BOSTON
BROWN AND COMPANY
•
c COPYRIGHT
(C)
I962 BY CARVEL COLLINS
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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOG CARD NO. 62-17953 FIRST EDITION
ATLANTIC-LITTLE, BROWN BOOKS
ARE PUBLISHED BY LITTLE,
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IN ASSOCIATION WITH
THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY PRESS
by
Published simultaneously in Canada Brown & Company {Canada) Limited
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PRINTED
IN
THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
To the amiable
members
of
the Faulkner Seminar,
University of Tokyo, 1961-62, the compilation of this is
volume
warmly dedicated.
Preface William Faulkner added
to his already
Japan when he took part
tation in
university teachers
and students held
Strongly impressed by him,
have said they doubt they an incandescent meeting.
growing repu-
in the
seminar of
Nagano
at
members
in 1955.
of that seminar
will ever again experience
And younger
such
Japanese students
have volunteered that they not only admire Faulkner's but would like to thank him for the address he
fiction
wrote "To the Youth of Japan."
Now
that Faulkner
is
again the subject of study by a
seminar of students and teachers in Japan, versity of
Tokyo,
it is
Uni-
at the
pleasant to present to them in this
volume some of the work he produced
forty years
ago
while he himself was part of a university community.
When prose,
University
Faulkner's
and drawings
came
first
seemed well not
of
poetry,
Mississippi
to the compiler's
knowl-
to reprint such early work. His
edge,
it
great,
mature books had not yet won him the Nobel Prize;
and though readers were admiring them numbers, many
critics still
in increasing
held them in low regard. But
now, widely recognized as a major world
writer,
Faulkner
has such stature that even his earliest works are of interest to
many. So
it
no longer seems helpful
reprinting such pieces.
now
in the
And
it
seems well
hope of avoiding confusion
to
postpone
to reprint
like that
them
which a
few years ago accompanied the reprinting of Faulkner's early
New
Orleans newspaper sketches: During the same [
ix
]
came upon and postponed
year in which the compiler
reprinting these University of Mississippi pieces he
upon those
New
Orleans sketches and thought
it
came
best also
postpone reprinting them, for the same reason. But
to
within a short time other admirers of Faulkner published
New
eleven of the sixteen after hearing
Orleans sketches and
volume containing
just those
two sketches.
proper to bring out the complete leans
had all.
sketches
— and
clearly not
The
later,
about two more of them, published a second It
then seemed
set of sixteen
New
been a service to Faulkner studies
situation has
Or-
that postponing their reprinting
begun
after
to repeat itself with Faulk-
ner's University of Mississippi pieces:
most of them have
been found and several projects for publishing them are planned by scholars
who have
not
come upon
the
all
materials reprinted here, already a few of the drawings
have been reproduced, parts of the prose have been quoted in
articles,
and an
article in
an anthology of
col-
lege writing has reprinted part of the poems. So, with
close students of Faulkner here
and elsewhere becoming
interested in his early writings,
it
this little
compilation
fectiveness at
now
Nagano and
to
the enthusiasm of the
of the current University of
The many people whose general assistance have these full
seems well to publish
honor both Faulkner's
ef-
members
Tokyo seminar. reminiscences, advice, and
made
possible the gathering of
and similar materials already know the compiler's
awareness of the debt he owes them, which he looks
forward to acknowledging in detail elsewhere. Here he
wants to take the opportunity to thank those [
x
]
who
sup-
plied the documents, sanctions,
on which
this
the staffs of
little
their generosity
George W. Healey,
Jr.,
and the
the Ole
and cooperation; Mr.
Raymond
Dr.
late
B.
former Editors of The Scream, and Mr. Branham
Hume, former Business Manager their support
details
1955
of that magazine, for
and open-handed offering of drawings and
of publishing history; Dr.
United States Embassy here, in
services
The Mississippian newspaper and
Miss annual for
Zeller,
and professional
compilation immediately depends:
to the success of the
who
Leon Picon
of the
contributed so
Nagano seminar,
much
for infor-
mation and advice; Mrs. John Pilkington for her generous and efficient checking of Mississippi documents; the staffs of the libraries at the University of Mississippi,
the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Texas,
Harvard University, and Yale University for
assistance of tion tions
many
Laboratory
and
at
kinds; the staff of the Microreproduc-
M.I.T. for reproductions of
illustra-
for skillful photographic salvaging of
manuscript pages; the
staff of the office
which
burned
registers
the deeds of Lafayette County, Mississippi, for unflagging
patience during the examination of their
newspapers; as well as the assistance far it
beyond the
staff of the
file
call of hospitality.
has been a pleasure to assemble this
of
Oxford
Oxford Eagle
little
And
for
because
volume, from
materials brought to Japan as seminar illustrations with
no thought of publishing them
as a book, the compiler
wants to thank those Japanese students
who urged
its
publication out of their admiration for William Faulkner.
Tokyo, 1961 [
xi
]
Preface to the American Edition These early published works by William Faulkner having been made available to Japanese readers because of a seminar offered at the University of
Tokyo,
it
has
been suggested that they be made available to Americans interested in Faulkner's writing.
trait,"
the
This edition expands
volume by adding photographs and "Por-
the Japanese
poem which Faulkner
published in the
Orleans Double Dealer during 1922 while he was at the University of Mississippi. this
same
literary
magazine
after leaving the University for
essays which bear
poems
on
still
The appendix added
to
works which Faulkner pub-
edition contains four
lished in the
New
New
in
1925 shortly
Orleans: two critical
his University writings,
and two
— "Dying Gladiator" and "The Faun" — which ne
published before his
first
novel and which are not in-
among the poems he later collected in A Green Bough. Though these two essays and three poems from the Double Dealer were among the items reprinted in 1932 by Paul Romaine in his Salmagundi, that volume is cluded
unfortunately out of print. lishers
want
The compiler and
the pub-
to express their gratitude to Mrs.
Lillian
Friend Marcus, Managing Editor of the Double Dealer, for her permission to reprint here these additional
of early prose
and poetry by William Faulkner.
Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1962 [
xiii
]
works
Contents ix
Preface Preface to the American Edition
Faulkner
at
University of Mississippi
the
xiii
3
L'Apres-Midi d'un Faune
39
Cathay
41
Landing
in
Luck
42
Sapphics
51
After Fifty Years
Une
Ballade des
53
Femmes Perdues
Naiads' Song
55
Fantoches Clair de
54
57
Lune
58
Streets
59
A Poplar A Clymene
60
Study
62
Alma Mater
64
To
70
a
61
Co-ed
Books and Things: In April Once by W. A. Percy
71
Books and Things: Turns and Movies by Conrad Aiken Co-education
at
74
Ole Miss
77
Nocturne
82
Books and Things: Aria da Capo by
Edna
St.
84
Vincent Millay
[
XV
]
Books and Things: American Drama: Eugene O'Neill
The
86
90
Hill
Books and Things: American Drama: Inhibitions
93
99
Portrait
Books and Things: Joseph Hergesheimer
101
Appendix
On
109
Criticism
Dying Gladiator
113
Verse Old and Nascent:
A
Pilgrimage
114 119
The Faun
123
Notes on the Text
[xvi
]
William Faulkner: Early Prose and Poetry
Faulkner
at
the University of Mississippi
William Faulkner drew
a picture for the
annual of the University of Mississippi.
was
of contributions he
make during
to
1916-1917
began a
It
series
the next eight
years to that annual, to the University newspaper, and to a University cations
humor magazine. By 1925
had brought out
ings, sixteen of his
at least sixteen
poems,
and prose sketch, and articles
—
of his draw-
his first published short story
of his reviews and literary
six
the artistic explorations of a
would become the best duced
these three publi-
more
novelist his
young man who
country has pro-
in this century.
Faulkner's father, an officer in the administration of the University of Mississippi, which adjoins the
Oxford, had a house on
Faulkner lived for
much
its
campus,
in
town of
which William
of the period under discussion
here. In such close physical association with the University
he found
its
publications open to
him not only
during the time he was enrolled as a student but earlier
when he worked
at a
bank and
University Post Office. [
3
]
later
when he ran
the
A his
former student of that era has kindly volunteered
memory
that
Faulkner wrote in 1916 for the Uni-
newspaper two or three imitation "Letters of a
versity's
Japanese School Boy" which were tions.
A
series of
such
letters
clusion the newspaper identified
man, and there seems
to
be
his earliest publica-
did appear; but at
little
its
possibility of attributing
individual letters from that series to Faulkner.
him with any
equally impossible to attribute to
It
may have
written
some
of them.
may
high school publications as yet unavailable
seems
certainty
another, shorter series of imitation letters of the period, though he
con-
author as another
its
same
Even
contain
written juvenilia or drawings similar to ten of Faulkner's
pen-and-ink school sketches which survive from 1913.
