‘That’s right, great general! Lie always with your face to the east, that the enemies of France shall always see it and beware!’
At which moment there was a sudden movement, surge, in the crowd to one side; the hats and capes and lifted batons of policemen could be seen struggling toward the disturbance. But before they could reach it, something burst suddenly out of the crowd—not a man but a mobile and upright scar, on crutches, he had one arm and one leg, one entire side of his hatless head was one hairless eyeless and earless sear, he wore a filthy dinner jacket from the left breast of which depended on their barber-pole ribbons a British Military Cross and Distinguished Conduct Medal, and a French Médaille Militaire: which (the French one) was probably why the French crowd itself had not dared prevent him emerging from it and even now did not dare grasp him and jerk him back as he swung himself with that dreadful animal-like lurch and heave with which men move on crutches, out into the empty space enclosing the Arch, and on until he too faced the caisson. Then he stopped and braced the crutches into his armpits and with his single hand grasped the French decoration on his breast, he too crying in a loud and ringing voice:
‘Listen to me too, Marshal! This is yours: take it!’ and snatched, ripped from his filthy jacket the medal which was the talisman of his sanctuary and swung his arm up and back to throw it. Apparently he knew himself what was going to happen to him as soon as he released the medal, and defied it; with the medal up-poised in his hand he even stopped and looked back at the crowd which seemed now to crouch almost, leashed and straining for the moment when he would absolve himself of immunity, and laughed, not triumphant: just indomitable, with that side of his ruined face capable of laughing, then turned and flung the medal at the caisson, his voice ringing again in the aghast air as the crowd rushed down upon him: ‘You too helped carry the torch of man into that twilight where he shall be no more; these are his epitaphs: They shall not pass. My country right or wrong. Here is a spot which is forever England——’
Then they had him. He vanished as though beneath a wave, a tide of heads and shoulders above which one of the crutches appeared suddenly in a hand which seemed to be trying to strike down at him with it until the converging police (there were dozens of them now, converging from everywhere) jerked it away, other police rapidly forming a cordon of linked arms, gradually forcing the crowd back while, rite and solemnity gone for good now, parade marshals’ whistles shrilled and the chief marshal himself grasped the bridles of the horses drawing the caisson and swung them around, shouting to the driver: ‘Go on!’ the rest of the cortege huddling without order, protocol vanished for the moment too as they hurried after the caisson almost with an air of pell mell, as though in actual flight from the wreckage of the disaster.
The cause of it now lay in the gutter of a small cul-de-sac side street where he had been carried by the two policemen who had rescued him before the mob he had instigated succeeded in killing him, lying on his back, his unconscious face quite peaceful now, bleeding a little at one corner of his mouth, the two policemen standing over him though now that the heat was gone their simple uniforms seemed sufficient to hold back that portion of the crowd which had followed, to stand in a circle looking down at the unconscious and peaceful face.
‘Who is he?’ a voice said.
‘Ah, we know him,’ one of the policemen said. ‘An Englishman. We’ve had trouble with him ever since the war; this is not the first time he has insulted our country and disgraced his own.’
‘Maybe he will die this time,’ another voice said. Then the man in the gutter opened his eyes and began to laugh, or tried to, choking at first, trying to turn his head as though to clear his mouth and throat of what he choked on, when another man thrust through the crowd and approached him—an old man, a gaunt giant of a man with a vast worn sick face with hungry and passionate eyes above a white military moustache, in a dingy black overcoat in the lapel of which were three tiny faded ribbons, who came and knelt beside him and slipped one arm under his head and shoulders and raised him and turned his head a little until he could spit out the blood and shattered teeth and speak. Or laugh rather, which is what he did first, lying in the cradle of the old man’s arm, laughing up at the ring of faces enclosing him, then speaking himself in French:
‘That’s right,’ he said: ‘Tremble. I’m not going to die. Never.’
‘I am not laughing,’ the old man bending over him said. ‘What you see are tears.’
