A Rose for Emily
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The short story “A Rose for Emily” written by William Faulkner is a tale about an old woman named Emily living in the town of Jefferson. The story opens with the town finding out about Emily's death. The story is told by an unknown narrator who lives in the town of Jefferson. We learn of the life and times of Emily, and her unfortunate relationship with her father, the town’s people, and her lover. At the end of the story we find out t the disturbing truth that Emily was hiding.
The street that Emily lived became to be the worst street, for it had decayed and gotten old the same as Emily. The old ways of the town changed and was now decayed and past on just as Emily and her father. The house she lived was once beautiful now it was an eye sore for the town. As Emily aged so did the house. Once when the house and yard began to smell, know one would tell Emily, they tried to cure that smell themselves by putting lime down. The house seemed to be symbolic in the story, It became old so did Emily, it lost its glamour so did Emily. They were connected.
Emily showed that she was strong. Throughout most of this story Emily gives us the sense of strength. She shows strength when she rebukes the men who come to collect her taxes, even though her source of proof has been dead for ten years. Emily character has a great deal of r respect, and sometimes even reliance, on the past and her ancestry. Emily comes from an "old style" southern family. While most of the town changes she does not. She relies on the past to dictate how she should act. In the situation where she is involved with Homer Barron, the man working for the city, she seemingly tries to persuade him to stay with her by buying him nice things.
Emily was very beautiful when she was younger, but her father never let her court, she became fat and old and gray. It seemed when Emily aged and decayed her mind went with her. She had one love, Homer Barron, which the town had believed had left her. It is revealed at the end of the story that he in fact did not leave Miss Emily. Emily had poisoned Homer and left his body in her bed. Emily's mind had decayed to such a point that she was not aware of what was right or wrong. She could not even understand what was normal. The ending of the story emphasizes the length of time Miss Emily must have slept with her dead lover; long enough for the townspeople to find "a long strand of iron-gray hair" lying on the pillow next to "what was left of him, rotted beneath what was left of the nightshirt. Over the course of Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily", Emily’s strange and outrageous behavior becomes crazy, and the townspeople in the story, is left wondering how to explain the fact that Miss Emily has spent years living and sleeping with the corpse of Homer