But
his first
published work which
been able to identify
is
this investigation
has
the signed drawing for the 1916-
1917 Ole Miss annual. It
was followed the next year by two signed drawings
in the
1917-1918 Ole Miss, one of them for the same
"Social Activities" page his to decorate a
page
first
listing the
had decorated, the other
members
of a dancing
group. Faulkner presumably supplied the
staff
of Ole
Miss with these drawings before April 10, 1918; for on that
day he began work
company
as a ledger clerk at
in Connecticut. Signing
ing Corps,
an armament
up with the Royal Fly-
and then resigning from
June 15, 1918, he made a brief
his job as clerk
trip
home
family before leaving Mississippi on July
Toronto, Canada, to begin training as a
months
later
came
the Armistice. [
4
]
When
on
to visit his
8,
1918, for
pilot.
Four
the British re-
William Faulkner in 1918, as a Cadet in the Royal Flying Corps, Training in Canada
[
5
]
him from
leased
from Canada
training the following month, he returned
to Mississippi.
That spring and summer
— according — Faulkner
to Phil Stone,
did even
a close associate of those days
more reading than usual and wrote much he would revise for The Marble Faun of
On August
6,
1919, The
New
draft
so
to
five years later.
Republic printed
"L'Apres-Midi d'un Faune,"
known
of the poetry
his
first
have been published and
poem
published
his first
whom
on the Symbolist poets from
his
piece of writing
he would draw
much. At summer's end, on September
19, 1919,
he
registered as a student at the University of Mississippi,
enrolling in French, Spanish,
and the sophomore survey
of English literature.
His
The
first
contributions to the University's newspaper,
Mississippian,
were a
slightly
revised
version of
"L'Apres-Midi d'un Faune" in October and, on November 12, 1919, the
some
these pieces:
seem
poem "Cathay." "Cathay"
illustrates
accompany
reprinting
of the uncertainties which
to
Lines of the
poem
perfect guidance for emendation
other three available versions. three
is
in
The Mississippian
have been disturbed by faulty typesetting, but is
not to be found in the
The most
accessible of the
a typescript William Faulkner loaned to the
Princeton University Library for
its
which now can be seen
among
in
as Plate 3
exhibition of 1957, the illustrations
James B. Meriwether's excellent book The Literary
Career of William Faulkner (Princeton, 1961).
from the printed version
at points
[
6
]
It differs
where The Mississip-
made
pian seems not to have
came
other two versions
1941
The
about a decade after a
had destroyed a house containing early Faulk-
fire
ner papers
— when
was
I
and help of the owners, out,
typographical errors.
to light
able, with the kind consent
to separate
from the
debris, dry
and read more than four hundred and seventy pages,
including a
damaged holograph
version of this
poem
dated 1920 and an undated, damaged typescript of
They in
differ at several points
it.
not only from the version
The Mississippian but from
the version
Mr. Faulk-
ner loaned to Princeton. These documents
be-
differ
cause William Faulkner revised and improved his early
poems as
for several years, printing
some
of
them
as late
1933, after he not only had become a novelist but
had created that
fictional masterpiece,
The Sound and
the Fury.
The Mississippian launched Faulkner fiction
when
two weeks it
story he
after
it
had printed
his
as
an author of
poem "Cathay,"
brought out on November 26, 1919, the
known
is
Luck" and
set
to
at
have published, a
military
titled
training
first
"Landing
aerodrome
in
in
Canada. In the same issue the newspaper published another of his poems, "Sapphics," the rest of that
and
in subsequent issues during
1919-1920 academic year published ten
more. Most of them were more sophisticated than the verse other students wrote for the newspaper,
and the
discrepancy created opposition to Faulkner's work.
February
4,
On
1920, the week after he published "Une
[
7
]
Ballade des
Femmes
Perdues," a fellow student parodied
After Faulkner published "Naiads' Song" and "Fan-
it.
toches," which the paper mis-set as "Fantouches," the
parodist struck again, with "Whotouches," signed "J."
As an
artist partly
apprenticed to the Symbolists, Faulk-
ner already must have learned from them to expect hostility
of this sort;
and one would
he was learning to adapt to skills
some
like to
his
own
that, while
circumstances and
of the aesthetic practice and theory of the
dun Faune" and
authors of "L'Apres-midi
Faulkner was also learning from to cherish
imagine
more and more
les
"Fantoches,"
poetes maudits
the natural independence and
self-containment within which he has recorded his aesthetic perceptions with
remarkable indifference
much
to
neglect and hostility during long early years, great adula-
during recent years, and considerable misunder-
tion
standing throughout.
With
his
"Fantoches," on February 25, 1920, Faulk-
ner began the publication of a group of four poems which
he specifically connected with their source, in the
work
— appeared
"Streets,"
all
of
them using Verlaine's
3,
1920, and the third,
on March
laine's "Streets"
issue of
"A
—
on March
of this group of four titles
this case
of Paul Verlaine. "Clair de Lune," the second
17. Faulkner's adaptation of
was not
Ver-
his only contribution to that
The Mississippian;
in addition to a
poem
called
Poplar" he published one of the very few responses
he has ever
made
to the student "J"
to the reactions of his readers, a reply
who had parodied two
poems. Appearing under the [
8
title
]
of his earlier
"The Ivory Tower,"
and with the obvious typographical
this reply said (in part
removed):
errors
Ben Jonson, himself that laughter is
is
a strong advocate of Mirth, has said
one of our most valuable possessions. Which
quite true: Imagine
what
Yet mirth requires two I
I
myself that
flatter
am
I
unprejudiced
his present vein
and accepting
unknown
make
—
he
collaboration.
this
— and
I
"affinity"
statement is
It
lest
I
am
sure
has notably
will state further, that in
never achieve
will
it.
a sense of humor.
possess the latter; but
— my
"Wolf!"; yet the matter
my
humor and
producing the former.
failed in
boldly
world would be without
this
things:
it
without asking
were not the
—
sufficient that I
reader justifiably cry
scarcely worth exhausting either
vocabulary or the reader's patience, so
shall
I
be as brief
as possible.
The
(1.)
first
own poem was
poem submitted by him was One sees at a glance
stupid.
stupid, for
my
then, the utter
valuelessness of an imitation of an imitation. (2.) This though,
was not the only way
in
which the poet sinned. The most de-
plorable thing was his meaningless and unnecessary parading of his doubtless extensive knowledge of the Latin language.
To my mind of two
there
languages
is
nothing as vulgar as a conscious mingling
—
unless,
of course,
the
mingling gives
shades and tones that the work would not otherwise possess.
Whatever tones and shades seems
to
me, been drawn
have been enhanced,
his
poem
in single
possessed could have,
language
in all probability,
(its clarity
it
could
by adhering to some
simple language such as an early Aztec dialect). This though, is
beside the point.
The second poem the
first in
...
if
humor
this is,
is
not worthy of note, closely resembling
being a vulgarly stupid agglomeration of words.
be humor, then
like evil, in the
I
have
lost
my
sense of
eye of the beholder. [
9
]
it;
unless
However,
he has, by any chance, gained the effect for
if
which he has so palpably
striven, the
answer
is,
of course,
simply de gustibus.
William Falkner.
Faulkner, in signing this response, followed the form
name which
of his family
his father, grandfather,
and
great-grandfather used, as he did in signing most of his University of Mississippi pieces which are reprinted here.
Discussions of
name
rival in
who
put the "u" in William Faulkner's
number
the renditions of that great musical
question about the overalls in Mrs. Murphy's chowder. Insignificant as the matter
concerning
it
illustrates the
about Faulkner.
the continual confusion
is,
immaturity of
The customary
— and
planation of the change in spelling counterfeit coins which too
ner industry have passed
is
much wrong
writing
—
ex-
one of the small
many workers in the Faulkamong themselves from the
beginning to the present. For example, the most recent of the J.
American books of Faulkner
criticism, Frederick
Hoffman, William Faulkner (New York, 1961),
1924
ferring to the year
in
its
re-
"Chronology," says, "First
book published: The Marble Faun, a book of poems, published by the Four Seas Co. of Boston. Because of printer's error, a
"u" added to Faulkner's name, which
he has retained." That esting piece of this
as untrue as
is
an even
less inter-
minor coinage which once again
re-
appears in another recent, small book, Michael Millgate,
William Faulkner (Edinburgh, 1961): that in the First
World War, join the
as Millgate puts
it,
Faulkner "managed to
Canadian Flying Corps," which must have taken [
10
]
considerable managing because in that war
no
These
air force.
Canada had
biographical counterfeit, of
bits of
no importance whatever. But when such
course, have
books, drawing them from dubious secondary
tertiary
sources, offer
them again and again, they are an obvious
much more
reminder of the existence of a more subtle, significant false coinage of critical
books also
circulate.
The "u"
judgment which such
in Faulkner's
name began
to
appear intermittently some years before the publication
of
The Marble Faun
the spelling staff
of the
worked his
as
in
in
1
924 by
armament company
name appears
work: 1919.
