Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner

As I mentioned, my current "Commute Classic" is Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner. I selected this book for two reasons:

1. Because of the use of the word "Absalom" at the end of the song Distant Early Warning by Rush. I remember reading somewhere that Neil said he used it more because he liked the sound of it as a play on Absolute and Obsolete than because of its literary or Biblical meaning.
2. Because of Faulkner's placement on lists of "Best Novels of the 20th Century" like this one.

An Amazon review says the following:

The story of Thomas Sutpen, an enigmatic stranger who came to Jefferson in the early 1830s to wrest his mansion out of the muddy bottoms of the north Mississippi wilderness. He was a man, Faulkner said, "who wanted sons and the sons destroyed him."

I'll start by saying that I don't understand how the quote by Faulkner applies to the book. But there is a lot I don't understand about the book. Its writing style contains long, rambling narratives that go between the present of 1910 and the 1830s, and many points in between. I saw a quote on the web that says that it contains a candidate for the "Longest Sentence in English (language) Literature" at 1287 words. I don't see anywhere that lists the specific sentence, so I'm not sure I believe it. However, I also wouldn't be surprised if it's true.

In addition to talking about Sutpen, the book goes into the lives of his descendants, with a good deal of it ostensibly being Quentin (the grandson of one of Sutpen's friends) discussing Sutpen's life and times with his friend Shreve in a cold New England university in 1910. It's difficult to follow at times and is the kind of book that tells bits of the same story several times, adding more detail with each retelling. So, whenever you're introduced to something, don't miss it. It's probably important and will be expanded on later.

Sutpen was seen as evil by many, including his ex-sister in law, who's an old woman talking about the Civil War-era days to Quentin. However, perhaps the most interesting bits are when we learn about Sutpen's history and personal morality. He certainly didn't let the feelings of others stop him from meeting his goals. But Faulkner makes an effort to show that he did have his own personal code and meant well, at least at first.

It's a complex book. I am sure that I would get more out of it if I read (or listened to) it again. But is this really the sign of a good book? I'm sure that Literature-Major types, and any that like to study a book, would get a lot out of it. But if I think I need to check out the SparkNotes to understand what is going on, I have to ask myself if that's a book for me. I'm not doing this for a high school or university class or anything. I have a few different rating scales for different types of books, and have been getting away from my "Star" ratings lately. I'll give Absalom a rating of Not Recommended, at least to the general reading public.