Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner

By my count, this time was my fifth reading this book, and it remains one of my absolute favorites. I love the layers of story-telling, the resonances between Quentin, Shreve, and Henry, and even that demon, Sutpen. In this reading, I noticed many more similarities between Sutpen and his son Charles, the novel's tendency to use economic metaphors to describe transactions of the heart, and the chronological misplacement of Haiti in the narrative. I was also awed by the beautiful structure, which carefully builds up to the novel's awful climax. It's clearly a novel about what it means to tell a story, about perspective, about multiple discourses (including those we can never know), about the South, and about love, friendship, and pride. I don't recommend reading this novel once--read it many times, or never pick it up.