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Light in August

3.9 of 5 stars 3.90 · rating details · 26,027 ratings · 1,115 reviews

Light in August, a novel about hopeful perseverance in the face of mortality, features some of Faulkner’s most memorable characters: guileless, dauntless Lena Grove, in search of the father of her unborn child; Reverend Gail Hightower, who is plagued by visions of Confederate horsemen; and Joe Christmas, a desperate, enigmatic drifter consumed by his mixed ancestry.

Paperback, 512 pages

Published January 30th 1991 by Vintage (first published 1932)

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May 01, 2012 Mariel rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: it's written all over my face

Recommended to Mariel by: I started reading it without meaning to

Don't pray over no body. I knew that I would figure it out. It was something I already knew. That's how you don't feel bad about wanting to know anyone. Don't expect anything. It doesn't get rid of the falling feeling when you think about them, though. Light in August is an ultimate societal kangaroo's pouch of claustrophobic guilt for me. Where does anyone belong?

William Faulkner writes to me in my favorite way of being talked to in stories (anything). If I could have this in every book I read...more

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Sep 20, 2008 Juushika rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: status-borrowed

Lena Grove travels, on foot and with the aid of strangers, through the South in search of the father of her unborn child. Her journey introduces the reader to a variety of characters, including the child's father, a man who falls in love with Lena, and a biracial man named Christmas. Like Lena, all of these characters have stories to tell, and Faulkner interweaves a number of back stories and histories in the body of this book. One of his more accessable texts, Light in August is easy to get in...more Lena Grove travels, on foot and with the aid of strangers, through the South in search of the father of her unborn child. Her journey introduces the reader to a variety of characters, including the child's father, a man who falls in love with Lena, and a biracial man named Christmas. Like Lena, all of these characters have stories to tell, and Faulkner interweaves a number of back stories and histories in the body of this book. One of his more accessable texts, Light in August is easy to get in to and builds up gradually to its complexities and confusing narrative traits. The result is a readable text that still manages to capture the character depth and human study that Faulkner does so well. While I prefer his more difficult/complex work, I definitely enjoyed this text and I highly recommend it.

For the first couple chapters, this book doesn't feel like Faulkner. I was surprised by just how approachable and linear the text was. By the last few chapters, Faulkner is intertwining disparate narratives and times and using more streams of consciousnesses. The book definitely becomes more complex as it progresses. This gradual build up in style and complexity allows the reader to adapt to Faulkner's writing style and techniques, making the end of the book more rewarding because the reader has a better grasp of how to understand and interpret it. I highly recommend this text for readers new to Faulkner, and I think high schools would do well to use it in place to As I Lay Dying in schools.

That said, I enjoyed both As I Lay Dying and The Sound and the Fury more than this book. Because both books delve immediately into the complex end of Faulkner's writing style, they reach their full potential from the onset rather than building in to it. Characters have more stories, more thoughts, more key events; information is tightly packed, emotional, and raw, less filtered through the writer's lens. I don't feel like I found as much depth or character interest in Light in August, with the possible exception of Christmas, whose life story receives the most attention and time. I have no doubt that this was a good book: characters are real and descriptions detailed, almost physical; Faulkner attacks his greater issues of humanity, personal history, and fault and action from multiple angles both narrative and character-based. The book is compelling, both depressing and uplifting and certainly enlightening. Nonetheless, I believe that Faulkner sacrificed some depth by limiting the writing style at the beginning of the book.

I do recommend this book, as well as any other book by Faulkner. He is an extraordinary author and conveys fascination with and insights on humanity: what makes a man, what insights him to action, and when, despite all justification, man is still at fault. This book is a good start for those new to Faulkner. While it may be disappointing, in terms of style and depth, to those that have already read him, Light in August nonetheless contains one of Faulkner's most complex and compelling character and is a rewarding read.(less)

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Mar 16, 2012 Marlene rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Light in August was a recommendation from a friend. I hadn't read any book of Faulkner at all, so he thought I should maybe change that. I'm glad he suggested it.

At first it was a little hard to get used to Faulkners style of writing, but after a while I found it very interesting indeed. What also complicated matters was that he switched from one perspective to another. There were so many people the reader was watching, their stories of life interwoven with one another...!
At the same time this w...more

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Apr 01, 2013 Judy rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Steinbeck and Stegner fans

Recommended to Judy by: Chelsea

Shelves: classics, fiction, chunksters, 2013-reads, mississippi

Each year I choose a famous author who I've never read. I determine to read at least one of his books all the way through and if I like what I read I add more of his/her works. Last year, I tackled Hemingway, this year its William Faulkner. I like Faulkner. Hemingway? meh.