Faulkner
for
which Faulkner
in their records of that year's
work signed "Faulkner"
public,
employees
known published literary his first known published
first
is
New
"L'Apres-Midi d'un Faune,"
To
five years
Faun
—
Re-
reduce the possibility that writers on
will attribute that insertion of the
than
to
whose error
Connecticut from April into June of 1918,
"William Faulkner." His
literary
printers to
continually attributed. According to the
is
before the publication of
an error by the
New
"u"
— more
The Marble
Republic printers,
it
may
be well to mention other early appearances of "Faulkner."
Among
the burned sheets of his early writings
salvaged some years ago was a small, badly damaged, beautifully
produced booklet of poems, hand-lettered
as a gift to a friend, titled
The
Lilacs, dated
1920, and bearing, carefully lettered by
name "W. Faulkner." One
January
1,
author, the
of the two copies I have read
of the booklet titled Marionettes,
11
which Faulkner "pub-
and circulated
lished" himself in pen-and-ink
[
its
]
to a
few
William Faulkner in the Uniform of the British Air Force
[
12
]
"1920" and the name "W. Faulk-
friends, bears the date
ner," both in Faulkner's characteristic lettering. In addition to his booklet
The
among
Lilacs, other items
the
fire-damaged papers of his University of Mississippi years
which
relate to this little matter are typescripts of
by "William Faulkner" which bear-dates
The Marble Faun.
of
So, apparently, this
Who
Name?
is
Put the "u"
in
is
to
William Faulkner's
William Falkner.
Whatever way he was
spelling his family
ner's importing to the Mississippi
name, Faulk-
campus not only the
works of French Symbolists but a walking detached
one puz-
and the answer
zling spelling printers did not cause,
the question
poems
earlier than that
air of
unemployment which masked
stick;
his
his dedica-
which has produced more
tion to the labor of writing,
than twenty-five books and was already producing the formative published and unpublished pieces of those early years;
and
—
all
him
these
the
his awareness,
had
led
some of
1920. This
is
fore the
uncommon
the college students to give
The Mississippian
apparently the
on Faulkner's works
many
to
first-rate artist
nickname "Count," which the student "J" used
in a letter printed in
to
common
would one day become a
genius, that he
first
— and War
March
one more similar
of the commentaries
Second World
for
24,
published commentary in tone
on Faulkner published be-
than
it is
pleasant to recol-
lect: I feel
it
my
duty to answer an article that appeared in
the last issue of your very estimable paper. This article seems to
have been written by a peculiar person [
13
]
who
calls
himself
William Falkner and sides in the
who from
all
accounts undoubtedly re-
ters" himself that he possesses a sense of ters himself this
make
humor.
says he "flatI
say he
flat-
he says he possesses anything. "I boldly make
if
statement
course,
He
remote village of Oxford, Miss.
lest the
'Bull.' " I shall, of
Editor justifiably cry
this article
very brief, desiring to conserve the
valuable space in this paper and also
my own
exhaustible
energy for some more serious subject.
Mr. Editor,
feel,
I
times, each a find
trifle
kicking myself three successive
like
severer than the former.
what the Count was "driving
at,"
I tried
so hard to
and only that
him-
he,
me
admits his work was "stupid." Modesty forbids
self,
using a stronger epithet than "stupid." I
have written the parodies to give Count's poems a mean-
ing;
and behold! how
But permit
me
fine University
if all
little
he appreciates
my humble
wander. Mr. Editor, wouldn't
to
of us were to wear sailor collars,
we would
efforts.
monkey
hats,
and
street
by the aid of a walking prop; and, ye gods forbid,
brilliant
pantaloons;
if
be a
this
'mose' along the if
we
should while away our time singing of lascivious knees, smiling lute strings, and voluptuous toes? Wouldn't that be just
too grand?
Since Count used a quotation, allow I
use the words of Lord Byron,
"He
me
the
same
liberty.
brays, the Laureate of
the long-eared kind."
And now,
allow
me
to apologize for wasting
time on such a subject, and permit
me
Your humble
Two
weeks
your valuable
to remain,
later the controversy in
servant,
—
J.
The Mississippian
over Faulkner's poetry had not abated, for the paper carried a brief note by Faulkner wondering of "J" "where
did he learn English construction?" and a lengthy de[
14
]
fense of Faulkner by
someone signing himself "F," a new
who seems now
participant in the controversy
to our
hindsight pleasantly perceptive:
I
feel
my
it
last issue of
duty to answer an article that appeared in the
your very estimable paper. This
have been written by a peculiar person "J"
some
think
Count
gentle reader should undertake to defend
Of
in this controversy.
a poet
.
the by-products of nature,
all
such a di-
the least able to protect himself in
is
lemma.
.
.
not intended to infer that Count could not answer this
It is
article as well as
in
seems to
signs himself
.
.
.
I
article
who
anyone
else.
However, he
is
probably now,
fancy, with the keen discernment of a poetic eye,
his
measuring the dimple on the knee of some
fairy, figuratively
speaking, so that he can convey to our thirsting souls in
rhythmic verse interrupted in
and for once tions to
its
this, I
in
my
full
life
Rather than have him
significance.
burden
my weak
shoulders with the task,
perhaps place nobility under obliga-
me.
following Count's passionate outbursts with some of Possum Hollow poetry adds about as much dignity and calm to the majestic pose and sweep of Count's literary
"J"
's
his
course as a tomato can tied to a poodle's
The only excuse he has poets seems to be that he
tail.
.
.
.
for this propensity to pester the is
them meaning. Ha! well
giving
might one use a raindrop to measure the ocean's depth, choose the movement of a
turtle to explain the eagle's flight,
or listen to the screech of the "J" bird to interpret the love
notes of a dove.
Poets don't sprout in every garden of learning, and
how
can they grow and bloom into a genius when they are continually
surrounded by bitterweeds. [
15
]
.
.
.
This defense of Faulkner's poetry ended the controversy with "J" except for a lished almost a
month
weak
which "J" pub-
letter
May
on
later,
5,
saying he had
delayed his reply on the assumption that Faulkner's defender "had been shipped to Jackson for treatment" in the
asylum. The Mississippian published only two
state insane
more parodies
new
of Faulkner's poetry, apparently by
performers: in the same issue which contained the letter
from "F," a parody of Faulkner's "Clair de Lune,"
"Cane de Looney"; and during
the next month,
"Une Ballade
Femmes
on
12, a
parody of
titled
"Une Ballade d'une Vache Perdue," execrably
his
des
ten but briefly arresting because of
its
of a motif which Faulkner himself
would use
1943
"L'Apres-midi d'une
as
as
humor
writ-
crude presentation for
humor
Vache" and which he
for thematic point, parody, in
May
Perdues,"
French translation during
in a piece first published in
would use
titled
The Hamlet when the
and pathos
idiot
as well
wanders with
his
cow. Though the parodies ended and though Faulkner
— — when he won by "F"
received visible support of his writing
in addition to
that in the letter
a prize for the
best literary
work
in the
1920 Mississippian, a fellow
student and good friend recalls that Faulkner's departure
from campus poetic convention led balled for
amusing
On
membership
and
to Faulkner's friend,
April 14
mene," the
to his being black-
a literary society
in
—
a vote
others.
The Mississippian published "A Cly-
last of the
four
poems which Faulkner
as-
cribed to Verlaine. With "Study," on April 21, 1920, and
"Alma Mater," on May
12,
[
The Mississippian concluded 16
]
publication of works by Faulkner during his
its
But
as a student.
first
year
his University productions of that year
were not over: the 1919-1920 Ole Miss appearance contained
in
of his pieces,
six
its
end-of-year
five
of
them
drawings. Faulkner had served during the college year
one of the
as
on the
art editors
Louis Cochran,
who was
staff
under the writer
then a student and the annual's
editor in chief. In addition to Faulkner's drawings, the
annual also contained
Cochran had Cochran
led
to joke
his
him
invited
poem "To
to contribute
a Co-ed," which
— and which has
about having been the
first
publisher
to get Faulkner's writing into a book.
The next autumn, when Faulkner again
enrolled at
the University, he joined at once in formally founding the
Marionettes as the University's Faulkner's friend
official
dramatic society.
Ben Wasson, whose work
on Broadway, was the
first
president;
later
appeared
and Faulkner was
charge of staging the plays, such as The Arrival of
in
Kitty,
performed the next January. Members of the Mar-
ionettes recall that several of them, including Faulkner,
had enjoyed producing plays for a year or more before officially
connecting their group with the University, and
Faulkner was to continue with the society for some years beyond his semesters as a student, being an honor-
ary
member
until
1925.
Early in his association with the Marionettes, Faulkner
wrote a one-act play
titled
Marionettes, which he "pub-
lished" for friends as a few attractive hand-lettered booklets.
The
first
page of the
text of
one copy and
its
facing
drawing have been made generally accessible as Figure [
17
]
1
James B. Meriwether, The Literary
of the illustrations in
Career of William Faulkner. Another copy of the bookcontains fifty-three pages of hand-lettering and nine
let
pages of line drawings.
