English Literature

William Faulkners A Rose for Emily, despite its rather short length, is a complicated short story in many ways.  This is because this short story is filled with a number of symbols and other literary elements that make rereading the story over and over again a necessity if it is to be truly understood and appreciated.  In order to illustrate some of this complexity, this paper will examine some of the literary elements that Faulkner used in this short story.  More specifically, this paper will discuss the setting, the point of view and tone, the characterization, and the symbolism.

    This story was set at the end of the American Civil War in the late nineteenth century.  Emily, the main character, lived in Jefferson this was a small town in the South.  The physical setting was therefore in a part of America that had just suffered a devastating defeat in the Civil War.  In terms of time, although Emily is dead when the story is written, it eventually follows her fathers death until her death.  The story concludes in Emilys bedroom.  This particular place is perhaps the most important setting in the entire story.  The bedroom in many ways represents isolation in much the same way the American South and its previous way of life has become isolated.  The setting therefore contributes to the theme of social and cultural isolation in terms of setting the story in the South and settings such as Emilys bedroom.

    This pervasive sense of isolation is also reinforced in terms of the authors choices regarding point of view and tone.  The point of view is in the third person.  The third person does not know what Emily is thinking precisely or the exact nature of her emotions and feelings.  The point of view is only descriptive.  Again, this helps to create Emily as a more distant figure and supports the isolation theme.  The narrator, by describing Emilys behavior and conversations, can help the reader to attempt to understand her deeper thoughts and feelings, but there is a distance that remains in place.  The tone, always steady and serene, lends an objective view when reading about Emily.  This leaves it up to the reader to judge motives and feelings.  The narrators tone is familiar, as if he lives in the same town as Emily, and this distance type of objectivity makes it seem as if Emilys neighbors do not understand her any better than the reader.  This, once more, deepens the notion that she is isolated and lonely.  Emily might, for example, decide to commit suicide and it seems probable that her own neighbors would not learn of her death for a long time.

    In terms of characterization, Emily is portrayed as a tragic figure.  She was a noblewoman before the war and the consequences of the war have affected her profoundly.  Her father is dead and demands for the payment of taxes are being made.  She resists all of the demands being made.  She refuses, for instance, to pay the taxes.  She also refuses to build a post box I front of her house.  She seems to ignore the fact that the world around her has changed, is changing, and she withdraws more deeply into herself and her memories of the past.  She even withdraws from her neighbors who have suffered similar losses and similar new obligations.  Significantly, Faulkner at one time uses the expression Invisible Watch.  Emily carries a watch in her clothes, but she does not want to see the watch or check the time.  This suggests that the passing of time is painful for Emily and that perhaps she is afraid of the passing of time.  Her loneliness increases as the seconds tick away.

    If Emily could have frozen time, or turned it back, it is highly probable that this is what she would have done.  Her bedroom symbolizes this longing for a past time that cannot be recovered.  Her bedroom, for example, is described in the story as being similar to a newly married couples bedroom.  The bedroom, in addition to representing isolation, also symbolizes sadness for the loss of past desires.  In Emilys case, she desired the love of Homer Barron.  The bedroom never functioned as a marital bedroom, at least not in life, because Emily decided to poison and kill Homer.  Maybe she was afraid of losing him in the same way that she had lost her past.  Ironically, the killing may have been a perverse form of Emilys love for Homer.  Her neighbors and even her minister criticized her love for Homer and she found a way to remain with him forever.  Even in Emilys love, in her bedroom, she was able to retain nothing more than a decaying corpse and memories.  This is a frightening feature of her isolation and her inability to change with the times.

The rose is perhaps the most powerful, and confusing, symbol in the entire story.  The rose might be interpreted in different ways.  First, it might symbolize the narrators and the communitys apology for judging her so harshly and trying to dictate how she lived her life.  She had grown old and ugly and maybe the rose was meant to symbolize the beautiful woman that they remembered from the past.  Second, maybe the rose was symbolic of Emilys tendency to hurt herself in order to protect herself for example, thorns draw blood, and maybe the rose was intended to highlight hurting oneself unnecessarily.  Emily was symbolic of the thorn more than the beautiful flower of the rose.  Finally, perhaps the rose symbolized how her life progressed from youthful beauty to a wilted elderly stage and finally to death.  All of these interpretations seem plausible to a certain extant and it is this complexity that makes A Rose for Emily such an interesting story.