Sentence:  It would be profitable , I believe , to read these realistic humorists alongside Faulkner 's works , the thought being not that he necessarily read them and owed anything to them directly , but rather that they <WSD>dealt</WSD> a hundred years ago with a class of people and a type of life which have continued down to our time , to Faulkner 's time . 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  act on verbally or in some form of artistic expression