Some
of the play's motifs
"A
come
— among them
from other Faulkner works of that time
Poplar" and "Study" in The Mississippian as well as
preliminary versions of the poetry he would later publish as
The Marble Faun
— and from
the works of other
Amy
Lowell, the motif
and
writers, including Verlaine
of a well-groomed
woman
walking the formal paths of
her garden presumably owing something to Miss Lowell's "Patterns." Despite great differences of intention and
some elements which appear
surface, this play introduces in at least
two other prose works Faulkner wrote during
Galwyn in the unpublished Mayday and Quentin Compson's
the 'twenties: the story of Sir allegorical booklet titled
section of
The Sound and
of this play, though
Mayday from Shade of
it
the characters
removed than
and the
Spirit of
Autumn,
presenting the significance of mortality as
The Sound and
troubled Pierrot to the
farther
monologue, are Pierrot, the
Quentin's
do the man named Time in
much
Pierrot, Marietta,
this last figure
Among
the Fury. is
in
Mayday and Quentin's father The suggestion that the
the Fury.
may have drowned
drownings which end the
in a river looks
lives of
ahead
both Sir Galwyn
and Quentin Compson. During
his
period at the University of Mississippi, and
probably rather early in friend,
wrote a
it,
brief, untitled,
ently survived in only
Faulkner, according to a one-act play which appar-
one copy. [
18
1
It
shows how Ruth, an
emancipated
gagement
of the prohibition era, ends her en-
girl
to the
more worldly Francis and becomes en-
gaged to pusillanimous Jim, who, though giving
Ruth on he
is
all
so dominating.
signed, unpublished
One
interested in identifying un-
works by Faulkner might
opening remark of tence of Jason's
this play
monologue
like to
between the quiet
feel at least the slightest of similarities
as well as
in to
counts, wins her because, according to her,
and the noisy opening sen-
The Sound and
in
between the action of
this
the
Fury
play and the central
motif of one of Faulkner's unpublished, fire-damaged, signed poems; but nothing whatever in the wording and plot of the play proves that
it is
by Faulkner.
Before two months of the autumn semester of his
second year had passed, Faulkner withdrew from en-
November
rollment in the University, on
never again registered as a student! But
this
5,
1920, and
by no means
severed his connection with the University's publications.
Five days after he abandoned formal schooling The Mississippian brought out the articles:
of a series of his literary
first
a review of a volume of
W. A.
Percy's poetry in
which Faulkner made the interesting remark that Percy "
—
like alas!
how many
of us
—
suffered the misfortune
of having been born out of his time." series of articles discussed
The second
in this
Conrad Aiken, whose poetry
Faulkner respected and frequently quoted admiringly to his University of Mississippi friends, as
of
he did the poetry
James Joyce, a volume of which he often carried
about the campus. In
May,
1921,
The
Mississippian,
[
19
]
which retained
name on
Faulkner's
its staff roll
one of the "Contrib-
as
uting Editors" despite his having resigned as a student,
poem "Co-Education
published his
at
Ole Miss."
annual, which also had retained Faulkner's staff roll, as
one of
its
decorative border, featuring
the plates
writer Stark
known
left
at
as a
City.
with
its
two-page spread which
One
sequence of
this period, staying for
Young
did
more than
whom
offer
a
was the
of his friends there
Young, a native of Mississippi
Oxford.
its
a printers' error.
Oxford during
New York
name on
poem "Nocturne" it
in spite of the reversal of the
— presumably
Faulkner time in
at
art editors, published four of his
drawings and his unsigned
was impressive
And
1920-1921 academic year the Ole Miss
the end of that
he had
Faulkner
a temporary base in this unsettled period following college; for, as
he has helpfully written in a
letter,
able to introduce Faulkner to Elizabeth Prall, "in
house
I
had a room, the room
he was
whose
shared for a time."
Bill
Later Elizabeth Prall, by then the wife of Sherwood
Anderson, was to introduce Faulkner to her husband
New
since described as one he
But before
his
remembers with great pleasure.
important sojourn in
Faulkner resumed for three years the University of Mississippi. for Friday,
reported:
who art,
in
Orleans to begin an association which Faulkner has
December
The
1921, in
9,
his
New
Orleans,
association with
University newspaper its
"Locals" column
"William Falkner, former Ole Miss student,
has been in
New York
City for
some time studying
has returned to the University to take the temporary
postmastership at the University post office." [
20
]
And
an-
other article in the same issue, noting that the "examination for the position
was held Saturday
in
Oxford" for
Faulkner and two other contestants, wished "the best
man
success." Faulkner
won
the position, and by March,
1922, his recommendation to become permanent postmaster reached the United States Senate for confirmation,
which
it
received.
The month
he began work in the University's
after
The
post office, Faulkner began contributing again to Mississippian, with a review of
Edna
St.
Vincent Millay's
Aria da Capo, on January 13, 1922, and an ing
Eugene
initialed
on February
O'Neill,
article prais-
1922, both of them
"W.F."
Though he had published "Landing
in
March
10,
sketch,
"The
the tenth in
1922,
is
first
as
piece of fiction,
he had enrolled as a
had published no other piece of
more than two years
The sketch
his
Luck," almost as soon
student, Faulkner in the
3,
that
The Mississippian printed
Hill,"
which
it
fiction
had passed when on prose
a
credited merely to "W.F."
so closely related to a
A Green Bough —
poem by Faulkner
that there
is
—
no problem
about ascription; but for confirmation that he wrote
this
and the four other Mississippian pieces signed "W.F."
am
indebted to a former
The week following
member
the appearance of this sketch
Mississippian printed the
ner called "American
of the newspaper's
first
Drama:
I
staff.
The
part of an article by FaulkInhibitions,"
which
it
com-
pleted in the next week's issue. That spring the Ole Miss
annual for 1922 contained, on the page of the French Club,
its last
drawing by Faulkner, ending an association [
21
]
which had begun
five years
before
published the drawing which tion this investigation has
But by
his
work from
readers as he was
their relatively small circle of
moving toward professional publica-
When
world-wide.
national
which now, forty years
Double Dealer
— appeared
"little
later,
the Ole Miss annual was printing
drawings by Faulkner, the
contributions to the "Portrait"
much
the University of Mississippi's
tion for the larger audience
this last of its
publica-
first
been able to discover.
amateur publications and
is
the annual had
time Faulkner was, of course, not so
this
withdrawing
when
Faulkner's
is
in the June,
—
first
of his seven
the
poem
titled
1922, issue of that
magazine," which was published
at
New
Orleans, where Faulkner was later to turn to fiction.
Though Faulkner had brought out his last University poem in the spring of 1921, his concern with poetry was to continue for some years: He dated a few unpublished poems during
his
New
Orleans months in 1925 and had
published four in the Double Dealer by the time he
New
Orleans for Europe on July
lished
poems
are dated
on
7,
European
that
left
1925. Other unpubtrip.
In 1926,
the period immediately following his return, he dated
more poems, from Pascagoula,
Mississippi. After he
published major novels he
showed
still
his
had
concern with
poetry by publishing during 1932 several poems in an issue of
Contempo which
ing out in
featured his work, and by bring-
1932 and 1933 This Earth and
A
Green
Bough, volumes which included revisions of poems he
had written
at the University of Mississippi.
In December, 1922, the University newspaper pub[
22
]
,
lished
its last
essay by Faulkner, a review article center-
ing on three novels by Joseph Hergesheimer. Interestingly
— though probably
it is
only coincidence
—
of his previous pieces of literary criticism in
he
moved
become,
a
little
The
Missis-
drama while he was
sippian had been either poetry or
voting his time to writing
the subjects
poems and
plays, but
as
was
to
closer in time to the novelist he
this final
de-
now
Mississippian review was Faulkner's
only contribution to that newspaper about an author of fiction.
Possibly Faulkner
made one more
contribution to
At
Mississippian after this review of Hergesheimer. start of the last
The the
year of his postmastership, on January
1 1
1924, the paper carried a large, humorous "advertise-
ment" for a Bluebird Insurance Company which was dedicated to the happiness of students because protect
them
in their college courses
it
would
by insuring them
"against professors and other failures." This advertise-
ment and those which followed
it
purported to have been
purchased by a company composed of three men: student
who had
had been
at
Oxford
as a
a
from England where he
just returned
Rhodes Scholar; one of Faulk-
ner's post office assistants,
who
later
would become
post-
master when Faulkner resigned; and Faulkner. Each was listed as a "president" of the
The published accounts
company.
of Faulkner's
tion the Bluebird Insurance
sumed without question veloped
this joke.
life
Company seem
which mento
that Faulkner invented
One cannot
interpretation wrong, but there
[
23
have
as-
and de-
with assurance label that is
]
the possibility that
much
—
or all?