If I had known that Light in August was Faulkner's most complex novel, I probably wouldn't have chosen it. However, it turned out well especially since I picked up the Cliff's Notes to guide me through the book. I'm glad I did,...more

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Sep 06, 2007 Chazzbot rated it 5 of 5 stars

Like some bemused god looking down on his creations with a trace of empathy, but also with a hint of disdain at their hopeless bigotry, indolence, and willful ignorance, Faulkner's keen, cool eye for the way humans can be chilly in its precision. But there is no denying that Faulkner knows his characters and, by extension, his readers. This is a somewhat grim novel, with little evidence of hope for any of the characters who manage to walk away, but you will be hard pressed to find a more honest...more

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Mar 30, 2008 Corinne rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: the-nook-book-club

Faulkner is amazing - he is always making up words that are several words put together. I like this technique because that one combination-word somehow creates a whole different picture. For example: cinderstrewnpacked or Augusttremulous or pinkwomansmelling. It's a harsh story but, I think, so beautifully written. Sometimes he writes whole paragraphs that are just a jumble of memories - like just a bunch of loosely related details in one sentence, with nothing connecting them. Those take a whil...more

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Sep 20, 2011 Jessica rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: crime-and-punishment, groups-of-people, they-made-me-do-it

So I'm back in school now, and for the first time in ages am being made to read books. Now I don't have any personal experience with desperately trying to get pregnant, but reading novels for school reminds me of that: there's this activity that I'm used to doing purely for fun when I feel like it, that I'm now grimly pushing through on an inflexibly dictated schedule, whether I'm in the mood or not, with this intense sense of purpose that seems to poison the whole event. The result is that I'm...more So I'm back in school now, and for the first time in ages am being made to read books. Now I don't have any personal experience with desperately trying to get pregnant, but reading novels for school reminds me of that: there's this activity that I'm used to doing purely for fun when I feel like it, that I'm now grimly pushing through on an inflexibly dictated schedule, whether I'm in the mood or not, with this intense sense of purpose that seems to poison the whole event. The result is that I'm not really enjoying any of the books I read these days -- I feel so oppressed powering through 700 pages in a week under the threat of a syllabus that it's impossible for me to tell whether I'd like the books I'm reading in more organic conditions. So I guess if my star-rating average drops a lot, that'd be why.

This is my first Faulkner, and I didn't hate it or anything, but it may well be my last. I'm glad I read it, because never having read him was always more than a little embarrassing, but now I get the gist of what his deal is, and it's basically more or less what I thought: lovely and often startling language, legions of poetically insane and religiously fanatic and sexually rampant violent southerners, and frequency of n-word drops that'd make a rap star turn green with envy. It was less formally innovative than I imagine his other stuff being, I guess, so maybe I'll try one of those someday to see. There were some great things in this book -- mostly language, and the evocation of mood, power relations and place -- but I thought it was overly long and fell apart at the end into some sloppy-seeming bloatedness and kind of Hollywoodish whatever. I read this for a class the same week that we also did The Power and the Glory, and this made for an interesting comparison with its thoroughly created and self-contained nightmare world of terrorism and fear (though I liked the Graham Greene a whole lot more).

I dunno, it was fine, and it did have its moments, but I really suffered through the last 150 pages. Admittedly this was because I had to finish it by the next day for class, but nonetheless that was my experience, and it was pretty brutal and bad.(less)

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Jan 14, 2008 Paul rated it 4 of 5 stars

Incredible characters, and Faulkner handles the subject of race in the south in the 20's unflinchingly. As usual, everybody in his books, black or white, is deeply flawed and superficially unlikeable, but has some quality which compels a connection. Some of the best final 50 pages of any book ever.

