This richly detailed outline of William Faulkner's life is written by an eminent French scholar who brings new insights to the Nobel Laureate's career and writings.

This book is intended to be a quick reference guide to Faulkner's works as they relate to his life. Principally an outline of a literary career, it will serve as a useful aid for students beginning a study of Faulkner's novels. It gives emphasis year-by-year to the main events in his life and to his professional activity. For the major works, Gresset gives an account of the inception, composition, revisions, and publication. In addition, to summarize Faulkner's publications in a given year, Gresset provides a list of the fiction published during the period.

From the time of Faulkner's death in 1962 through 1984, the chronology provides a publishing history of new original Faulkner material as well as information about important books and events that relate to Faulkner.

“The figure that looms behind this chronology,” Gresset says in his introduction, “is that of a hard-gutted and hard-fisted little man whose rather unhappy life may well have found only in literature . . . the deep satisfaction . . . that he never ceased to yearn after. ”