A Rose For Emily By William Faulkner

People are inquisitive. We want to know the answer when we hear or read a question. If we do not have an answer, we always find it. In William Faulkner’s short story, “A rose for
Emily”. Emily is a courageous character who creates her catastrophic reality by fighting the imposition of idealism and the truth of people around her. Faulkner demonstrated this in a series of events when Emily faced conflicts with her father, the townspeople, and the young generation.
Emily’s father is an antagonist in Emily’s life. Her father being over-assertive in her life, took most of the life decisions which affected Emily’s future. Moreover, Townspeople visualized them as “a tableau, Miss Emily a slender figure in white in the background, her father a

Emily’s purity and cleanliness is consistently controlled and overwhelmed by her father, He is spread across her life, making decisions in her life such as him rejecting all the young men who were chosen to be her bride, this imposition of ideals created beliefs of isolation and mental stress in Emily’s mind making her indulge in activities which were considered abnormal. For instance, Emily tries to retaliate against her father’s antagonistic ideals by falling in love with someone who was the opposite of what his father would have chosen. Accordingly, this was Emily’s first attempt to create her own physical reality.
Townspeople are the worst audience of all. Townspeople have an image of Emily, who always does the opposite of what seems ideal to them. This opposition to Emily made them criticize her by talking badly about her. “Some of the ladies began to say that it was a disgrace to the town and a bad example to the young people.” (5). Town people are judgmental and unorthodox, always complaining about Emily’s irrational behavior as they are blinded by

The young generation did not accept Emily. The young generation was ignorant towards
Emily. “The painting pupils grew up and fell away and did not send their children to her […] the front door closed upon the last one and remained closed for good” (6). The young generation became the backbone of town and they rebel against Emily’s ideals by rejecting and not sending their children for “China painting lessons”. The young generation viewed Emily as a killer and someone who is mentally upset, they imposed this idea of truthfulness onto her by isolating her completely this ignorance and isolation is the breaking point in Emily’s life because teaching children was the only way for Emily to keep herself intact with her sanity and this right was seized by the young generation. Furthermore where the old generation tried to mold Emily’s sense of truthfulness by creating a disagreeable environment the new generation imposed their ideals by not accepting her as a part of their sense of faithfulness. At last Emily not giving up fights by closing her doors for the young generation and the door remains close until she