A Rose for Emily Study Guide
“A Rose for Emily” is one of the most quotable and well-known works of William Faulkner. It is centered on author’s favorite topic – change, strangeness, openness, and flexibility. Even though some might find other meanings in it and they will be right.
Located in a fictional city, the story can be summarized as a gothic plot about courage and patience. The events happen in a used-to-be grand neighborhood that takes pride in its past. All the descriptions are soaked with melancholy and symbolism. The readers meet the heroine of the book, Emily Gierson, in two conditions, both of which are mingled in sentences placed next to each other.
We find out that she has been excused from paying taxes for decades now. The mayor who made that order is long dead now but new officials struggle to turn it around. There is something that we don’t know about this whole story and it’s serious.
It is a dark and somber plot mostly about Emily, an old lady living alone and dwelling in her past, and those who know her somehow. She is proud, reserved and stubborn. It’s hard to really get to know her. When the reader discovers her dark secret at the very last, he can’t help but wonder what kind of symbol this lady impersonates.
The author confronts his readers with an irrecoverable tragedy of one person, one woman. We can’t change the consequences of her tragedy, but can learn from it and acknowledge its existence. Just like a man acknowledges the existence of a woman with a flower, a rose.
Don’t try to look for explanations of the book title in the text. The author himself says that the title is an allegory. “A Rose for Emily” is worth Reading just for the fantasy facts mixed with a bit reserved British humor. You will love its intricate plot, carefully crafted words, and detailed characters. There are more than a hundred ways to interpret it - read the book to find yours.
Author: Leona Watson
New Essays
“Barn Burning” and “A Rose for Emily” each tell a story from both side of the class divide. In William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily,” the grandeur of the Old South begins to fade away and the seamy underside of the upper crust begins to literally seep through the floorboards with an intolerable...
Nobel Laureate William Faulkner’s short story centers on a unique character – Emily Grierson mirrored in the fish -eye vision of the townsfolk of Jefferson. Miss Emily was a celebrity in her own right, with her sense of haughty lineage and her mysterious closeted life. “Alive, Miss Emily had been...
It is understandable that the older Falkner was influenced by the history of his family and the region in which they lived . Mississippi marked his sense of humor, his sense of the tragic position of blacks and whites , his keen characterization of usual Southern characters and his timeless themes ...
There are popular sayings that goes “love moves in mysterious ways” and “love makes people crazy.” The amalgam of those sayings would somehow serve as a rough description of William Faulkner’s story “A Rose for Emily.” Since its publication, the story...