Book Review: "Requiem for a Nun" by William Faulkner

You've probably seen me here and there rereading some works by Faulkner. If you haven't then here's where you can start!

Faulkner is one of my all-time favourite authors and when it comes to American Literature, I don't think that very many authors from the United States have such a vast and incredible bibliography. One of my favourite books of all time is Absalom, Absalom! and it really does feel like a Shakespearean tragedy. But here, in one of his lesser known works, Requiem for a Nun, we see Faulkner at possibly his most gritty and calculating in prose. The storyline feels warped with emotion, dark and intense like his characters are, in fact, slouching towards Bethlehem. This is not quite the sound and fury of my favourite Faulkner books, not so wrought with fire. But instead, it is quiet and pacing, juggled with a sense of constant foreboding - as if someone has cast a spell on both book and reader.

Nancy is a woman who became a nursemaid from being an addict and a sex worker in America, but now she's being sentenced to hang for the murder of an infant - the daughter of her employers. Of course, it's a Faulkner novel so we can expect it to traumatise us from the very beginning. But, it is also written with depth and urgency from the outset. It isn't a novel that sits down but also doesn't rage. It's plodding towards us, gradually gaining in speed once we realise what is really happening. The mother of the child, Temple Drake is someone we recognise from reading Faulkner's novel Sanctuary where her own traumatic past is investigated. Now it is coming back, haunting her constantly with the atmospheric increase of a plane going down. She eventually marries an alcoholic named Gowan Stevens and maintains some sort of social standing despite having such a horrifying life experience it would definitely stain the way she is seen by her fellow person during this time.

There's a man from her past, Pete, whom she wants to run away with and abandon her entire family and of course this isn't innocent because it's a Faulkner novel - it can't be innocent and wanting - it has to be absolutely traumatic. It has to have huge stakes. The stakes are that Pete has compromising letters written by Temple and so, he's blackmailing her, threatening to destroy her current life and social standing. Before the age of the internet and documentation it was much harder for people to investigate other people's backgrounds and so, turning up with someone's old letters is something that is just terrifying if that is the life this person has been trying to break away from. Plus, it has been almost a decade that Temple has been holding herself together. To see it taken away from her in a heartbeat must be really frightening.

It's Nancy that tries to stop Temple from leaving and when Temple refuses to listen, Nancy murders the child in the belief it would be the only way to get Temple to stay and it may be the only way to save the children from what would become a ruined life for them. Their mother abandoning them would mark them for good in the eyes of the public and their futures. Nancy thinks that this is the only good thing she can do to stop the madness. It would be Temple who feels the deep guilt of everything, attempting to save Nancy from her execution, along with her husband who will eventually learn the horrific truth about the whole sordid thing.

William Faulkner has written something incredibly special here. Requiem for a Nun is traumatising without invoking ire, it is pacing and cold, it feels like a beating drum almost constantly. The climax doesn't feel climactic but instead feels inevitable. If you want to read a Faulkner novel that immerses you into the true darkness of past and present colliding then I would say you need to read this one. Yes, it's a little shorter than his other novels but that doesn't make it bad. It is a reflection of a moment in time, a moment that comes to impact the lives of every single person involved for the rest of their time on earth.