END
December, 1944
Oxford—New York—Princeton
November, 1953
EDITORS’ NOTE
A Fable was conceived in 1943 during a discussion in wartime Hollywood among Faulkner, producer William Bacher, and director Henry Hathaway about a film on the Unknown Soldier. One proposal was that the Unknown Soldier might have been Jesus Christ returned to earth to give humanity one last chance, an idea Faulkner was enthusiastic about. They never made a film on this theme, but the basic idea was to consume Faulkner for over a decade, with brief stints away from it to work on filmscripts, “The Compson Appendix,” Intruder in the Dust, the stories that would make up Knight’s Gambit, and Requiem for a Nun. There exist several hundred pages of preliminary typescript and manuscript, some of it dated as early as 1947, and the typescript setting copy is itself composed of typescript pages from several different versions of various passages, typed on at least two different typewriters and clearly representing materials dating from throughout the decade of its composition. Faulkner took the typescript of A Fable to Random House on November 5, 1953, and soon after left for four months in Europe, where he visited friends and worked on a film for Howard Hawks. While reading proof in Rome in April 1954, he wired Random House that he had forgotten to include the “Judas Misery” material in the chapter titled “Tomorrow,” and he supplied that material when he returned to New York. Random House published the book on August 2, 1954, in a text altered in hundreds of major and minor ways by editorial intervention. Faulkner’s typescript is the setting copy for the Polk text reproduced here, except for the “Judas Misery” sequence, for which the first edition is the only extant text.
American English continues to fluctuate; for example, a word may be spelled more than one way, even in the same work. Commas are sometimes used expressively to suggest the movements of the voice, and capitals are sometimes meant to give significances to a word beyond those it might have in its uncapitalized form. Since standardization would remove such effects, this volume preserves the spelling, punctuation, capitalization, and wording of the text as established by Noel Polk, which strives to be as faithful to Faulkner’s usage as surviving evidence permits.
The following notes were prepared by Joseph Blotner and are reprinted with permission from Novels 1942–1954 (1994) in the edition of Faulkner’s collected works published by The Library of America. Numbers refer to page and line of the present volume (the line count includes chapter headings). No note is made for material included in the eleventh edition of Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary. For more detailed notes, references to other studies, and further biographical background, see: Joseph Blotner, Faulkner, A Biography, 2 vols. (New York: Random House, 1974); Joseph Blotner, Faulkner, A Biography, One-Volume Edition (New York: Random House, 1984); Selected Letters of William Faulkner (New York: Random House, 1977), edited by Joseph Blotner; and Calvin S. Brown, A Glossary of Faulkner’s South (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1976).
1 Place de Ville] Town square.
2 Hôtel] In full, Hôtel de Ville, town hall.
3 Comité des Forges] A national association of iron and steel manufacturers.
4 S.P.A.D.] Société Provisoire des Aéroplanes Deperdussin, a society of aircraft manufacturers.
5 expletive … legend.] French general Pierre-Jacques Cambronne, commander of the Imperial Guard at Waterloo, was said to have replied “Merde” in response to a British demand for surrender.
6 ‘Gil Blas,’] A picaresque romance by Alain René Lesage (1668–1747).
7 Able … France] A play on a well-known palindrome, “Able was I ere I saw Elba.”
8 École Militaire] Military college, then at St. Cyr, for the training of infantry and cavalry officers.
9 K.R. and O.] King’s Regulations and Orders.
10 Sandhurst] Village in England, site of the Royal Military Academy.
11 Mons … bar] The Mons Star medal was given to those who served in France and Belgium before November 23, 1914. The Military Cross is a decoration for bravery awarded to officers; the bar indicates that it has been awarded a second time.
12 Cox’s] Cox and Co., Bankers and Army Agents.
13 R.T.O.] Railway Transport Office.
14 A.S.C.] Army Service Corps.
15 lo … dead] Cf. Christopher Marlowe (1564–93), The Jew of Malta, IV, 1.
16 archie] Anti-aircraft artillery.
17 In Christ … began] Cf. 1 Corinthians 15:20–22.
18 ’Change … windy] The stock exchange. Windy is slang for afraid, nervous, alarmed (from “got the wind up”).
19 long vac.] The long vacation, as in the Oxford and Cambridge academic year.
20 Gaston de la Tour] Gaston de Latour (1896), unfinished novel by Walter Pater.
21 Pip Emma] Signaling code for P.M.
22 Vickers … Lewis] On the S.E. fighter aircraft, a belt-fed Vickers machine gun was mounted on the fuselage in front of the pilot’s cockpit and synchronized to fire through the arc of the propeller without hitting its blades. A drum-fed Lewis machine gun was mounted on the top wing; in its normal position it fired forward over the propeller arc, but it could be elevated to fire upwards.
23 Aldis] A gun sight.
24 napoo] Finished, done, nothing doing, end of argument (from il n’y a plus, “it is no more”).
25 p.b.i.] Poor bloody infantry.
