Big Woods: The Hunting Stories » (Reprint)

The only place you can find Yoknapatawpha County, Mississippi, is in the Nobel Prize-winning fiction of William Faulkner. The imagined lives of its residents form an exploration of suffering, love and family that has been acknowledged as one of the great literary achievements of the 20th century. Along the way, Faulkner set a tone for Southern literature that influences writers decades later.

Big Woods is a collection of Faulkner's best hunting stories. An avid hunter as well as one of America's greatest writers, Faulkner spent many days hunting in the big woods near Oxford, Mississippi. Included here is his most famous hunting story, "The Bear," as well as "The Old People," "A Bear Hunt," and "Race at Morning." Together, these four stories are considered to be the finest hunting stories ever written. Each is introduced with a prelude that weaves these tales together into a modern American classic. In Big Woods, Faulkner creates a variety of unforgettable characters: Sam Fathers, the Indian guide; the bear, Old Ben; and his bear dog, Lion; the young boy; and Major de Spain. Faulkner also wrote eloquently about our loss of hunting area. Even in the '40s and '50s Faulkner presaged the incipient decrease in wildlife habitat. " In the old days we came in wagons and pitch a camp in the rain and rise at daylight the next morning and hunt Now a man has to drive two hundred miles to find enough woods to harbor game worth hunting." This book, a classic collection of sporting literature, belongs in the library of every sportsman. Big Woods was published in 1955. It has long been out of print in hardback, and a copy of the book commands up to $175 if you can find one. This special edition of 1,200 copies is bound in rich cloth on 70-pound acid-free paper, with a silk ribbon and a handsome slipcase. Brett Smith, one of today's foremost sporting artists, created six full-page etchings especially for this edition. Noted author Jim Casada provided a special introduction.

Publishers Weekly

The first paperback edition of the 1955 collection of four stories about nature and hunting includes The Bear and Race at Morning . (May)