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The Sound and the Fury

Part of Penguin Vitae

Author William Faulkner
Introduction by Ayana Mathis
Hardcover
$28.00 US
Penguin Adult HC/TR | Penguin Classics
On sale Jun 02, 2026 | 288 Pages | 9780143138846
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A collectible hardcover edition of Nobel Prize winner William Faulkner’s masterpiece, with a new introduction by Ayana Mathis, the New York Times bestselling author of The Twelve Tribes of Hattie

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

A Penguin Vitae Edition

The Sound and the Fury traces the decline of the American South through three generations of the once-powerful Compson family. In Yoknapatawpha County, Mississippi—perhaps the most famous fictional setting in American literature—antiquated ideas of race, class, and sex prevail among the erstwhile landed gentry of the Reconstruction-era South, embodied in the Compson siblings: Benjy, whose mental disability blurs the past and the present; Quentin, who is consumed by his obsession with his family’s honor; Jason, who unleashes his blind rage on the rest of the household, especially their longtime Black servant, Dilsey; and their elusive sister, Caddy, whose tragic estrangement sets in motion the family’s fall from grace. A kaleidoscopic narrative punctuated by haunting interior monologues, The Sound and the Fury brings to life Faulkner’s aristocratic South as a land of decadence and despair, gallantry and greed in the face of financial and moral ruin. What Faulkner once considered his “most splendid failure” was also his favorite of his novels; it now ranks among the greatest novels of the twentieth century, and as one of the cornerstones of American fiction.

Penguin Vitae—loosely translated as "Penguin of one's life"—is a deluxe hardcover series from Penguin Classics celebrating a dynamic and diverse landscape of classic fiction and nonfiction from seventy-five years of classics publishing. Penguin Vitae provides readers with beautifully designed classics that have shaped the course of their lives, and welcomes new readers to discover these literary gifts of personal inspiration, intellectual engagement, and creative originality.
William Faulkner, one of the greatest writers of the twentieth century, was born in New Albany, Mississippi, on September 25, 1897. He published his first book, The Marble Faun, in 1924, but it is as a literary chronicler of life in the Deep South—particularly in the fictional Yoknapatawpha County, the setting for several of his novels—that he is most highly regarded. In such novels as The Sound and the Fury, As I Lay Dying, Light in August, and Absalom, Absalom! he explored the full range of post–Civil War Southern life, focusing both on the personal histories of his characters and on the moral uncertainties of an increasingly dissolute society. In combining the use of symbolism with a stream-of-consciousness technique, he created a new approach to fiction writing. In 1949 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. William Faulkner died in Byhalia, Mississippi, on July 6, 1962. View titles by William Faulkner

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A collectible hardcover edition of Nobel Prize winner William Faulkner’s masterpiece, with a new introduction by Ayana Mathis, the New York Times bestselling author of The Twelve Tribes of Hattie

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

A Penguin Vitae Edition

The Sound and the Fury traces the decline of the American South through three generations of the once-powerful Compson family. In Yoknapatawpha County, Mississippi—perhaps the most famous fictional setting in American literature—antiquated ideas of race, class, and sex prevail among the erstwhile landed gentry of the Reconstruction-era South, embodied in the Compson siblings: Benjy, whose mental disability blurs the past and the present; Quentin, who is consumed by his obsession with his family’s honor; Jason, who unleashes his blind rage on the rest of the household, especially their longtime Black servant, Dilsey; and their elusive sister, Caddy, whose tragic estrangement sets in motion the family’s fall from grace. A kaleidoscopic narrative punctuated by haunting interior monologues, The Sound and the Fury brings to life Faulkner’s aristocratic South as a land of decadence and despair, gallantry and greed in the face of financial and moral ruin. What Faulkner once considered his “most splendid failure” was also his favorite of his novels; it now ranks among the greatest novels of the twentieth century, and as one of the cornerstones of American fiction.

Penguin Vitae—loosely translated as "Penguin of one's life"—is a deluxe hardcover series from Penguin Classics celebrating a dynamic and diverse landscape of classic fiction and nonfiction from seventy-five years of classics publishing. Penguin Vitae provides readers with beautifully designed classics that have shaped the course of their lives, and welcomes new readers to discover these literary gifts of personal inspiration, intellectual engagement, and creative originality.

Author

William Faulkner, one of the greatest writers of the twentieth century, was born in New Albany, Mississippi, on September 25, 1897. He published his first book, The Marble Faun, in 1924, but it is as a literary chronicler of life in the Deep South—particularly in the fictional Yoknapatawpha County, the setting for several of his novels—that he is most highly regarded. In such novels as The Sound and the Fury, As I Lay Dying, Light in August, and Absalom, Absalom! he explored the full range of post–Civil War Southern life, focusing both on the personal histories of his characters and on the moral uncertainties of an increasingly dissolute society. In combining the use of symbolism with a stream-of-consciousness technique, he created a new approach to fiction writing. In 1949 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. William Faulkner died in Byhalia, Mississippi, on July 6, 1962. View titles by William Faulkner

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