Audio of William Faulkner Teaching at UVA

I intended to post this yesterday (as it was William Faulkner's birthday) but the day got away from me. In any event, this is too cool to pass up. Faulkner is one of my favorite writers (and probably my favorite Southern writer). At some point, I really need to get to Oxford, MS to see his home (and the Grove), but I digress.

Thanks to the University of Virginia, a new audio archive of the author reading, lecturing, and answering questions has recently been published online, accessible to the public for the first time. Nearly fifteen years in the works, the vast archive encompasses almost thirty hours of audio transferred from open-reel tapes.

Here's the link to the UVA audio tapes.

William Faulkner teaching at UVA in 1957

[H/T: Garden & Gun]

Deliverance: Released Forty Years Ago

Do know what's gonna be here? Right here? A lake. As far as the eyes can see. Hundreds of feet deep. HUNDREDS of feet deep. Did you ever look out over a lake and think of somethin' buried underneath it? Buried underneath it. Well man, that's just about as buried as you can get.

Released in 1972, Deliverance, is a movie that punches you in the face. Remembered mostly for the grisly rape scene, and the banjo music, it has much more than that. Friendship, survival, ethics, civilization vs. nature, and on, and on...

One of South Carolina's celebrated sons, James Dickey comes at you in the book with all he's got, and the movie rings true.

Here's a great article interviewing Jon Voight, Burt Reynolds, Ned Beatty and Ronny Cox forty years later. 


Read the whole thing.

You don't beat the river.

To Kill a Mockingbird

How well do you know it?