Faulkner and Love

GAMBIER, Ohio (September 9, 2010) The role of women in the creative life of William Faulkner will be explored in a lecture by Judith Sensibar on Monday, September 13, at 8:00 p.m. in the Cheever Room in Finn House.

Sensibar is the author of Faulkner and Love: The Women Who Shaped His Art and will discuss "Faulkner and His 'Female World': Writing a Revisionist Biography" as part of the Faculty Lectureships series, co-sponsored by the American Studies Program.

Sensibar is a Chicago-based Faulkner scholar. Her book was chosen as an "outstanding academic title" for 2009 by Choice magazine and it was a finalist for the 2009 Marfield Prize, the national award for arts writing. Yale University Press described the book as the first to inquire into three important women in Faulkner's life, including "his black and white mothers, Caroline Barr and Maud Faulker, and the childhood friend who became his wife, Estelle Oldham."

Peter Rutkoff, professor of American studies, said, "Sensibar's book is a remarkably insightful and original interpretation of the intersection of literature, gender, and race in the work of William Faulkner. Her historical and cultural texture, born of extensive research, deepens our appreciation and understanding of one of America's great writers."

Sensibar is also the author of The Origins of Faulkner's Art.