26 Les Amis … Monde] Literally, “The Myriad and Anonymous Friends to France of All the World”.
27 D.C.M.] Distinguished Conduct Medal.
28 d’Artagnan] Hero of The Three Musketeers.
29 espada] Matador.
30 p.c.] Signaling code for post of command.
31 Ack Emma] A.M.
32 Antipas] Herod Antipas (21 B.C.–A.D. 39).
33 St Cyr] See note 52.10–11.
34 banlieu] Suburbs, outskirts.
35 Der Tag] The Day.
36 No heel taps] A toast, like “Bottoms up!” (from the heel tap shape of the residue of liquor left at the bottom of a glass).
37 his poule] His whore.
38 Mon homme … mari] My man—my husband.
39 ‘Monjay.] “Eat” (mangez!).
WILLIAM FAULKNER
(1897–1962)
William Cuthbert Faulkner was born in 1897 in New Albany, Mississippi, the first of four sons of Murry and Maud Butler Falkner (he later added the “u” to the family name himself). In 1904 the family moved to the university town of Oxford, Mississippi, where Faulkner was to spend most of his life. He was named for his great-grandfather “The Old Colonel,” a Civil War veteran who built a railroad, wrote a bestselling romantic novel called The White Rose of Memphis, became a Mississippi state legislator, and was eventually killed in what may or may not have been a duel with a disgruntled business partner. Faulkner identified with this robust and energetic ancestor and often said that he inherited the “ink stain” from him.
Never fond of school, Faulkner left at the end of football season his senior year of high school, and began working at his grandfather’s bank. In 1918, after his plans to marry his sweetheart Estelle Oldham were squashed by their families, he tried to enlist as a pilot in the U.S. Army but was rejected because he did not meet the height and weight requirements. He went to Canada, where he pretended to be an Englishman and joined the RAF training program there. Although he did not complete his training until after the war ended and never saw combat, he returned to his hometown in uniform, boasting of war wounds. He briefly attended the University of Mississippi, where he began to publish his poetry.
After spending a short time living in New York, he again returned to Oxford, where he worked at the university post office. His first book, a collection of poetry, The Marble Faun, was published at Faulkner’s own expense in 1924. The writer Sherwood Anderson, whom he met in New Orleans in 1925, encouraged him to try writing fiction, and his first novel, Soldier’s Pay, was published in 1926. It was followed by Mosquitoes. His next novel, which he titled Flags in the Dust, was rejected by his publisher and twelve others to whom he submitted it. It was eventually published in drastically edited form as Sartoris (the original version was not issued until after his death). Meanwhile, he was writing The Sound and the Fury, which, after being rejected by one publisher, came out in 1929 and received many ecstatic reviews, although it sold poorly. Yet again, a new novel, Sanctuary, was initially rejected by his publisher, this time as “too shocking.” While working on the night shift at a power plant, Faulkner wrote what he was determined would be his masterpiece, As I Lay Dying. He finished it in about seven weeks, and it was published in 1930, again to generally good reviews and mediocre sales.
In 1929 Faulkner had finally married his childhood sweetheart, Estelle, after her divorce from her first husband. They had a premature daughter, Alabama, who died ten days after birth in 1931; a second daughter, Jill, was born in 1933.
With the eventual publication of his most sensational and violent (as well as, up until then, most successful) novel, Sanctuary (1931), Faulkner was invited to write scripts for MGM and Warner Brothers, where he was responsible for much of the dialogue in the film versions of Hemingway’s To Have and Have Not and Chandler’s The Big Sleep, and many other films. He continued to write novels and published many stories in popular magazines. Light in August (1932) was his first attempt to address the racial issues of the South, an effort continued in Absalom, Absalom! (1936), and Go Down, Moses (1942). By 1946, most of Faulkner’s novels were out of print in the United States (although they remained well-regarded in Europe), and he was seen as a minor, regional writer. But then the influential editor and critic Malcolm Cowley, who had earlier championed Hemingway and Fitzgerald and others of their generation, put together The Portable Faulkner, and once again Faulkner’s genius was recognized, this time for good. He received the 1949 Nobel Prize for Literature as well as many other awards and accolades, including the National Book Award and the Gold Medal from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and France’s Legion of Honor.
In addition to several collections of short fiction, his other novels include Pylon (1935), The Unvanquished (1938), The Wild Palms (1939), The Hamlet (1940), Intruder in the Dust (1948), A Fable (1954), The Town (1957), The Mansion (1959), and The Reivers (1962).
