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The Sound and the Fury

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The Sound and the Fury

By: William Faulkner, Casey Cep
Narrated by: Grover Gardner, Gabra Zackman
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About this listen

NOBEL PRIZE WINNER • One of the greatest novels of the twentieth century is the story of a family of Southern aristocrats on the brink of personal and financial ruin. • The definitive corrected text, including Faulkner's Appendix

One of The Atlantic’s Great American Novels of the Past 100 Years

The Sound and the Fury is the tragedy of the Compson family, featuring some of the most memorable characters in literature: beautiful, rebellious Caddy; the manchild Benjy; haunted, neurotic Quentin; Jason, the brutal cynic; and Dilsey, their black servant. Their lives fragmented and harrowed by history and legacy, the character’s voices and actions mesh to create what is arguably Faulkner’s masterpiece and one of the greatest novels of the twentieth century.

“I give you the mausoleum of all hope and desire.... I give it to you not that you may remember time, but that you might forget it now and then for a moment and not spend all of your breath trying to conquer it. Because no battle is ever won he said. They are not even fought. The field only reveals to man his own folly and despair, and victory is an illusion of philosophers and fools.” —from The Sound and the Fury

Cover photograph: © Eggleston Artistic Trust. Courtesy Eggleston Artistic Trust and David Zwirner.

Check out more selections from Oprah's Book Club.(P)2005 Random House, Inc. Random House Audio, a division of Random House, Inc. Classics Fiction Genre Fiction Literary Fiction Heartfelt American Depression Fiction

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Critic reviews

One of The Atlantic’s Great American Novels of the Past 100 Years
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I would be interested to read this book. It is a stream of consciousness and I did not enjoy it on audible, felt I would have gained more by seeing the book laid out. Too much, he said, she said.

Not one for audio

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Willian Faulkner writes well, but this was a hard book to listen to. Brilliant reading!

It was to be published in coloured sections, to help the reader. So to take this book on! Excellent.

The story is quite difficult, might need some notes or internet to help you.

It's a very clever book, but it doesn't allow you to score that!

William Faulkner Writes Well!

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Very well acted and unabridged audio of this great Modernist text , audible also helped to understand this difficult novel.

Well read

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Wonderful, just wonderful.
So relevant today.
And yet we never learn to be peaceful.
Too much he said she said.

Sound Fury (and Peace)

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beautifully written and performed in the most convincing ways possible. It's a journey into the US south, all its complexity and contradictions. must read!

a great masterpiece performed beautifully.

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this book was a difficult/unusual format to read, so I thought audio performance would help. I'm not that impressed with the performance element, but listening to it read aloud did help. it's a complex and powerful story, very unique style, essential Faulkner.

complex but powerful

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I had to check Wikipedia to see what the plot was and it bore no comparison with what I heard. I enjoyed the stream of consciousness but I get the impression that this is a very complex book that will require multiple listens to understand. 3 stars for story on first listen but it could very well go up to 5 if and when I get my head round it.

Complex

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I read a lot of reviews before getting this audiobook, everyone said it was difficult to read and difficult to listen to because of the writing style the author used. I have never been one to shy away from a challenging book, so I wasn't deterred by those reviews.
No one mentioned the racist and sexist perspective. I am a black woman, this was not an easy book to finish, but I powered through.
I initially managed fine with all the racist texts when I thought these were just the perspectives of the characters and didn't necessarily reflect the author's view. That was until I read a bit more about the author and learnt he was such a huge racist, that he publicly supported segregation and lynching. This information was the last straw for me. I felt like I had paid money to hear the thoughts and dehumanising views of someone who hates people who look like me. This author is entitled to his views and this is his artwork, so he can express his racism through this work as much as he wants, I just wished I had been warned so that I didn't have to be a part of this world. Hence the reason I am leaving my review. If you are a black person and or a woman, be warned, this book could get you upset. There were occasional jabs at Jews too. But most of Jason's (one of the characters) hatred was aimed at black people and women, after learning about the author, it's very difficult to not believe Jason's character was a tool for the author to air out his views and I unwittingly paid him for it by buying his book.

I couldn't get past the racism and woman hating

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