—
the office of
of this series of advertisements originated in
The Mississippian and
perhaps, the other two
men were
that Faulkner and,
drafted as "presidents"
without their consent or knowledge. Linking the three
men
company may have
together as founders of the
struck the newspaper's staff as funny:
whom
Rhodes Scholar, just this
life at
Ox-
England, the reporter described the talk rather
dis-
Club of the University about
respectfully, saying versity
had
the returned
time called "the famous and inimitable," gave a
talk to the Latin
ford,
When
a Mississippian news article of
it
had revealed
that at
Oxford Uni-
"luncheon was served in one's room and one only
to take one's dinner,
doncher know, with the
rabble" and that there one "
jolly
— had appeared —
— can you
believe
it?
lets
afternoon tea interfere with a hotly contested cricket
match." The post
enough
antly
—
pleas-
office assistant
in
a series of Mississippian columns
which made fun of campus
and
figures
Faulkner and others of the post illustrated half
also,
office
along with
force,
in
an
page of the humor section of the 1922
Ole Miss which named the post
Club" with "Hours: 11:20
to
office the
"Postgraduate
12:20 every Wednesday,"
"Motto: Never put the mail up on time," and "Aim:
Develop postmasters out of Faulkner's the
University's
"Freshman
1919-1920 Ole Miss he had been
listed
Miss for 1923 in the
list
fifty
students every year."
name had appeared on
as^
the formal roll of
Literary
as "Falkner,
Class"
in
the
Count William," and
by the humor section of the Ole
"Hardest Worker
— Count Falkner"
of "Superlative Election" results which [
24
]
named
!
WE INSURE YOU! MAKE OLE MISS A WINTER RESORT! Insure yourself against professors and other failures. Let your failures pay your way through college. If the professors don't appreciate your brains, they mean less popthe co-eds will your money. Laugh at pop-writtens written checks.
—
Girls,
TKink of Your Feet!
Our
Foot-Ease Dancing Policy for ladies beats Blue-Jay in stopping that after-dance pain. Take out one of our famous policies and then write your A. & M. friends to come over.
Boys, If sweetie stands
you up,
let
men
will
Policy for young
Why
Worry?
us be the one to worry.
Our Broken-Hearted
make you laugh when
sheik
m?kes a date
with her
man who went hunting.
When
he was a long ways from Seeing no other shelter, the man rain very, very hard. crawled into a hollow log and went to sleep. When he awoke the log had swollen so that he could not get out. The man felt that his last days had come. At once he began to realize he had wasted most of his life and had failed to take out that policy when the BLUEBIRD salesman called the day before. This made him feel so small that he crawled right out of the little end of the log. Moral Let the BLUEBIRD help you out
There was once a home it began to
:
of tight places.
THE BLUEBIRD INSURANCE "We Take James Bell,
CO.
Anything" William Falkner,
Jr., President.
Louis Jigcetts, President
Bell-Falkner-Jicgetts, Unlimited, Underwriters
[
25
}
President
such other involuntary electoral victors as "Most Popular Professor"
and "Biggest Grouch," and through the
years he had appeared in the "Hayseed Letters" columns
The Mississippian
of
which the correspondence be-
in
tween an imaginary bumpkin
back on the farm
at
column opportunities faculty.
to
As one example,
the son wrote
at college
Possum Trot gave
make
jokes about students and
home: "Wei here
best schule in the world.
his father
September 21, 1920,
in a
Me
Negro about the campus
and
the authors of the
am back
I
and Blind Jim [an
whom
letter
again at the afflicted
the students sometimes
member of the Tubb and Hannibal, Bill Falkner and Paul Rogers is all here now so school can comminct whenever it wants to." Though the "president" of the Bluebird Insurance Company who had been adopted as a class
officer or unofficial
University's administration], T.
a
Rhodes Scholar had
also
J.
been one of the two authors of
those "Hayseed Letters" with their burlesquing of stu-
dents and faculty, and though the "president"
an assistant Scholar
at the post office
among
was
the "Contributors to This Issue" of
Mississippian which carried the
ment,
it
who was
with the Rhodes
listed
first
The
Bluebird advertise-
seems doubtful that the remaining "president,"
William Faulkner, would strongly have favored publishing
among
Company
the defenses of the
ment of February 15 such an item
retired in the Post Office.
— during
humor has
its
advertiseis
a gross
Falkner has permanently
injustice to say that President
naps
in
as this: "It
He
merely takes temporary
business hours." Faulkner, whose sense of
clearly demonstrated that
[
26
]
it
includes himself,
may have
taken part in this series of advertisements,
which did not end
many months
until
dence appears either way, admirers of be kindly allowed
work up
voluntarily help
not write the
at least to
more
with a
later
page notice in the Ole Miss annual; but
full-
until firmer evi-
his fiction
assume that
if
should
Faulkner did
these Bluebird notices he did
flat-footed parts of them, did not favor
stretching the joke over such a long time,
whatever to do with the news
and had nothing
article in the
February 15
Mississippian which announced that the next day the
campus would
start
"The Bluebird Game,"
"some popular young man,"
"carry a striped letter" to deliver "to the
happened
to ask
in
secretly the Bluebird, first
which
would
who
coed"
whether he was the Bluebird. "The
for-
tunate young lady" would receive a ticket to the movies
and a Bluebird insurance "solely for the coeds.
policy.
The next
The
first
game was
to
a ticket to the show worth asking the question? Try You'll find
it
fun. Play the Bluebird
Company
it.
game."
Whatever Faulkner's relationship surance
be
solely for the eds." "Isn't
to the Bluebird In-
many pleasures in these He kept up his practice of
hoax, he had
years in addition to his writing.
taking long walks into the countryside, often covering
twelve or fifteen miles with Phil Stone on a Sunday, and
sometimes going days.
He and
off
on foot
his friends
for jaunts lasting several
enjoyed driving about in his open
white car, which was named, at least by some of the friends, "Snowflake,"
and must have offered a pleasant,
and notable, variation
in a time
still
affected
by Henry
Ford's legendary order to give them any color they want [
27
]
just so
it's
black. Faulkner also played golf frequently at
—
the University
so competently that near the time of his
resignation as postmaster he took part in an exhibition
match with two touring sin
professionals,
and one from Indiana, and turned
When
the
one from Wisconin the best score.
managers of the exhibition passed a hat
audience to collect money for the players to divide
in the
among
themselves, Faulkner elected to remain, in golf, an amateur.
Always an tively
athlete,
an outdoorsman, and a
man
effec-
concerned for the welfare of the young, Faulkner
served during part of this period as scoutmaster of the
Oxford Boy Scout troop. Former members
recall with
pleasure and admiration that at meetings, on day-long outings,
and during periods
in
camp, such
as
one
in late
August, 1924, at a small lake northwest of Oxford, William Faulkner created an unusually pleasant atmosphere, so that in the complete absence of nervous, shouted adult discipline, the
a fine time.
boys maintained sense and order and had
One former youth
of Oxford,
now an
im-
portant scholar, recalls the interest Faulkner was able to give a
game
which the problem was
in
unde-
to creep
Faulkner introduced and the boys of Oxford
game much en-
joyed. Faulkner himself enjoyed this association
and must
tected through the
woods toward a
have disliked having to end first-rate
it,
central player, a
for he obviously
was a
scoutmaster.
As postmaster apparently
left
in these years,
something
to
however, his performance
be desired.
He
is
said
by
friends to have accepted the job with the greatest reluc-
[
28
]
tance.
And
to readers of today there
and
Go Down, Moses making
the
Fury
a living sorting other peo-
Christmas cards. By September
ple's
something prepos-
is
The Sound and
terous about the future author of
1924, a U.S. Post
2,
Office inspector with headquarters in Corinth, Mississippi,
had written Faulkner a
letter
detailing patrons'
and packages,
his
reading a great deal instead of maintaining ardent
at-
complaints about undelivered
tendance process
at the
of
letters
stamp window, and
book which some patrons
a
publication
claimed was written
at the post office.
since recalled that Faulkner said he
The
inspector has
was "glad the Post
someone who had a sense of humor and
Office sent
realized
having in the
his
what a
'hell
of a job' "
it
was.
At
the end of
October, 1924, after almost three years at the post
Faulkner resigned and the next day in a moving a friend reported that free again to write
was pleasant
it
to be completely
and that he intended never again
so trapped no matter what the consequences.
weeks
later,
office,
letter to
to be
A
few
on December 26, 1924, when The Marble
Faun had been
published, Faulkner gave a copy to the
Post Office inspector, inscribed to him as one "to whose friendship
I
owe
extrication
from a very unpleasant
situ-
ation."
About mid-October Faulkner may have begun ning his departure from the post sity,
and from
sippi Hills:
office,
Mississippi. If so, his
My
plan-
from the Univer-
poem
titled "Missis-
Epitaph," which survives in manuscripts
dated October 17, 1924, and was
much
revised later for
the booklet published as This Earth and for [
30
]
A
Green
Bough,
has
1924, his Boston,
poignance.
additional
mid-December,
In
book, The Marble Faun, was published in
first
volume of poems dedicated
a
the
to
mother; with a preface dated "September 23,
who had been
written by Phil Stone,
ranging for
instrumental in ar-
and bearing
publication;
its
poet's
1924"
at its end, as a
May,
date line for the composition of the poems, "April,
June,
1
Some
91 9."
of Stone's prefatory
— comments about many
apply to
the poetry in
of Faulkner's early
— and
prophetic
The Marble Faun
poems which
also
are being
reprinted here:
They
are the
poems
of youth.
to that period of uncertainty
—
have the defects of youth cation and immaturity.
