Cover.

The novel deals with the trial of Lucas Beauchamp, a black farmer accused of murdering a white man. He is cleared through the efforts of black and white teenagers and a spinster from a long-established southern family. It was written as Faulkner's response as a Southern writer to the racial problems facing the South. In his Selected Letters, Faulkner wrote: "the premise being that the white people in the south, before the North or the Govt. or anybody else owe and must pay a responsibility to the negro".

Intruder in the Dust was turned into a MGM film directed by Clarence Brown in 1949 after MGM paid film rights of $50,000 to Faulkner. The film was shot in Faulkner's home town of Oxford, Mississippi.

In 1949, Faulkner won the Nobel prize for literature.

Intruder in the Dust is notable for its use of stream of consciousness style of narration.

The characters of Lucas Beauchamp and his wife, Molly, first appeared in Faulkner's previous novel, Go Down, Moses. Also, a story by Faulkner, "Lucas Beauchamp", was published in 1999.

References

• John Anderson page on William Faulkner
• IMDb article on ''Intruder in the Dust''
• Laurel Longe's article ''Lucas Beauchamp, Joe Christmas, and the Color of Humanity''

fr:L'Intrus (roman)