As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner

Some books you read. This one you feel in your bones.

From the Nobel Prize-winning author of The Sound and the Fury comes a true 20th-century classic: the harrowing, unforgettable account of the Bundren family and their long odyssey across the Mississippi countryside to bury Addie, their wife and mother.

What makes this novel so extraordinary? The way it’s told. Faulkner hands the story to each family member in turn—fifteen different voices, including Addie herself—weaving a chorus that ranges from dark, biting comedy to the deepest pathos. It’s the kind of book that rewired what American fiction could do, and it still feels startlingly modern nearly a century later.

Faulkner himself said it best: “I set out deliberately to write a tour-de-force. Before I ever put pen to paper and set down the first word I knew what the last word would be and almost where the last period would fall.”

This edition reproduces the corrected text as established in 1985 by Noel Polk—so you’re reading it just as it was meant to be read.

Fair warning: this one asks something of you. Lean in, and it rewards you tenfold. A perfect companion for a gray, rainy afternoon when the fog rolls in off the cove and you’ve got nowhere to be.

Whether you’re returning to Faulkner or meeting him for the first time, this is essential reading—a cornerstone of any well-loved shelf.

Come linger over the pages. We’d love to help you discover why this one has endured.

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