.
.
and
.
They belong
illusion.
.
.
inevitably
They
.
also
youth's impatience, unsophisti-
They have youth's sheer joy
.
.
.
and youth's sudden, vague, unreasoned sadness over nothing at all.
...
poems show promise. They have
think these
I
an unusual feeling for words and the music of words, a love of soft vowels, an instinct for color and rhythm, and
times
who
—
coming muscularity of
a hint of
...
a
—
at
man
has real talent will grow, will leave these things behind,
will finally bring forth a flower that
garden but
his
New
could have grown in no
own.
Immediately the
wrist
after the publication of
The Marble Faun,
Orleans Times-Picayune, under the headline,
"Author Goes versity, Miss.,
to
Europe," and under the date
line,
"Uni-
Dec. 16," announced:
William Falkner, author of "The Marble Faun," which he recently received
from
his
New York
publisher,
and
Italy,
where he
will
spend the [
31
]
is
preparing
campus for England winter months in study.
to leave the University of Mississippi
Young Falkner poems
expecting also to complete a
is
number
of
started in this country.
But when Faulkner reached he postponed the
Quarter for
trip
several
and
New
Orleans to take a ship
months
important
changed from a writer who had expected in his University years, to
a writer
which he
in
to continue, as
devote his energy to poetry into
who was to give his energy during the
to fiction
French
settled in the city's
— and with magnificent
Orleans that Faulkner almost
results. It
at
next decades
was
New
in
once began writing
sketches for the Double Dealer and for the Picayune, the first
for
fiction
which he had received payment; and
within a few months of his arrival at
completed Soldiers' Pay, the
During from time
his to
months
in
New
1925
there
manuscript of an unpublished
on February 26, 1925, he took some
The Scream, being as
one of the
he possibly
novels.
Orleans Faulkner returned
part in the production of a University called
Orleans he had
many
time to the University of Mississippi, where,
in addition to dating the
poem from
New
of his
first
made
humor magazine
officially listed
art editors. Associates
on the
staff in
remember
designs and drawings for another
that
humor
magazine, but whether he did or not remains uncertain
and the drawings have not come a few weeks before he
left
New
to light. In
May, 1925,
Orleans for Europe, The
Scream printed three pieces of work which are the this investigation
last
has found signed by Faulkner in any
University of Mississippi publication. Just as his
first
three
signed contributions had been eight years before, these three were drawings.
[
32
]
But Faulkner's connection with The Scream was not quite over with their publication or even with the publi-
cation the next
man
batics
May
autumn
of an unsigned drawing showing a
dangling outside an airplane in death drag acro-
which seems
of 1927,
to
be in Faulkner's
style.
when he had already published
novel, did the staff of
The Scream,
Not his
until
second
financially pressed
and
appreciative of his draftsmanship, cut in half their 1925 plate of his
women
drawing showing two men watching three
boarding a streetcar and print the parts as
trations of
two jokes,
illus-
end by a kind of amitosis the
to
series of contributions to University of Mississippi publi-
cations
which William Faulkner had begun
[
33
]
in 1917.
William Faulkner: Early Prose and Poetry
I'M^R
[
36
]
[
37
]
L'Apres-Midi d'un Faune
I
follow through the singing trees
Her streaming clouded
And
hair and face
dreaming knees
lascivious
Like gleaming water from some place
Of
sleeping streams, or
Slow shed through
autumn
leaves
love-wearied
still,
air.
She pauses: and as one who grieves Shakes down her blown and vagrant hair
To veil
A Or
—
her face, but not her eyes
hot quick spark, each sudden glance, like the wild
brown bee
that
flies
Sweet winged, a sharp extravagance
Of
on
kisses
my limbs and neck.
She whirls and dances through the
That
lift
and sway
like
arms and
Her with quick shadows, and
trees
fleck
the breeze
Lies on her short and circled breast.
Now hand in hand with her I go, The green night in the silver west Of virgin stars, pale row on row Like ghostly hands, and ere she sleep
The dusk
will take
her by some stream
In silent meadows, dim and deep
—
In dreams of stars and dreaming dream. I
have a nameless wish to go
To some
far silent
[
midnight noon
39
}
Where
And And The The
lonely streams whisper and flow
sigh
on sands blanched by the moon,
blond limbed dancers whirling past, senile
Their hair
And Are
worn moon
staring through
sighing trees, until at is
last,
powdered bright with dew.
their sad slow limbs
petals drifting
Shed from the
and brows
on the breeze
fingers of the boughs;
Then suddenly on all of these, A sound like some great deep Falls, It
bell stroke
and they dance, unclad and cold
was the
earth's great heart that
For springs before the world grew
—
broke old.
WILLIAM FAULKNER.
[
40
CATHAY.
Sharp sands, those blind desert horsemen, sweep
Where yesterday
Swam
in thy
tall
shining carvels
That now the winds go
lightly, lest
Be broken? Where once
And
What Fate
golden past.
foretells
thy sleep
thy splendors rose,
cast their banners bright against the sky,
Now go
empty years
the
Rich with thy ghosts. So
The seed
of
infinitely is it:
Fame, makes
who sows
the grain for
Death
to reap.
Wanderers, with faces sharp as spears,
And Drift
and herds on aimless muffled
flocks
where
glittering kings
feet
went through each
street
Of thy white vanished cities, and the years Have closed like walls behind them. Still Through the spawn of lesser destinies,
We stare, where once thy stars burned, lest like these, We lose faith. They know thee not, nor will To
see thy
magic empire when the Hand
Thrusts back the curtain of the shifting sand,
On
singing stars and lifting golden
hill.
William Falkner, University Mississippi.
[
41
]
LANDING
IN LUCK.
By William
The machine It
levelled off
Falkner.
and
settled
on the aerodrome.
turned and taxied back and stopped, headed into the
wind again,
its
engine running
idle.
The
instructor in the
forward cockpit faced about and raised his goggles. "Fairish," he said, "not so bad.
How many
hours have
you had?" Cadet Thompson, a "barracks ace," who had
made
just
a fairly creditable landing, assumed an expression
of assured confidence.
"Seven hours and nine minutes,
"Think you can
— hold
sir."
that stick back, will
you?
—
think you can take her round alone?"
"Yes,
sir,"
he answered as he had answered at least
four times a day for the last three days, with the small
remaining part of his unconquered optimism in his voice.
The
instructor climbed slowly out onto the lower wing,
then to the ground, stretching his
from
his clothes
legs.
He
got a cigarette
after a fashion resembling sleight-of-
hand.
[
42
]
"You've got
name
such a
some
to solo
raggin' last night.
The C. O. gave
you never know
aerodrome or down
at
if
you are
And
Borden.
brought you to think you could
what
to
do with you. Let you
recommend you
all
a
goin' to land
try
Swear
fly?
I
What ever know
don't
and break your neck,
it
for discharge.
on
then you always
pick a house or another machine to land on.
cr
us
this stage
Here you have had seven
for inefficiency.
hours, and yet this
day.
chaps like you that give
It's
Get
rid of
you
either
way, and a devilish good thing, too."
A
silence
The
hung heavily about Thompson's unhappy
instructor,
sucking his cigarette, stared off
across the aerodrome,
where other wild and hardy ama-
head.
teurs took off, landed tail
and crashed.
high, levelled off too soon
bumps
like
an inferior tennis
A
machine descended
and landed
in a series of
ball.
"See that chap there? He's probably had half your time but he makes landings alone. But you, you cut your
gun and
sit
up there
like a blind idiot
descend to dive the bus, you necks, yours and
mine
too;
try
and
and when you con-
your best to break our say right now, that's
I'll
somethin' none of you rockin' chair aviators do. Well, off,
it's
your neck or
my
is
reputation, now.
goin' to
Take her
and what ever you do, keep your nose down."
Thompson
pulled
angry enough to
down
his
goggles.
kill his officer for
He had been
the better part of a
week, so added indignities rested but lightly upon him.
He was
a strange mixture of fear and pride as he opened
the throttle wide
and pushed the
[43
]
stick
forward
—
fear
would wreck the machine landing, and pride
that he
he was on his
was
his fear
own
that he
and
spins
side slips
All-in-all,
that
physical coward,
whom
and gliding
his
he had talked largely of
angles.
he was in no particularly safe frame of mind
for his solo flight.
was
He was no
would show himself up before
fortunate friends to
less
tail
at last.
off the
He
gained speed
down
the field.
ground now and Thompson, more or
The less
nervous, though he had taken the machine off like a veteran with the instructor aboard, pulled the stick back
before the machine had gained speed sufficient to It
lurched forward and the
speed.
