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Luai Alyahya

ENGL201 - Dr. Nadeau

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Term P<iper 2 - March 30, 2010

truth, that Emily murdered "Homer" and kept his body for 40 years in her hOllse, refl ects the

realities of the "Old South". It highlights how the notions of the "Oid South's" greatness gloss

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 over the disturbing realities of the "Old South" which included, among others, slavery, racism

a d classism hough to be fair, the latter seems to be a defining feature of American society in

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The story also discusses how Emily's personal life underscores the conflict she faced yc" d ~t ,
between her past and her POSSib~future. mily's father was a dominating man, and an ..l ~
auth~itarian
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figure in her life. Faulkner himself described him~
s "s r;ISh"{ she denied EmilY1'~ ..L;
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the courtship of other men so that only he has her full attention. en he die~she refused to let ~ wk..., \
go of his body, clinging to her past as much as she can. Also, due to her father's stem rules she

umed out to have very little experience with men, so it was easy for Homer to seduce her~e
\ Q. : t +her father represe~ed the past to her, she seems to have hoped that Homer would open the ga~ ~
of a happier future. hen she realized Homer never intended to marry her she felt that her future VI tkk ~
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was also finished, just like her past (represented in her dad).
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is situation pushed her over the
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, edge, ergo she committed the murder and slept next to the ody until her deat~ hus, while she r

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~~ ~:.murderer, she is also a tragic vi ctim of her unfortunate circumstance: ) I;.,..... . ,I 't

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~~ ,fj l Then there was the town itself. The story is narrated from the perspective of "we" 0 ,.

~ aJ representing at different times the men of the town, the women of the town, or the whole own. ~ (""

\\tA dl c.. tp ~tory not once does the reader learn anything about Emily from her directly, but simpl

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the perspectives of the town ' p pie. Since the town did not communicate wi th Emil

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it simply created assumptions about her, changing them as the situation changed. For instance, .iltV\. ~__~ f "'-J
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, \y one point the town's folks suspected she may be having an affair with Homer, prompting the ,
I; minister's wife to write "to Miss Emily's relations in Alabam~ater, however, their feelings
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~itWeb. William Faulkner, "A Rose for Emily".

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 about the subject changed, and they started to "support" Emily against her cousins. herefore,

when Homer disappeared after the cousins an·ived in their town, the nan·ator notes that the

town's people "believed that he had gone on to prepare for Miss Emily's coming, or to gi,ve her a

chance to get rid of the cousins. (By that time it was ([ cabal. and we \vere allk/iss Emily's allies

to help circumvent the cousins)".

~ These assumptions, however, did not truly describe Emily and her situation, and

( ultimately resulted in the town's people's ignorance of the murder and the fact the body was kept

for 40 years in Emily's hOll . After all, she is of an aristocratic lineage, a "real lady" who could

never forget her "noblesse ohlige". Thus, when Homer disappeared, they simply assumed he left

~ her and did not bother to check her house, even when the stench reached other houses in her
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neighborhood The fact the town's pe~ It! false assumption also plays to the theme of the

"Old South", where some Southem ~rs fonn assumptions that are not true, be it about "Emily" or

the South's past. In as nse, the narrators represent the spirit or perspective of Southerners after

losing the civil war The narrators viewed Emily the same way they viewed their South: through

a lens of fantasy whjch obfuscates realit: ' ]

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