That Faulkner was a "liar" not just in his writing but also in his life
has troubled many critics. With psychopathological imposture-theories
they have explained his numerous "false stories, " particularly those
about military honors he actually never earned and war wounds he never
sustained. The drawback of this critical approach is that it reduces and
oversimplifies the complex psychological and aesthetic phenomenon of
Faulkner's role-playing. Instead, this study by one of the most
acclaimed international Faulkner scholars takes its cue from Nietzsche's
concept of "truth as a mobile army of metaphors" and from Ricoeur's
dynamic view of metaphor and treats the wearing of masks not as an
ontological issue but as a matter of discourse. Honnighausen examines
Faulkner's interviews and photographs for the fictions they perpetuate.
Such Faulknerian role-playing he interprets as "a mode of organizing
experience" and relates it to the crafting of the artist's various
personae in his works. His conclusion, a comparative view of cultural
nationalism and international regionalism in the Thirties, will lead
readers to a new understanding of The Hamlet and of Faulkner's
self-portrait of the artist as a Mississippi farmer.