Taken from a question and answer session at the University of Oregon, the author shares his insights into the life of a writer.
Faulkner feels that his job as a writer is to write what he believes and express it in the best way that he can. And when he's finished, he hopes it is expressed in a way that everyone can understand and derive some benefit from it.
He believes that you need to wait before making changes. You will get to a point where you realize this is the best you can do. And if it still fails to express what you are striving for and is not good enough, then you must decide if there is enough there to make it worth finishing.
Personal satisfaction for him "...comes when you know you have completely expressed your idea... in knowing that you have written the truth." He considers "The Sound and the Fury" his best work, with "Absalom, Absalom" his second.
As for inspiration for him, it comes from something he sees or an idea that comes to him that needs to be told. He thinks about it, delays writing until the urgency of the idea becomes so great that it demands that he write.
Considering the short story, he feels "...all the trash must be eliminated, whereas you can get away with some of it in a novel."
A Nobel Prize laureate, Faulkner died of a heart attack at the age of 64.