ABSTRACT
If Mr. Faulkner were asked to tell a straight tale and tell it straight, I presume he would be physically unable to. Even in the novel-reading world, there is a mug born every minute, and certain novelists have availed themselves of this pleasing fact. But I do not suggest that Mr. Faulkner is one of these. I imagine him to be a perfectly sincere artist-which is what makes him so odd. Odder, I mean, than he would obviously be in any case! His importance is that he has created a school of worshippers. I am merely stating a fact, and making no sort of reference to his artistic powers, when I say that, by some method which I can admire but cannot understand, he has succeeded in producing what seems to me a purely reflex action in a section ofhis readers. Some writers are, as it were, literary Pavlovs, and, however innocently and honestly, try it on the dogs. Many whom everybody would admit to be far greater writers have never produced this automatic response. Shakespeare himself never produced it. Readers have always discriminated among the playsand passagesofShakespeare-like thismore, that less, the other not at all. If a new Shakespeare manuscript were discovered tomorrow, critics would immediately begin arguing about its merits. But say certain modern names, and the victim, stiffenedinto an attitude of adoration, generally does not recover for some hours. Mr. Faulkner, more, I suppose, by luck than demerit, has attained this enviable position. To talk dispassionately about him is (if I may vary my metaphor) to have the fangs at your throat. Fortunately, the fangs in my experience are either amiable or negligible.