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Jan 06, 2009 Colin Miller rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: novels, reviewing-commentary

A couple of thoughts I’ll tie together: 1) I read a BBC article that suggests a large percentage of people keep books on their shelf to impress others rather than to read them. 2) As young students, teachers take us to the library and allow us to pick out whatever book we like (as long as we’re not just trying to avoid reading by picking out a pamphlet), but by the time we reach high school and college, it’s assigned. Though I believe an educator’s recommendation to be valuable, I believe taking...more A couple of thoughts I’ll tie together: 1) I read a BBC article that suggests a large percentage of people keep books on their shelf to impress others rather than to read them. 2) As young students, teachers take us to the library and allow us to pick out whatever book we like (as long as we’re not just trying to avoid reading by picking out a pamphlet), but by the time we reach high school and college, it’s assigned. Though I believe an educator’s recommendation to be valuable, I believe taking away a person’s choice can rob them of finding the book that will spark excitement and turn them into readers for life. I believe far too many people are forced to read classics, when quite frankly, some of them will never be appealing. For me, I usually have strong reactions, good or bad, to the classics, but I found my spark long ago. For most people though, they know that reading is an intelligent practice, but they’re bored by what they’ve been forced to read, so books are used for the perception they create rather than the pleasure of their contents. While some of it is taste and a blatant unwillingness to participate in any medium straying from the instant gratification culture, there are certainly a good number of masturbatory authors who are more concerned with coming off as intelligent rather than relatable.

I believe William Faulkner is one of those writers who lets his writing get in the way of a good story.

Published in 1932, Light in August is written in the Southern Gothic tradition—set in Faulkner’s fictional Mississippi county, Yoknapatawpha county—where the grotesque is often perpetrated by horror/romance archetypes without moral judgment from the author. The plot consists of three connected strands: 1) A pregnant woman, Lena Grove, in search of the father of her baby; 2) An enigmatic alcohol smuggler, Joe Christmas, struggling with his mixed ancestry; and 3) A disgraced Priest, Reverend Gail Hightower, who lives in near-isolation after annoying the town with his sermons about his dead grandfather. Much of the novel deals with the racism of the South, pulling in violence and observing Judeo-Christian values if they were smashed into a funhouse mirror. It takes a little while to find Faulkner’s rhythm, but it’s not a tough search and it’s enjoyable until you realize he won’t just tell the story. The reader gets dragged through lengthy flashbacks even though the compelling plot line just found its adrenaline. Then you’ll get to the part you’ve been waiting for and Faulkner will skip ahead, spoiling his own story then slowly backing through the incident without any of the tension.

There are obscure punctuation choices, too, and while it’s not a major point of contention, it illustrates my frustration with his style: He uses six ellipses (. . . . . .) when the standard three (…) will do. The second quarter of this book, about 150 pages, could have easily been trimmed back to a lean 30, and even though I liked the last chapter, at least 40 of the pages before that could have been cut out, too, but that’s not Faulkner’s style. He believes in stream of consciousness, where thoughts expand and ideas ramble so that you understand the deepest recesses of a character. While this has certain strengths—as each character gets presented in differing ways, depending on who’s viewing them—I still find the style obese and much of the information superfluous. I lean minimalistic by default (though even I like a little meat on the bone), so I’m not a fan of reading what I think a visceral editor should have cut. Nothing seems to be minor in Faulkner’s eyes. As a result, none of the characters feel all that major either. They’re unique, distinguished, but with everything else, there’s just too much to appreciate it. It’s like mixing all the beautiful colors. After a while, you just end up with brown. Sometimes you need to make choices and Faulkner doesn’t make enough for my liking. As a result, any other book of his will not come onto my shelf. I don’t care who thinks I look smart. Two stars. Barely.
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Mar 10, 2008 Tosh rated it 5 of 5 stars

It inspired Boris Vian and that's enough in my book. Joe Christmas is one of the great fictional characters in fiction. I can smell Southern culture right off these pages. Taste it and live the tale.

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Oct 20, 2011 jessaka rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: novel

I couldn't finish it. While Faulkner is a beautiful writer he is very depressing. I lost interest after 100 plus pages, so I really can't even say that I read the book. What did me in was his flashbacks. It was okay for one chapter, but chapter after chapter revealed flashbacks, and this during the time when I found the book so interesting. My thought was to skip them and get on with the book, but so many chapters were on it. I will keep the book and keep trying.

