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William Faulkner's A Rose For Emily

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William Faulkner’s short story ‘A Rose for Emily’ was one of his first and one of his most read. This story offers so many possibilities for interpretations mostly because of its unconventional style. The author describes what the world of Emily Grierson is like, a horrible world full of psychological issues. In this ‘A Rose for Emily’ analysis, I am going to discuss the main themes of the story. There are several themes and the major ones include death, isolation, and tradition vs change.
The story starts with a quick description of the funeral for Emily Grierson that the whole town went to. The narrator then tells Emily’s extremely strange behavior in a series of flashbacks throughout decades. The narration travels back and forth in …show more content…

It is even mentioned in the first sentence. William Faulkner uses the theme of death to explain the strange life of Emily Grierson. This theme is so important to the story that Faulkner begins and ends this fiction story with her death. Emily even tries to take power over death by denying the of death of her father. With her being unable to admit that he has past, she clings to the controlling parental figure who did everything in his power to keep her isolated and control her. This became the only, yet extreme, type of love she ever knew. She only then gives up his body after days of it chilling in the house. Later in the story when Emily meets Homer, he also dies. Except this time Emily was responsible for the death of Homer. With poisoning him with arsenic she was able to make sure he never left her. Emily’s house can also be identified as a symbol for death when told by Faulkner that “only Miss Emily's house was left, lifting its stubborn and coquettish decay above the cotton wagons and the gasoline pumps – an eyesore among eyesores” because of how run down, old, and covered in dust it is. The house is decaying along with …show more content…

Despite some wide-ranging changes in her hometown, Emily Grierson represents the old traditions of Jefferson. As a living monument of the past she’s to be treated with respect and honor, but at the same time she is also a burden and still lives in a time period where she is completely cut off from the outside world. While the new generation of Jefferson is busy industrializing the city and constructing cotton gins, Emily’s house is the only old building still standing. After the colonel protected and made sure she didn’t have to pay taxes by making up a deal he had with her father, later the new government leaders did not follow that path and wanted her to pay. She refused to pay multiple times and sent them on their way telling them to talk to Colonel Sartoris even though he died ten years earlier. That is another way it is shown that she is stuck in the

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He is by no means an admirer of Emily but has a split relationship with her. At first, he describes the ornate, old wooden house of the Griersons, which testifies as the last monument of the past splendor of the southern states. At the same time Faulkner characterizes the house resident Emily: a remnant of the old upper class, for whose obstinacy the narrator sometimes has sympathy. It is a relic in the midst of industrialized modernity with its cars and cotton factories. She is a victim of her stern father, who in a way is responsible for her turning in to the old maid she becomes known

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It is clear that in her era, Miss Emily was seen as traditional American Southern women, who lived to become an inferior women to man but was later a burden to her society. She was a lady who was secluded from society, lived a psychopathic life, which at the end, and was no secret for the town’s people. While Miss Emily was alive, she lived in a secluded home of a single father, thus leading her to be dependent upon him. She did not have much of a socially engaged life, for her father drove men away. When he finally died, Miss Emily told the townspeople that he was not dead, and finally, on the third day, let the town’s people buried him (William Faulkner 1105).

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Significantly, in Part 4, Faulkner uses Homer Barron 's corpse rotting in a room filled with "invisible dry dust" as a symbol; Emily thought of Homer like a rose, one she expected to endure long after being picked, even after his body was corrupted by the decay of time. Hence, ‘A Rose for Emily’. Notably, Faulkner uses profound imagery to summon a decrepit atmosphere, as the theme is reiterated: accept it or not, change and decay are inevitable. This change Emily always refuses, as we have seen through her father’s death, in leaving the home untouched, and certainly through her murder of Homer to allow their relationship to continue. In this case, Emily attempts to freeze time

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In Section II, we learn of Emily’s inability to accept death as a natural part of the life cycle, which is a major factor that leads to her perceived illness. The day after the death of Emily’s father, people of the town greet her at her door to offer her their condolences. Faulkner states, “She told them that her father was not dead. She did that for three days, with the ministers calling on her, and the doctors, trying to persuade her to let them dispose of the body” (Faulkner 796). Emily’s refusal to believe in death despite the entirety of the town recognizing the truth is another red flag pointing towards a mental separation from reality.

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Also, Faulkner uses the house to represent Emily metaphorically as decomposing and change-resistant. Faulkner also uses a rose to symbolize irony. Whereas roses represent love, Miss Emily never actually comprehend the actual meaning of love. Furthermore, he uses the strand of hair to symbolize the sometimes-perverse acts that individuals undertake in their quest for contentment. The discovery of the strand of hair is also predicted when the narrator explains the bodily decline of Miss Emily.

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