Magazine Illustrations

The first visualizations of Faulkner's Yoknapatawpha fictions were the illustrations drawn to accompany the publication of his short stories in magazines like The Saturday Evening Post, Scribner's and Collier's, the large circulation periodicals that Faulkner regularly submitted work to in his quest for income. Although Faulkner occasionally worked directly with the magazines' editors to revise a story, there is no evidence that he had any control over - or even interest in - the way these magazines illustrated his texts. The illustrations can, however, help us appreciate the way Faulkner's world, and the people of different races and classes who inhabit it, appeared to his original readers.

The following items are drawn from the William Faulkner Foundation Collection at the University of Virginia's Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library (http://small.library.virginia.edu/).
Click on any image to see an enlargement.

The colorful way the Post illustrated this late short story reflects the ways in which both the magazine's appearance and Faulkner's status had changed by the mid-1950s. It's interesting to compare the photo of the "Nobel Prize-winning author" with the larger, but similarly-cropped drawings of the story's characters, as represented by illustrator Ray Prohaska.

   

      Citing this source:
Stephen Railton, "Illustrating 'Race at Morning,'" Digital Yoknapatawpha, University of Virginia, http://faulkner.drupal.shanti.virginia.edu/node/16320?canvas   (Date added to project: 2018)
Illustrations © The Saturday Evening Post.