P.S. I gave in and finished the...more

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Dec 26, 2011 Penelope Linton rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

It took 2 times to finish reading it. The first time I just could not get into Faulkner;s style, I suppose. I put it aside and then went back to it again from the beginning.
The first character I encountered was Lena Grove, an umarried pregnant teenage who leaves her home in search for the man who got her pregnant. She walks for miles and miles and she meets Byron. who immediately falls in love with her, who is kind to her and finds her a place to stay in Jefferson. And then I do not meet her a...more It took 2 times to finish reading it. The first time I just could not get into Faulkner;s style, I suppose. I put it aside and then went back to it again from the beginning.
The first character I encountered was Lena Grove, an umarried pregnant teenage who leaves her home in search for the man who got her pregnant. She walks for miles and miles and she meets Byron. who immediately falls in love with her, who is kind to her and finds her a place to stay in Jefferson. And then I do not meet her again till almost the end of the book.
There are a ton of flash backs to orient you to the other characters. I did not care for the other characters in the book. There is the usage a lot of the "n" word which was disturbing to me but this was written in the early 30's and takes place in the deep south so that is to be expected.
The other character Christmas, is black, or is he? but passes for white. He was left at an orphange on Christmas day and is abused by his adoptive father who is very strict and tries to beat religion into Christmas. He runs away and has a string and non-meaning relation ships with women, Then there is the Rev. Hightower who is recluse,whose wife committed adultery and killed her self. He lives an isolated life. Brown/Burch and Christmas live in a cabin that is behind Johanna Burden's house. Her family is from the North and they were against slavery .So she was not accepted in this Southern town but she stays on anyway. She is an older woman and begins a sexual relations with Christmas. She struck me as being mentally unstable. All the women in the book are sexual and not virtuous. I really did n ot care for the characters in the book except Byron Burch, who seemed to be kind. And I was so irritated by Lena for being so dumb and naive, believing that Burch who changed his name to Brown and never did go back to get her like he promised, yet she walks for miles and miles pregnant to meet him .
Ok. it was a very dark book that is humorless... there are no 'happy scenes', and all the characters have some sort of mental problems, and it has racial tension and prejudices, murder, mystery, poverty, and yet when I finished reading it.... those images and characters are still in my head. Faulkner's writing is more like prose and his use of combining words to form one word was a little jarring... I may pick it up again to reread some passages just for the prose. This book made me feel and think and I will always remember having read it. The books that did not do that to me are lost in my memory , but books that affect me stay with me and change me in some small way and "Light in August" is forever burned in my memory. (less)

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Jan 30, 2011 Dominic rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: classic-literature

Joe Christmas is quite possibly the most sympathetic misogynist in fiction. Of course most of the men of Light in August are ruthless, brutal women-haters and racists, throwing around the words "slut" and "whore" and racial epithets like it's nothing. But that is one of the reasons I love to deconstruct Faulkner's work--and if I ever get my doctorate in English, I may just write my dissertation on masculinity and Faulkner.

Yet Joe Christmas is still, despite all his repulsive nature, a tragic and...more

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Mar 02, 2010 Ann rated it 4 of 5 stars

Recommended to Ann by: Liz

I finished reading this and I am glad to have finally completed it; it took a long time. I had never read Faulkner and my sister had mentioned his work a lot so I wanted to check him out. The story centers around Christmas, a man who doesn't know if he is black or white. Faulkner's writing is interesting and goes from place to place, telling detailed and elaborate side stories that all come together (but very slowly). He has passages where I am not going to lie, I have no idea what is going on....more

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Aug 31, 2008 Alison rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: people who enjoyed "Barton Fink"

It seems to me that in this novel populated with ghosts and ghost-hunters, the most important ghost is the idea of essential identity. These characters drive themselves crazy searching for a Way to Be--by which they mean rest, immobility, freedom from yearning and disappointment and change--yet that kind of being doesn't exist and never has. So Hightower lives a kind of living death immersed in the fantasy of his Confederate hero grandfather who was shot for stealing a chicken; Lena and Byron ye...more

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Jul 19, 2008 Steve rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, 2d-readings-the-good-stuff

I’ve been working my through some great books I read many years ago. I don’t know as I’m picking up on new things reading with older eyes, but so far I’ve not been disappointed. The emotional wallop in these great novels still remains. My latest effort was Faulkner’s Light in August. It’s not Faulkner’s greatest book (see Absalom, Absalom), but it is the most accessible of his great novels. And it contains one of the saddest characters in all of literature: Joe Christmas. Abandoned, institutiona...more

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Sep 07, 2008 Stephanie rated it 4 of 5 stars

This book, and my response to it, is so complex I hardly know how to begin here. The book gave me a lot to hate--whether it was Faulkner expressing his own beliefs, Faulkner reflecting the attitudes of his society, or Faulkner revealing truths about humankind. I found myself, for example, wondering whether Faulkner really believed women and African Americans are all inclined to be as weak, violent, or manipulative as his characters...although it seemed he incriminated the entire human race by th...more