He knew
that he
tail
had gone too
and should turn back and take throttle.
When
far
down
off again, so
the field
he closed the
the noise of the engine ceased he heard the
and the
instructor shouting at him, cycle.
rise.
sank heavily, losing more
splutter of a
motor
Sending after him, were they? Cadet Thompson
was once more cleanly angry. He jerked the
throttle
open.
His subconscious mind had registered a cable across the end of the that it.
it
He was
now. So,
climbed as
as to
his eyes
in time
at
know
and he knew
were he to close the
on the speed
The motion
to
whether he would clear
afraid of rising too soon again
the stick back.
A
and he had flown enough
would not stop
that he throttle
field,
was touch and go
indicator, he pulled
once became easier and he
much as he dared.
shock; he closed his eyes, expecting to go over and
down on
his
back
in the
road below.
When
nothing hap-
pened he ventured a frightened hurried glance. Below him [
44
1
was the yellow of a wheat
and the aerodrome
field
far to
the rear.
So the cable had broken! Must have, for here he was still
going forward. His altimeter showed two hundred
feet.
Thompson
what
flying was. Rotten,
Now
shouting.
felt like
was he? He'd
ing and walk up to that officer and
tell
he'd
show 'em
pull a perfect land-
him
just
what kind
of a poor fish he was.
"Blasted Englishman," he said, "thinks he's the only
man
wing who can
in this
been on
cable he'd
a'
Wish
he was."
t'hell
He made
his
really
back
Below
his turn carefully.
aerodrome stood the ambulance, at
him. "Like
fish,"
Bet
fly.
if
he'd
a' hit
in that road, right
its
that
now.
edge of the
at the
crew gaping foolishly
he thought, "like poor
fish."
He
leaned out of his cockpit and gestured pleasantly at them,
known
a popular gesture
to all peoples of the civilized
world.
Eight hundred
made another on the
field.
pushed the
feet.
"High enough," he decided, and
He
circle, losing height.
picked his spot
"Now," he thought, cut the
He found
stick forward.
a
throttle
and
good gliding angle,
wires singing, engine idle and long flames wrapping back
from the exhausts. The
field
was
filled
with people run-
ning about and flapping their arms. Another machine rose to
meet him.
a warning.
He opened
"Why'n
the throttle
and closed
the hell don't they get off
it
again,
and lemme
land?" he wondered.
The other machine passed him cupants shouting
at
in a long
bank,
its
oc-
him; one of them carried something [
45
]
which he gestured and pointed
to
came out
of his dive.
They
frantically.
circled again
Thompson
and he saw that
the object was about the size and shape of a wheel?
A
wheel from the landing gear of a machine.
was
of a joke
this?
Why
show him? He'd seen chine
— on
his
remembered cable, then.
What kind
had they brought a wheel up
to
Had two on his mawheels? Then Thompson
lots of wheels.
machine
the cable.
—
He had
There was nothing
on
stripped a wheel else
it
that
could mean. His
brain assimilated this fact calmly. Having lost a wheel, he
had nothing less to
to land on. Therefore
it
were quite point-
bother about landing, immediately, anyway. So he
circled off
and climbed, followed cautiously by the other
machine, like two strange dogs meeting. "Sir," said
an orderly, entering the mess where the
C. O. and three lesser lights were playing bridge,
Commander, B
Flight
Flight,
"sir,
reports that a cadet
the is
abaht to crash." " 'Crash?' " repeated the C.
"Out "
'ere, sir.
Yes,
'No landing gear?' What's
"Yes,
sir.
'E wiped
"My
got no landing gear."
What's this?" sir.
Commander
'E's
says
abaht
'e'll
be
sir."
word," said the C. O., going to the door and
closely followed
"There
"My
this?
orf a-taking orf,
it
out of petrol and the Flight
a-coming down soon,
O.
sir, 'e 'assn't
by the others.
'e is, sir, that's
'im in front."
word," said the C. O. again and went
the hangars at a very
good
[
gait.
46
]
off
toward
"What's this? What's this?" Approaching the group of officers.
Thompson,
"Cadet
Bessing
came
"What's narrowly.
crashes, he
is
"Mr.
one,
over, lifting his feet nervously.
all this,
An
volunteered
sir,"
Oh, Bessing!"
Bessing's cadet.
Mr. Bessing?" The C. O. watched him
instructor gets a
bad name when
responsible for the cadet's
life
his cadet
as well as the
machine. "Rotten take
when he
off,
He
sir.
failed, instead of
tried to rise too soon,
comin' back and
he carried right on. Struck that cable and
wheel and he's been
up there ever
sittin'
another chap up to pull him up a petrol
and
he'll
bit.
and
tryin' again, lost his right
since.
We
sent
He's almost out of
have to come down soon."
"H-m. Didn't send him up too soon, did you, Mr. Bessing?"
"Chap's had seven hours,
sir,"
he protested, and pro-
duced Thompson's card.
The C. O.
studied
"Wharton,
sir?"
a
it
He
moment, then returned
it.
helped the C. O. to a light and
lit
a cigarette for himself.
"Good
lad,
good
lad," said the C.
O., shading his
eyes as he stared into the sky. "Something in you people at this wing, though.
got
it,
ago.
too.
Do
Cadets and
G. O. C. gave
something.
The drone from
Thompson was
Do
me
officers both.
N. C. O.'s
a jolly raggin' not a fortnight
something, swear
I will."
the engines above suddenly ceased.
out of petrol at
[
47
]
last.
The two machines
descended
wide
in a
and they on the earth stood
spiral,
watching him as he descended, as utterly beyond any
human
on another
aid as though he were
planet.
"Here they come," Bessing muttered half aloud. he only remembers to land on his
wing
left
—
"If
the fool,
oh, the blind, bounding fool!"
For Thompson's nerve was going earth.
The temptation was
and close
his eyes.
as he
neared the
strong to kick his rudder over
The machine descended,
barely re-
He watched the approaching ground make any pretence of levelling off, para-
taining headway. utterly unable to
had ceased
lyzed; his brain
his height, the
he was
to function,
eyes watching the remorseless earth.
He
ground rushed past too
all
staring
did not
know
swiftly to judge,
but he expected to crash any second. Thompson's fate
was on the laps of the Gods.
The
touched, bounded, scraped again.
tail
wing was low and the wing
tip
crumpled
The
left
like paper.
A
tearing of fabric, a strut snapped, and he regained do-
minion over
his limbs,
but too late to do anything
The machine
there anything to be done. solidly,
slewed around and stood on
Bessing was the
first
its
— were
struck again,
nose.
to reach him.
"Lord, Lord!" he was near weeping from nervous tension.
"Are you
all
right?
through, never expected
Don't ever
let
of that
was a
are you
all
anyone trick
it!
Never expected you'd come Didn't think to see you alive!
else say
many an
you
can't
fly.
Comin' out
old flyer couldn't do! I say,
right?"
48
Hanging face downward from the cockpit, Cadet
Thompson looked this cold, short
and
tribulation
at Bessing, surprised at the
tempered
He
officer.
insult in this
words of
forgot the days of
man's company, and
his
recent experience, and his eyes filled with utter adoration.
Then he became
violently
That night Thompson
room
the writing
of a
sat
ill.
gracefully
down town
on a
table in
boot
hotel, tapping a
with his stick and talking to sundry companions. "
up
— and
to
when my
so,
me.
I
of several, but this one
put
my
tail
petrol gave out, I
had already thought of a plan
down
first
worked
fool
just as I
it
was
thought
I
seemed the best
— which was
and then drop
my
the old bus wouldn't turn over and it
knew
—
had doped
it
lie
left
to
wing, so
down on me.
Well,
out, only a ditch those
A. M.'s had dug right across the
field,
mind you,
tripped her up and she stood on her nose. I had thought of that, too,
and pulled
a pretty good scout
"Ah-h-h
"Look
—
—
my
" they jeered
at the
belt up. Bessing said
—
he's
him down profanely.
nerve he's got, will you?"
"He'—" "Ah, we know you! Why, the poor his solo,
and
bum
crashed on
listen at the line he's giving us!"
"Well, Bessing said
—
Go
"Bessing said! Bessing said!
tell
the
G.O.C. what
Bessing said!"
"Dammit, don't That's
all.
I
know what
Bessing said?
Ask him!
You're a bunch of poor hams that think you
[
49
]
can
fly!
poor
Why,
fish.
Ask
I
got an hour and a half solo time.
Bessing! there's a guy that
You
knows what's
what."
He
flung out of the room.
They watched him with
varying expressions. "Say," spoke one, a cadet but recently enlisted and still
in
that?
ground school: "D' you think he
really did all
He must be pretty good."
"That guy? That guy
fly?
He's so rotten they can't
discharge him. Every time he goes up they have to get a gun and shoot
him down. He's
the
T
out of flying.
Biggest liar in the R.A.F."
