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A review by graywacke
Soldiers' Pay by William Faulkner
reflective
slow-paced
4.0
Faulkner's first published novel, one that no one read. 1200 copies sold before he became famous and this wasn't the first one anyone read once he got famous either. It's also a little unusual in that the setting he small town Georgia, not Mississippi (and that he wrote in New Orleans, no Oxford, MS). It's an interesting and complex novel, doing lots of thing. It's also drawn out a bit and Faulkner clearly had trouble letting his characters go.
He's working on post-war America. WWI soldiers are returning home to wives, fiancés, widows, and not everyone has been true, or wants to be. The soldiers are wild and girls have a lot going on to. The main tangled story here is a hot-headed veteran takes to a seriously wounded air force veteran, with a nasty facial scar and a fiancé waiting at home. He can't see and may be dying. They get help from a war widow who our healthy veteran has fallen for, but feelings are kind but not mutual. Once in Charleston, GA, we meet the wounded soldier's father, a rector who can't see his son is dying, and his fiancé, who is young, gorgeous, and runs around in white silk dresses attracting and toying with a number of men, some pushing to uncomfortable lengths. It's a sexually charged novel throughout until it isn't. It's also a southern culture charged novel, with "negroes" filling various roles, including servants and musicians, but always foreign, other and mysterious. And Faulkner is straining the normal prose styles. He's itchy to jump around, become impressionistic. He spends many pages on various micro-dramas at a dance.
I feel this is a novel that will reward rereading. There is a lot built it. An interesting if forgotten and overshadowed immature work.
He's working on post-war America. WWI soldiers are returning home to wives, fiancés, widows, and not everyone has been true, or wants to be. The soldiers are wild and girls have a lot going on to. The main tangled story here is a hot-headed veteran takes to a seriously wounded air force veteran, with a nasty facial scar and a fiancé waiting at home. He can't see and may be dying. They get help from a war widow who our healthy veteran has fallen for, but feelings are kind but not mutual. Once in Charleston, GA, we meet the wounded soldier's father, a rector who can't see his son is dying, and his fiancé, who is young, gorgeous, and runs around in white silk dresses attracting and toying with a number of men, some pushing to uncomfortable lengths. It's a sexually charged novel throughout until it isn't. It's also a southern culture charged novel, with "negroes" filling various roles, including servants and musicians, but always foreign, other and mysterious. And Faulkner is straining the normal prose styles. He's itchy to jump around, become impressionistic. He spends many pages on various micro-dramas at a dance.
I feel this is a novel that will reward rereading. There is a lot built it. An interesting if forgotten and overshadowed immature work.