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Aug 12, 2008 Michael rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: faulkner

Read the Modern Library College Edition, with an introduction by Cleanth Brooks.
This is the most accessible epic I've read yet by Faulkner. Instead of the complicated genealogy of Go Down, Moses or the difficult stream of consciousness of The Sound and the Fury, what Light in August offers are Faulkner's patented time shifts and extreme subjectivities rendered through colloquial, usually plain speaking language. I'm just starting to wonder at the reason for this difference, but whatever it is, i...more

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Oct 19, 2009 John rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2009, nobel-laureates

One of the most powerful novels I’ve read probably since I picked up Crime and Punishment and Moby Dick last year. Light in August twines together a handful of people’s stories in the town of Jefferson – the gravid Lena, who comes from Alabama in search of the father of her soon-to-be-born child, Hightower, a disgraced preacher, and others, including a chilling (neo)Nazi type – but it really is the story of Joe Christmas, what he is (or isn’t) and what he does. Joe Christmas, despite being white...more

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Mar 08, 2008 AK rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: year-o-readingness

murder, intrigue, ::gasp:: fornication, lots of white men being really terrible to women and black people. i am very happy that i was not alive in the 1930s. in the u.s. and the south, at least. it sounds like a very miserable time and place.

one character, disillusioned about love and reality, thinks toward the very end of the novel "how false the most profound book turns out to be when applied to life." i didn't find any of the characters in this novel are especially sympathetic, likable or rel...more

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Feb 21, 2008 Michael rated it 5 of 5 stars

this book is so beautifully wrought i could hardly stand it. it literally pained me, mostly because this is the book i would want to write if i was a novelist. i now understand why gabriel garcia marquez said he had to kill faulkner in his own writing, so influential were faulkner's books on his development. this book grapples with all the great themes of the south, yet is universal in its scope and insight into the human condition. i knew i was taken because of the way i suffered right along wi...more

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Mar 29, 2013 Janel Comeau rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is the first William Faulkner book I’ve ever actually been able to finish, and it’s also my first ever eBook. It took me weeks to get through it, but I did it.

The story starts with young, pregnant, unwed Lena walking from Alabama to Mississipi to find the father of her child. As the novel progresses, Lena’s story gets mixed up with those of an underachieving mill worker, a mixed-race outlaw struggling with his past, and a disgraced ex-preacher obsessed with his dead grandfather. Some of the...more

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Feb 12, 2013 Andrea Blythe rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, fic-literary-mainstream

I am not a fan of Faulkner. I hated The Sound and the Fury and thought As I Lay Dying was just okay, and apparently my records show I've also read The Unvanquished, though I couldn't for the life of me tell you what it was about. His writing style is often so obtuse that it obscures the story, and his characters are generally unlikeable.

Light in August is more accessible, to the point that I was actually able to enjoy the wordplay and flow of language (and which came off as lyrical, especially...more I am not a fan of Faulkner. I hated The Sound and the Fury and thought As I Lay Dying was just okay, and apparently my records show I've also read The Unvanquished, though I couldn't for the life of me tell you what it was about. His writing style is often so obtuse that it obscures the story, and his characters are generally unlikeable.

Light in August is more accessible, to the point that I was actually able to enjoy the wordplay and flow of language (and which came off as lyrical, especially when read by Will Patton). The story begins with Lena, a pregnant women from Alabama, on the road to track down her wayward lover. She's calm and faithful that she will find the man who abandoned her. The roads lead her to Jackson, Mississippi, where the story weaves through a multitude of characters and lives, and culminating in sex and murder.

This book is infused with racism, saturated with it, which can be hard to read. Generally, I'm not fond of the argument, "consider the time and place," in these matters, because it's often used to shut down the conversation of racism in regards to classic books. In this case, however, the story grows up so much out of it's time and place that it can't be separated from it. Also, I don't get the sense that Faulkner is championing the racism or attempting to demonize his black characters, rather he seems to be telling a story about people that cannot be separated from the racism of the time period. But likewise, he doesn't seem to be damning the racists, either. Instead, he seems to stand outside the scenarios, more as and observer, merely recording actions of his characters (some of which even he doesn't seem to understand), without judging them one way or another.

