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a literary analysis of a rose for emily
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A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner In "A Rose for Emily", Emily, a lady of a noble origin, finds herself alone in small town in the Old South. The townspeople there turn their back on her because of her origin, although they have always been present at all of the events that marked her life, until the day she died. Emily's social isolation is evident through the development of the elements of character and events. The main reason that led the locals to isolate Emily was the fact that she came from a respectable and prestigious family, in a time where most of the people were poor. The fact that she lives in a big house and has a colored servant to work for her, it is something that make the locals feel that Emily is not one of them, and therefore it is only logical to put her aside. In addition, it is also her attitude towards the townspeople that showed that she differentiated herself from them, that she felt that she was somehow superior to them: "she carried her head high enough" (32). But it is not her fault. She had been brought up to believe that she's someone special, better than the rest of the people, and that is the reason why she never got married. Her father believed that no one would ever be good enough for his daughter, and thus he turned away all the men that asked for Emily's hand. So, Emily had only her father to protect and take care of her, and now that he is dead, she found herself all alone. She doesn't have anyone to protect her, and furthermore, she's left with no money, but for the house that she lived in. At this turning point in Emily's life, the townspeople turn their back on her, for her suffering seems to give them pleasure, since now "she had become humanized" (31). The difficult t... ... middle of paper ... ...rom the Negro" (34), and so they had no idea about what was going on in Emily's life. And thus, Emily died all alone forgotten from everyone in the town. Emily's isolation from the rest of the town, their indifference, as well as the lack of initiation was the reason of her own tragic death. The town knew that "old lady Wyatt, her great-aunt, had gone completely crazy at last" (30), and they were afraid of having the same end as her great-aunt, but they just turned their back on her and let her be because it was the easiest thing to do. They also "knew that there was a room ... which no one had seen in forty years, and which would have to be forced" (34), but they didn't do anything and Emily was left alone to meet her destiny, and in that sense, they are accomplices to Homer's murder. Works Cited Faulkner, William. "A Rose for Emily"
In, 'A Rose for Emily', Emily is being kept and locked away from the world. Her father keeps her isolated with only the company of their servant. The people of the town “remembered all the young men her father had driven away” (Faulkner 219). Because of this, Emily grew well past the age of being courted and finding a husband. After he died, she was left even more alone than before. Her family was not really present in her life ever since they and her father had an argument and did not keep in touch. The people of the town also helped with the isolation of Emily. The people have always regarded the family as strange and mysterious keeping their distance. Emily had “a vague resemblance to those angels in the colored church windows- sort of tragic and serene” (Faulkner 220). She did not leave the house often and when she did, ...
In addition, as a lady descended from aristocracy, Emily was educated in how to behave as a noble, which became her huge barrier to people around her. Throughout the story, Emily always 'carried her head high enough', even when she went out with Homer Barron, bought rat poison, or talked to the Board of Alderman. A head carried high showed that Emily was absolutely aware of her status, which kept her from having a person to confide with. Even she never talked to the Negro servant who lived under the same roof with her for years. That was the reason why people only saw him go in and out of the house silently from the beginning to the end of the story. If Emily carried her head a little bit lower and spent time looking at people around her, she could find a reliable listener to help her escape from the isolation.
should come to her. Instead Emily lived by herself with only a black male servant.
Emily came from a well to do family that had alot of history in the town. The Grierson's were so powerful, Emily did not have to pay taxes. The whole townspeople seemed to think taht they were snobby because in Emily's father's eyes, none of the men were quite good enough for Emily. Unfortunately, Emily turned out to be a lonely old woman because of her father's influence.
Homer had lived in the present, and Emily eventually conquered that. Emily’s family was a monument of the past; Emily herself was referred to as a “fallen monument.” She was a relic of Southern gentility and past values. She had been considered fallen because she had been proven susceptible to death and decay like the rest of the world. As for the importance of family, Emily was really close to her father. He was very protective of her and extremely dominating.
When her father passed away, it was a devastating loss for Miss Emily. The lines from the story 'She told them her father was not dead. She did that for three days,' (Charter 171) conveys the message that she tried to hold on to him, even after his death. Even though, this was a sad moment for Emily, but she was liberated from the control of her father. Instead of going on with her life, her life halted after death of her father. Miss Emily found love in a guy named Homer Barron, who came as a contractor for paving the sidewalks in town. Miss Emily was seen in buggy on Sunday afternoons with Homer Barron. The whole town thought they would get married. One could know this by the sentences in the story ?She will marry him,? ?She will persuade him yet,? (Charter 173).
