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Professor turns detective to solve Faulkner mysteries in novel fashion
Detective Dupin Reads William Faulkner: Solutions to Six Yoknapatawpha Mysteries by Charles Chappell, International Scholars Publications, 7831 Woodmont Avenue, #345, Bethesda, MD 20814. (301) 654-7414. $55.49 paper; $74.95 cloth.
Dr. Charles Chappell, professor of English at Hendrix College, has published his first novel and his first book-length volume of criticism of the works of William Faulkner. With a little ingenuity, and a touch of humor, he's managed to blend his desire to write a novel with his ability to produce scholarly work that could benefit students of Faulkner everywhere.
"I wanted to make it more engaging to read," Dr. Chappell said, discussing his reason for writing the book as a novel. "And, I wanted to weave some humor into it. So, I decided to write it as a detective narrative."
Dr. Chappell said many of Faulkner's novels -- especially those that involve a crime of some sort -- raise unanswered questions and sometimes omit information that would help the reader figure out why things happen as they do. However, he believes the answers can be obtained through deduction. Therefore, it seemed natural to him to use the form of a detective novel to solve these Faulkner mysteries.
Chappell sets his story in the mythical town of Murryville, Ark., the county seat of the also mythical Crowder County, which he describes as being in the northeastern quadrant of the state.
His narrator is Archibald Fulmer "Speck" Watkins, an ophthalmologist, who initiates investigations into six mysteries or problems found in four different Faulkner works. The primary investigator is a retired Memphis police officer who claims to be descended from the first great detective in modern fiction, C. Auguste Dupin, who solved "The Murders in the Rue Morgue" and other Edgar Allan Poe mysteries. The primary questioner is a young professor at Moffatt College, a small liberal arts college in Murryville, who is suffering horrendous headaches brought on by the perplexing questions asked him by students in his Faulkner class. The narrator brings these two together and joins them in their quest for answers, an exercise that eventually involves the three men and their spouses in the quest.
This band of literary detectives tackles six cases: "The Case of the Furtive Memphis Lawyer" in Sanctuary, "The Case of Ms. Quentin's Second-Story Job" and "The Case of Quentin Compson's Suicide Site" in The Sound and the Fury, "The Case of Addie Bundren's Mathematical Bequest" in As I Lay Dying, and "The Case of Faulkner's Arch-Villain" and "The Case of the Infatuated Final Narrator" in Light in August.
Detective Dupin Reads William Faulkner grew out of Chappell's classroom discussions and his efforts to answer questions put to him by Hendrix students. Chappell, a 1964 graduate of Hendrix, has been a member of the Hendrix faculty since 1969. He earned both a master's degree and a doctorate in English from Emory University in Atlanta, Ga. Dr. Chappell has taught a Faulkner class at Hendrix since 1983, and he credits his students not only with raising the questions investigated in his book but also with helping him find the answers.
The solutions were published earlier as journal articles. He pulled the articles together and refined the novel format during a sabbatical from his teaching duties in the Winter 1996 term, when he also found a publisher. International Scholars Publications plans to distribute the book to libraries and for use as a text or classroom supplement in college-level Faulkner courses.
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