It's also interesting that one of the main characters, Christmas, who may or may not be part black, is given some of the most significant exploration. He's one of the few characters we see as a child and come of age. Though he looks, if not white, at least like a foreigner, the idea that he might be part black haunts him from childhood, with even the other children in the orphanage calling him the n-word. He absorbs all this as a kind of self hatred, though nothing can be proved one way or another. And it's this idea of what he might be and (white) society's judgment of the black race that shapes much of his life.

I'm just not sure what Faulkner is trying to say with this, if he's trying to say anything at all. His portrayals of other black characters are also problematic by today's standards. What he has done is write a story that's open to multiple interpretations, one that warrants discussion and of which one could argue both for and against the racism of Faulkner.

This is a beautifully written book about the ugliness of people. In fact, by the end the only two characters that were at all sympathetic were Lena and possibly Bunch. Otherwise, there's not much of anyone to like, let alone to champion.

I'm rather torn on to how exactly I feel about it. I love the writing, but am disturbed by the story and despise most of the characters. So, I guess it's a toss up as far as recommendations go. (less)

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Feb 07, 2013 Bengt rated it 1 of 5 stars

Faulkner is a great writer for good reason, but a great writer does not a great book make. Reading this book is akin to your favorite experimental jazz musician releasing a tape of whale sounds (insert Orca sound here).

Now, I'm a huge fan of the man, and I think The Sound and the Fury is the definitive stream-of-consciousness text, but Light in August was as paint-dryingly boring as a summers day in the deep South. Finishing a novel has never been so maddening; come to think of it, neither has f...more

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Dec 05, 2012 Emma Durham added it

I believe Faulkner's purpose for writing this story is to be an inspiration for those who are struggling. The characters in this story are searching for their true selves. Many of them are confused as to what it is they are searching for and what exactly they want out of life. All the characters are going through some sort of journey or transition. I think Faulkner is saying that it is okay to not have yourself together at all times. People have to go through transitions and change to grow so th...more I believe Faulkner's purpose for writing this story is to be an inspiration for those who are struggling. The characters in this story are searching for their true selves. Many of them are confused as to what it is they are searching for and what exactly they want out of life. All the characters are going through some sort of journey or transition. I think Faulkner is saying that it is okay to not have yourself together at all times. People have to go through transitions and change to grow so their are stages where you will not be sure about where you are going. Faulkner is saying this happens to everyone and you will get there eventually.
A main theme of the book is that the past will forever affect your life. Memories leave a stronger impression on a person than just knowledge. "Memory believes before knowing remembers. Believes longer than recollects, longer than knowing even wonders." (Faulkner) The story goes back and tells Joe Christmas's past and then brings you back to the present. You can understand Joe so much more as a character once you learn about his abusive past. I think Faulkner is trying to say be careful about the decisions that you make because they can come back to haunt you. Think wisely and don't let peoples's harsh treatments to you negatively affect the decisions you make.
The book was not told in a description style because it jumped back and forth from past to present times. Therefore, it did not focus on just one particular time or event. With that in mind I believe this story was told in the narration style. Instead of focus on one event, it tells the story on a series of events so you can fully understand what may be going on in each characters' minds.
I really enjoyed this book. I liked how there were so many different characters with their own unique personalities. This made the story easy relate to and made the conflict in the story far more dramatic. I wouldn't change anything about this book. I believe the story line was really unique and unlike anything I have ever read. I enjoyed how the perspective jumped around to different characters instead of just focusing on one. This helped me understand more of what was happening and what several characters thought.(less)

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Aug 01, 2012 Richard rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: People who like to think deeply about morality.

Shelves: 2012

"Light in August" is probably just about the best love story that I have ever read.

"What love story?" you ask. "I thought this book was about castration and arson and racism and horsebeating and wifebeating and whorebeating and slicing a woman's neck with a straight razor and then smashing in your dad's head with a chair?"

Yes. It is about that in a way. But it is as if Faulkner shows us the darkness of the human heart in order to warn us against the folly that lurks, often unchecked, in the de...more "Light in August" is probably just about the best love story that I have ever read.

"What love story?" you ask. "I thought this book was about castration and arson and racism and horsebeating and wifebeating and whorebeating and slicing a woman's neck with a straight razor and then smashing in your dad's head with a chair?"

