Sartoris

Returning home to Jefferson, Mississippi, at the end of the First World War, young Bayard Sartoris grieves the loss of his twin brother, John. Despite the stabilizing influence of his marriage to the lovely Narcissa Benbow, young Bayard's recklessness grows as the days pass, and hastens the destruction of the Sartoris family, who are still living under the shadow of Bayard's deceased, heroic great-grandfather. 

A story of a decaying family confronting the debilitating effects of war, Sartoris is a commentary on social class and family conditions in the post-war world of the American South. William Faulkner's third novel, Sartoris was published in 1929 and was the first novel he set in fictitious Yoknapatawpha County. It introduces many of the memorable characters found in his later books The Hamlet, The Town, and The Mansion, including the Snopes family.