Requiem for a Nun

New York: Random House, 1951 First edition, first printing, limited issue of 750 numbered copies. Signed by Faulkner on the limitation page. Publisher's marbled boards and black cloth, spine lettered and decorated in gilt; in the publisher's original acetate dust jacket. Book fine; dust jacket with two closed tears to the rear panel, minor chips to the spine ends. Overall, fine and attractive copy, signed by Faulkner. Petersen A32.1a In Requiem for a Nun, Faulkner revisits the story of Temple Drake, a young Mississippi woman who becomes the victim of the criminal assistant of a notorious Tennessee moonshiner. He first introduced these characters in his 1931 novel Sanctuary. Now a grown and married woman, Temple must reconcile with the horrors of her past as she attempts to provide a more normal life for her own child. Interestingly, Requiem for a Nun is presented in the form of a three-part play interwoven with prose sections, and it is divided into three parts: Act One, "The Courthouse (A Name for the City);" Act Two, "The Golden Dome (Beginning Was the Word);" and Act Three, "The Jail (Nor Even Yet Quite Relinquish--)." Notably, this text contains one of Faulkner's best-known phrases, "The past is never dead. It is not even past," which refers to the understanding that our present identity is inherently linked to our history, an idea that is present in much of Faulkner's work and throughout the Southern Gothic genre.. Signed by Author. 1st Edition. Hard Cover.