Yes. It is about that in a way. But it is as if Faulkner shows us the darkness of the human heart in order to warn us against the folly that lurks, often unchecked, in the depths of every man. "Light in August" is a parable, a thou shalt not. For, as Faulkner shows, racism so often leads to the destruction of men, misogyny so often leads to the destruction of the home, misguided patriotism so often leads to senseless violence. Faulkner knows, as the writers of the Bible knew, that hatred creates a distorted, inverted world, a moral climate (the Deep South, circa 1920) in which murder suddenly makes sense, becomes inevitable even. This is certainly true in the case of Joe Christmas who is ostracized and tormented from (literally) the second he was born for no good reason except that he was (purportedly) half African-American and born out of wedlock. For these two cardinal sins of the South he must pay. And he must make others pay in turn by fighting, killing, corrupting, running, burning everything in his wake.

I grew up being taught to hate racism, but this book, "Light in August" made me HATE HATE HATE racism. And not just that. It made me HATE misogyny and religious oppression. "Light in August" made me HATE the idea of using God or sex or skin color to try and control other people. Faulkner made me HATE hatred itself, and so he helped me to love. And because Faulkner shows us the depth of the accumulated other-hatingness in Christmas, he can, by contrast show us the depth of other-lovingness in the Byron Bunch character. Bunch, who gives up his life for the comfort of Lena Grove, a cussedly stubborn single teenage mother.

See? A love story.

Even though this book is overwhelmingly about Joe Christmas and his tragic life, I think that Bunch is the true hero. Hightower... well, whatever. Hightower is Hightower. But Bunch. Bunch is a hero because he is a fool. He is fool enough to love a girl who will in all likelihood not love him back. He loves against the odds.

Bunch is compelled by love to lay down his life that another might live. Christmas is compelled by hatred and he loses his life.

That is how awesome this book is. I know I am subject to hyperbole, but I have to tell you: this is probably the best book that I have read to date, in my life. It is certainly the best love story that I have come across.(less)

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Jun 16, 2012 Eric M. Witchey rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, writing

Sometimes, being a writer gets in the way of enjoying a good book. Asimov once said something like, "The worst thing I ever did for my reading was become a writer." The first time I attempted to read Light in August, I had a hard time with the narrative distance. The narrator's interpretation of setting felt inconsistent with the character's experience. I was 35 years old.

A couple days ago, I turned 54 and picked up Light in August again. Now, my experience was less like Asmiov's quote and more...more

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Jun 13, 2012 Terry rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: audiobook, 2012, literature

Light in August shows Faulkner's power as a writer discussing themes that only partly correspond to my 21st century life. Every character suffers from their own type of isolation but these are due to a mix of things like race, culture, education, and personal failings. The isolation of modernity seems much more external and while I get that there are different social narratives across time, I have a hard time accepting this one.

Light in August suffers from what I've come to call "vanguard syndro...more

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Apr 28, 2012 Bruce rated it 5 of 5 stars

The characters of importance in this novel are all in a sense outsiders to the society in which they find themselves. One, the first introduced, is Lena Grove, young and pregnant, having walked for thirty days looking for her lover who is a scoundrel and who left her when he learned of her pregnancy. She is at term. But shortly she seems to disappear temporarily from the narrative to be replaced by Joe Christmas (so named because as an infant he was abandoned on the doorstep of an orphanage on C...more The characters of importance in this novel are all in a sense outsiders to the society in which they find themselves. One, the first introduced, is Lena Grove, young and pregnant, having walked for thirty days looking for her lover who is a scoundrel and who left her when he learned of her pregnancy. She is at term. But shortly she seems to disappear temporarily from the narrative to be replaced by Joe Christmas (so named because as an infant he was abandoned on the doorstep of an orphanage on Christmas Day), and the narrative begins to focus on him to a much greater extent, first presenting him as an enigmatic and taciturn “foreigner” in the community, a laborer who soon leaves the mill and becomes a bootlegger. Then the narrative flashes back to his childhood, first in an orphanage and then as the adoptee of a rigid and severely abusive Presbyterian farmer from whom, after about ten years, he runs away. Joe’s relationships with women are always problematic, and he seems to fear softness and caring as strategies to break him down.

