Go Down, Moses

Typical Faulkner. I get lost in his writing about decades gone by. He’s never afraid to tell us the truth. I love how he transports you to other places and time. The mark of a great story teller

Although the pages were fairly yellowed, it didn't matter. The book was inexpensive. The print was readable, and its content was the issue. I bought the book for a friend who had never read William Faulkner.I lived in Oxford Mississippi for several years, arriving about two years after Faulkner died. While there, I often hunted with a certain group, which was mixed, because blacks and whites were always together in that group. I learned much later, after I finished my degree at Ole Miss and was not living in Mississippi, that one of the blacks in our group had hunted with Faulkner. Mary Faulkner told me that the man was probably one of Faulkner's character models (she also thought the ledger book in The Bear was almost certainly inspired by a real ledger book, and it did have factual information about the Leonid meteor shower of 1833). I agree with her, and I think he might have been the model for Tennie's Jim. Anyway, I like Faulkner, and I actually lived hunting events of the kind he wrote about in The Bear (I also grew up with the Arkansas fox hunt, during which you don't kill the fox. It's about hunting, for sure, but even more about overland aerobics!).I think Faulkner had good insight into southern culture, but I know a number of people on both sides of the Mason-Dixon line who don't appreciate him. He is increasingly politically incorrect in a society that has become obsessed, maybe even pathological, with political correctness.

The last couple of years I've been reading the Faulkner novels I hadn't read before and so Go Down Moses was next in line. Comparatively speaking it's not one of my favorites, and yet.....The last two sections of The Bear were just that. Not so much hard to follow as simply dense and voluminous, but struggling through it I got Faulkner's struggle: How do you make sense out of it all? Taking land, taking people, and killing yourself in the process. I can see Uncle Ike's point and then...The last two, "Delta Autumn" and "Go Down Moses" seemed to me to underline the consequence of Uncle Ike checking out. If he'd have not sat on the sidelines maybe some of these things would have turned out differently. I don't know if that was Faulkner's intention or not but that's what struck me. I'll have to explore that more when I read this book again.

Go down Moses is certainly not a very accesible novel, but that can be said of the whole Faulkner-oeuvre.The novel consists of several stories who are related to each other. To my opinion 'Pantaloon in Black' is not so much related to the rest, which tells the lifestory of Isaac McCaslin.Especially the last stories were very interesting. In "The old people" Faulkner makes a good connection between man and nature especially the Sam Fathers figure is interesting. Faulkner expands on this theme in "The Bear". The notion that nature is losing in "Delta Autumn" is very strong. Together with the struggle between man and nature, Faulkner explores the relationship between black and white. This is extra complicated by the interracial McCaslin-Beauchamp connection.What makes this book complicated is Faulkners style. I had to read several passages over and over again to understand what was going on. The complicated McCaslin family and introduction of different names (Uncle Bud an Uncle Buddy are often referred to with their official names) makes it also confusing.It took me almost two years to read it, but nevertheless a great book and worth reading.

This is the 6th or 7th William Faulkner book I've read over the years and they are consistent in a couple of ways: they are about the Old South, and they are worth the read if you can hang in. At his best, Faulkner is like poetry, but often also like a puzzle with one or two pieces missing. His stories usually start in the middle and then jump around time-wise; you are not always sure of whom he is talking about. Also, his existential view is a bit depressing: this is all there is, and there might be a god, but one who is really of no particular use. His sentences are run-on, poorly punctuated, convoluted, and sometimes a page or two long. BUT, if you can wade through all that, the stories are haunting or humorous but never boring. `Go Down Moses' generally gives personal highlights (or lowlights) of the 200-year history of a family that had both black and white branches descended from the same man. Faulkner has unusually keen insight into the racial tension that has plagued our country from even before the beginning, and it shows in his writings.Faulkner is after all a Pulitzer Prize winner (twice) and even a Nobel Prize winner, and well worth the read - - if you can hang in. At least that is my take on it.

Modern Library editions such as this are high quality books. They are satisfying to read and keep in a personal library.Faulkner masterfully threaded unifying themes throughout seemingly disparate stories to make a cohesive whole "novel". More recent authors have done far worse in similar endeavors.

Like all of Faulkner's works the language, structure, narrative....well everything can be confusing at times and it takes an extra effort to decipher it all. Go Down, Moses is particularly difficult because you have to navigate through seven interconnected stories involving one incredibly diverse, multi-generational family.It is completely worth it the effort, however, because once it all comes together, it is simply one of the greatest American works ever written. I read this novel for an Literature of the American South course at University and this gives you a much more personal history of the reconstruction of the South than any textbook. At times hauntingly beautiful, at other times wonderfully transcendent, it is a magnificent and enthralling masterpiece.

This is one of my favourite books, the Harper Perennial kindle edition was full of errors, not merely annoying typographical blunders but, in one case, half a dozen missing lines. The text was irritating to read and spoiled the experience of the book for me. I would never order a Harper Perennial kindle edition of any text again, even though they appear to have the rest of Faulkner.