Thompson passed through again, with Bessing, and arm was through the officer's. He was deep in discus-
his
sion evidently, but he looked
up
cheerfully condescending:
"Hello,
you chaps."
[
50
]
in time to give
them
a
SAPPHICS.
So
it is
Nor
in
:
sleep
comes not on
my eyes,
my
eyelids.
with shaken hair and white
Aloof pale hands, and
lips
and breasts of
iron,
So she beholds me.
And
yet though sleep
comes not
to
me, there comes
A vision from the full smooth brow of sleep, The white Aphrodite moving unbounded By her own hair. In the purple beaks of the doves that
Beaks
draw
straight without desire, necks bent
Toward Lesbos and the Weeping behind her.
flying feet of
her,
backward
Loves
She looks not back, she looks not back to where
The nine crowned muses about Apollo Stand
like nine
Corinthian columns singing
In clear evening.
She sees not the Lesbians kissing mouth
To mouth Nor
across lute strings, drunken with singing,
the white feet of the Oceanides
Shining and unsandalled. [
51
]
Before her go cryings and lamentations
Of barren women,
a thunder of wings,
While ghosts of outcast Lethean women, lamenting, Stiffen the twilight.
William Falkner, University, Miss.
[
52
]
AFTER FIFTY YEARS.
Her house
is
empty and her heart
old,
is
And filled with shades and echoes that deceive No one save her, for still she tries to weave With blind bent
Once
And
all
fingers, nets that
cannot hold.
men's arms rose up to her,
hovered
like
'tis
told,
white birds for her caress:
A crown she could have had to bind each tress Of
hair,
and her sweet arms the Witches' Gold.
Her mirrors know her whiteness, for there in dreams from other dreams that lent Her softness as she stood, crowned with soft hair. And with his bound heart and his young eyes bent
She rose
And
blind, he feels her presence like shed scent,
Holding him body and
life
within
its
snare.
W. FAULKNER.
[
53
]
UNE BALLADE DES FEMMES PERDUES 'Mais ou sont
I
sing in the green
les
neiges d'antan'
dusk
Fatuously
Of
ladies that I
have loved
— £a ne
fait rien!
Gay
ghosts of loves in silver sandals
little
Helas, vraiment, vraiment
They dance with quick feet on my lute strings With the abandon of boarding school virgins While unbidden moths
Amorous Call
of
my
white seraglio
them with soundless love songs
A sort of ethereal seduction They
hear, alas
My women And brush my lips Stealing
with
ghostly kisses
little
away
Singly, their tiny ardent faces
Like windflowers from some blown garden of dreams
To
their love nights
among
I am old, and alone And the star dust from Has dimmed my eyes I
sing in the green
Of
lost ladies
—
the roses
their
wings
dusk
Si
vraiment charmant, charmant.
— W.
[
54
1
Falkner.
NAIADS' SONG.
Come
ye sorrowful and keep
wedded
Tryst with us here in
The
silent
And
noon
lies
shaken ripples cover
Our arms
are soft as
Come keep
is
us,
the stream.
with us our slumbrous dream
Disheartened ones, If
sleep,
over us
if
ye are sad,
ye are in a garment clad
Of sorrow, come with us to sleep In undulations dim and deep; Where sunlight spreads and quivering To draw in golden reveries Its fingers
through our glistered hair,
Finding profound contentment there.
Come ye No more
sorrowful and weep in
waking, come and steep
Yourselves in us as does the bee
Plunge
in the rose that, singing,
he
Has opened. Here our mouths unfold As does a flower bare its gold; Our mouths are soft as any rose That
in a high walled
garden grows,
A garden level as a cup With the sunlight [
that
55
fills it
]
up.
lies
Come ye
sorrowful and sleep
Within our arms beneath the sweep
Of winds
that whisper in the trees,
And boughs
that whisper to the breeze
In a sad extravagance
Of dancers
in a
When Pan
sighs
hushed dance;
and
doth blow
his pipes
While sky above and earth below Stand
And
still
and hearken
to his strain,
sigh also as does the rain
Through woodland lanes remote and cool
To dream upon
Come ye
a leafed pool.
sorrowful and keep
Tryst with us here in
Our eyes are soft as Our breasts are soft
And white
at
On which we
wedded
twilit
as silken
dreams
dusk; our breasts the beds soothe
all
aching heads,
Binding each in a scented Till glides
sleep,
streams,
tress
he in forgetfulness,
While the night sighs and whispers by
Sowing
stars across the sky.
Come ye Here
in
sorrowful and keep
unmeasured dream and
sleep.
— W. FALKNER.
[
56
(:
\jO
I
O
tXfOLA
FANTOCHES. a Paul Verlaine.
Scaramouches and Pucinella Cast one shadow on the mellow Night, and kiss against the sky
And
the doctor of
Bogona kimono
In his skull cap and
Seeks for simples with pale avid eye
While
his
daughter half naked
Glides trembling from her narrow bed
To meet
her lover waiting in the
moon
Her lover from the Spanish Main Whose passion thrills her with a strain La lune ne garde aucune rancune
W. FALKNER.
[
57
]
CLAIR DE LUNE. From
Your
soul
is
PAUL VERLAINE.
a lovely garden, and go
There masque and bergamasque charmingly, Playing the lute and dancing and also
Sad beneath
their disguising fanchise.*
All are singing in a minor key
Of conqueror love and life opportune, Yet seem to doubt their joyous revelry As their song melts in the light of the moon. In the calm moonlight, so lovely fair
That makes the birds dream
in the slender trees,
While fountains dream among the statues there; Slim fountains sob in silver ecstasies.
— W. FALKNER. :
See Notes on the Text, page 128.
[
58
]
STREETS.
FROM PAUL VERLAINE.
Dance I
the Jig!
loved her pretty eyes
Fairer than starry skies
And
bright with malicious subtleties
Dance
the Jig!
She had those dainty
That
Ah, how
charming were her
truly
Dance But
To
That now
the Jig!
mine mouth and
to her
Dance
In
airs
this solace is
kiss her
Her
airs
poor hearts with tears
fill
my
find
heart
is
deaf and blind
the Jig!
face will ever be
my
mind's
infinity
She broke the coin and gave
Dance
it
half to
the Jig!
— W. FALKNER. [
59
1
me
A POPLAR.
Why do you
shiver there
Between the white
You
and the road?
river
are not cold,
With the sun
light
dreaming about you;
And yet you lift your pliant supplicating arms as though To draw clouds from the sky to hide your slenderness. You
are a
young
Trembling
girl
in the throes of ecstatic
modesty,
A white objective girl Whose
clothing has been forcibly taken
away from
her.
— W. FALKNER.
[
60
A CLYMENE. (From Paul
Verlaine.)
Mystical chords
Songs without words Dearest, because your eyes
Color of the
skies.
Because your voice estranges
My vision,
and deranges
And troubles the Of my reason.
horizon
Because your hidden slightness Like a swan's graceful whiteness
Has
my
filled
soul's
room
With your perfume. Because In
my
all
my
of
being
breathing and seeing
Is a lingering like
Of your
flowers
hours.
A nimbus that dances In
my
So
shall
heart and entrances, it
Through
ever be
infinity.
W. FALKNER. [
61
]
STUDY.
Somewhere
a slender voiceless breeze will go
Unlinking the shivering poplars' arms, and brakes
With sleeves simply crossed where waters
flow;
A sunless stream quiet and deep, that slakes The
thirsty alders
pausing there
(Hush, now, hush. Where was
at
I?
dawn.
Jonson)
Somewhere a candle's guttering gold Weaves a tapestry upon a cottage wall
And
her gold hair, simple fold on fold,
While
I
can think of nothing
Except the sunset
in
(Work, work, you
Somewhere
else at all
her eyes'
fool!
still
pool.
—
a blackbird lost within a
Whistles through
its
Some ways are white with birches in Of silver shaken by his mellow note, Trembling gaspingly as though
Where
the timid violet
(Muted dreams Bitter science.
And my
first
for them, for
Exams
I
me
are near
cannot hear [
62
]
a
hood
in fear;
appear.
thoughts uncontrollably
Wander, and
wood
golden wired throat;
The
voice telling
For everything
A
me
will
thousand years.
I
that
work
I
must,
be the same when wish
I
I
am dead
were a bust
All head.)
— W. FALKNER.
[
63
]
ALMA MATER.
All our eyes and hearts look up to thee,
For here
our voiceless dreams are spun
all
Between thy Lent by the
walls, quiet in dignity
spirits of
them whose
lives
begun
Within thy portals. Through them we can see
Upon
the
mountain top the shining sun
Success, drawing us infinitely
Upwardly,
until Life
and Task are one.
The beginning, not the end, is this. Onward, by her unremitting grace With memories that nothing can efface Throned securely in our hearts; to kiss
— Holding, and held by At
her in fond embrace
parting, her kind calmly
dreaming
face.
— W. FALKNER.
[
64
]
-
proaiyzdndu
f.
[
66
}
"
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