Faulkner’s style is remorselessly grim, his descriptions vivid, his syntax complex. Both Lena and Joe, in somewhat different ways, seem passive and enduring rather than active crafters of their fates. Early in Joe’s story, he is labeled as being “part nigger,” and it is never entirely clear whether this is simply an epithet thrown at him by those who don’t like him or whether, in this era of the 1930s in the deep South, this is true and of profound significance for his current treatment and his future. He himself claims that designation, even while admitting that he doesn’t know it for sure. Why might this be so? Shortly after his arrival in Jefferson, Mississippi – he is now thirty-three years old – he begins living in an out-cabin of Miss Joanna Burden, a spinster in her early forties, another “outsider” whose people are from New England, a recluse who has devoted her life and fortune to the betterment of blacks. She and Christmas become lovers, if a relationship with so little apparent affection can be so designated. Christmas hates this life, hates what he perceives as the sordidness of his nights. His lifelong habit has been to shun any caring for him by women, as if to acquiesce and accept caring would somehow diminish and weaken him, would make him vulnerable. Only with the whore Bobbie did he try to build an enduring relationship, and that was when he was very young, that relationship having ended badly. Christmas is the quintessentially isolated individual, the modern anti-hero, alone since birth, determined to remain alone forever. Never does he want to be tied down, to be tied to a woman, to be tied to anyone. Miss Burden’s suggesting that she might like a child is a warning to him; her assertion that she is pregnant is a final straw. By now he has been deceived her with other women, has been bootlegging liquor, has been telling himself that it is time to move on, something his inertia prevents.

What is this narrative really about? On its surface it explores the deep racial fears and antipathies of the Deep South during that era, the stigma attached to even the suggestion of mixed white-Negro blood, the outrage – no doubt hiding fear – of miscegenation. But, despite Faulkner’s obvious genius with language, this would not seem to be enough to cause the continuing fascination with this novel. Can these issues and themes be generalized? Is it about how people define themselves in contrast to “the other”? Does it speak to the need to define our own worth, our own personhood, by demonizing another group, especially when that group can be rather easily identified? Think of the scapegoating of Muslims; think of hate crimes against gays. And might it also involve the ways in which we externalize our own self-loathing, our own personal insecurities and feelings of unworthiness, projecting those feelings on others? Why did Miss Burden identify so with the Negroes in her environment? Why was Christmas so ready to identify with them and, despite his white appearance, readily announce to other people his possible Negro blood? And what role did the abuse he experienced as a child play in his subsequent emotional isolation? There are wider themes in the novel, themes and undercurrents that can be generalized to all our lives. At a certain basic level the novel explores existential isolation, tempered with occasional hopeful episodes of interpersonal connection.

Lena reappears in the narrative (she has really never left, but her story has been temporarily overshadowed by Joe’s). She is befriended by the infatuated Byron Bunch, who is determined both to care for her and to keep her from her child’s father, the fatuous and self-centered Brown. But Lena continues to seek Brown, stolidly confident that her link to him through their unborn child is unbreakable and will somehow make a bad situation right. The final tenuous resolution of this triangle lends a tone of hope to the end of the novel.

There are so many indelible less central characters in this novel – Christmas’s grandparents, and Hightower (arguably the moral or philosophical center of the novel), an isolate and defrocked minister who is in a sense spiritually resurrected – whom Faulkner delineates exquisitely, never leaving them as the cardboard sketchy figures that a lesser novelist might have done. In some peculiar way, is Christmas, the ultimate misfit, the ultimate outsider, rejected by society and eventually subjected to a violent death, a Christ figure? Perhaps only in a kind of ambiguous way, his personality having so many contradictions and antisocial features as to make a direct correspondence problematic. Byron Bunch certainly finally becomes a Joseph figure, leading Lena and her child away from the community to safety. Does Christmas’s death represent a kind of balance to the birth of Lena’s child, a death that in a metaphysical or metaphorical way facilitates the beginning of a new life with greater hope and potential? This magnificent and searing novel is haunting, multi-dimensional, and ambiguous, capable of yielding more profound depths and insights with each reading, great literature at its very best.
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Feb 10, 2012 Dawn Copley-Lindsey rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Everyone !

Recommended to Dawn by: High school teacher

For anyone who has never read William Faulkner, this is my ALLTIME favorite. I loved The Sound and the Fury, but Light in August is the best to start with to just dip your toes into a pond of Faulkner's reportoire' of indescribably excellent writing. The characters are so well defined that they become real people in every aspect. As the reader you get so involved with each character that your emotions want the plot to go one way or the other in their motivations or actions, yet as you know the h...more

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About William Faulkner

William Cuthbert Faulkner was a Nobel Prize-winning American novelist and short story writer. One of the most influential writers of the twentieth century, his reputation is based mostly on his novels, novellas, and short stories. He was also a published poet and an occasional screenwriter.
The majority of his works are based in his native state of Mississippi. Though his work was published as earl...more

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[Light in August]” — 60 people liked it

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