As time goes on Emily grows up, her mother criticizes and blames herself for the distance between the relationships. It is causing tension in their already rocky relationship. The mother is obviously suffering from guilt on how Emily was raised and the unpleasant memories of the past. Emily was also suffering. We see her shyness towards those who care for her. She was a very depressed teen. She had quietness in her daily duties, and her feelings of not being good enough towards herself. She always felt that she was extremely ugly and not smart compared to her younger sister, Susan. She thought she was perfect. She was the typical “Shirley Temple” image.
She didn’t socialize much except for having her manservant Tobe visit to do some chores and go to the store for her. Faulkner depicts Emily and her family as a high social class. Emily did carry her self with dignity and people gave her that respect, based from fear of what Emily could do to them. Emily was a strong willed person especially when she went into the drug store for the arsenic.
“Alive, Miss Emily had been a tradition, a duty, and a care; a sort of hereditary obligation upon the town” (33); this shows that Emily was much taken care of because who her father was. Her father had loaned money to the town, this was the town’s way of repaying her father. But when the next generation with more modern ideas came, this arrangement caused problems; they tried to stop this deal, but Emily refused to pay taxes for a city that she felt as if they owed her instead. The townspeople felt much pity for her and basically just let her be; waiting for her death that everyone knew was coming shortly.
As time went on pieces from Emily started to drift away and also the home that she confined herself to. The town grew a great deal of sympathy towards Emily, although she never hears it. She was slightly aware of the faint whispers that began when her presence was near. Gossip and whispers may have been the cause of her hideous behavior. The town couldn’t wait to pity Ms. Emily because of the way she looked down on people because she was born with a silver spoon in her mouth and she never thought she would be alone the way her father left her.
The story “A Rose for Emily” could be considered a tale of Southern Gothic, with its grotesque situations. A southern gothic genre transpires as a literature piece that includes rigorously unbalanced, peculiar characters that have a specific place and time in life, customarily in the South. Consequently, in the story “A Rose for Emily”, there is a presence of inadvertent repudiation from the townspeople to guard the main character, Miss Emily Grierson. Whether it is an obligation they feel towards her or the mortification for her presence in their town, the community disregards her mental stability. Emily was raised in what seems to be a harsh environment, by her father. After his death, Emily retracts into her home and her own world. This aloofness from her gregarious world only breeds the mental illness furthermore.
The house which stands as a symbol of a passing era in the south also stands as a representation of Emily’s mind: antiquated, closed off, and coming to its end due to a lack of maintenance. The odors from the house aroused suspicion and concern of the town’s people but no one actually stepped forward or took the initiative to find out what happened or actually questioned Emily. This shows how with the status held by Emily in the town; she seemed to be immune to the law or above the law, as she was perceived more as royalty rather than one of the
Emily’s isolation is evident because after the men that cared about her deserted her, either by death or simply leaving her, she hid from society and didn’t allow anyone to get close to her. Miss Emily is afraid to confront reality. She seems to live in a sort of fantasy world where death has no meaning. Emily refuses to accept or recognize the death of her father, and the fact that the world around her is changing.
After all the tragic events in her life, Emily became extremely introverted. After killing Homer, Emily locked herself in and blocked everyone else out. It was mentioned, “…that was the last time we saw of Homer Barron. And of Miss Emily for some time” (628). In fact, no one in town really got to know Miss Emily personally as she always kept her doors closed, which reflects on how she kept herself closed for all those years. Many of the town’s women came to her funeral with curiosity about how she lived, as no one had ever known her well enough to know. This was revealed at the beginning of the story when the narrator mentioned, “the women mostly out of curiosity to see the inside of her house, which no one save an old manservant… had seen in the last ten years”(623). Everyone in town knew of her but did not know her because she kept to herself for all those years.
No one knows the reason behind her actions and the decisions she makes. She was a mystery until her death, where the readers discover the extremity to which she clings to people that are involved in her lonely life. The narrator of the story retells these events that led up to Emily’s death, drawing from the present to the past, then from the present again and so on. Every scene is detailed so the audience can earnestly picture themselves in the story and feel how the townspeople felt about Emily. We get to see that the town pities Emily a great deal, having lost practically everything, but then disapproves when she refuses to pay for taxes again and sees Homer. The town is imperfect, like any town that exists. Moreover, William Faulkner succeeds in depicting not only the reality of isolation, but the values and behaviors real-life towns