William Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily" is a short story that explores the complexities of human nature, including love, loneliness, and the devastating consequences of clinging to the past. Set in the small town of Jefferson, Mississippi, the story follows the life of Emily Grierson, a once-prominent member of the community who becomes a seclusive after the death of her father. “She is little more than an unusual clinical case, a psychopath and necrophiliac who has committed a gruesome crime” (Skinner 49) Through Faulkner's use of literary devices, the reader is taken on a journey through Emily's life, as well as the history of the town. Faulkner uses many literary devices to further prove his thesis including irony, foreshadowing, flashback, symbolism, and …show more content…
The story opens with Emily's funeral and then flashes back to her life. Emily was born into a prominent and wealthy family, and her father kept her isolated from the world. After her father's death, Emily became increasingly reclusive and refused to accept the changing social norms of the town. She fell in love with a man named Homer Barron, but their relationship was doomed to fail due to the town's rigid social hierarchy. Emily ultimately poisons Homer and keeps his corpse in her bedroom, an act that highlights the destructive power of tradition and the devastating effects of isolation. One of the most striking aspects of "A Rose for Emily" is the way that Faulkner uses point of view to create a sense of distance and detachment from the story's central character. The narrator is an anonymous townsman who speaks in the collective voice of the