The Sound and the Fury

The Sound and the Fury is a novel by the American author William Faulkner, published in 1929. Faulkner's fourth novel, it is the second to be set in Yoknapatawpha County and the first featuring the Compson family, both of which would reappear in his later fiction. The novel's highly experimental style, including its use of stream of consciousness and multiple different unreliable narrators, are hallmarks of modernist literature. Its bleak and candid portrait of Southern life in the early 20th century is paradigmatic of the Southern Gothic genre.

The Sound and the Fury centers around Quentin, Benjy, Jason, and Caddy Compson as their wealthy Mississippi family descends into chaos and disorder. Each of the siblings have unique problems that impact the others, such as Benjy's mental disability, Caddy's promiscuity, Quentin's anger, and Jason's impulsiveness. The history of the Compson family is primarily revealed through sudden, unannounced flashbacks, as most of the novel takes place on a single weekend in 1928.

Although it did not initially find commercial success, after the publication of Faulkner's novel Sanctuary, The Sound and the Fury grew in popularity and Faulkner began to receive critical attention. It was instrumental in helping Faulkner to win the 1949 Nobel Prize in Literature. Now considered by scholars to be one of Faulkner's best novels, it has been described as "one of the most complex novels in America's literary history."