A rose for Emily
This story happens after the American Civil War, in Jefferson Town. It’s a story about an eccentric spinster named Emily Grierson whose marriage is totally manipulated by her father. Two years after her father’s death, poor Emily is acquainted with a northerner called Homer Barron, a day laborer and she falls in love with him. However, their relation is short-lived as Homer becomes tired of her and intends to get rid of her. In order to keep Homer at hand, Emily kills him with arsenic and “obtain” him, thus, she sleeps with his corpse for decades. This is the truth that villagers find after her death. From my own perspective, this masterpiece reflects the decline of the southern society and reveals the conflicts between the two different value systems and two societies after the American Civil War. Then, I will explain my opinions from the following three aspects: character, symbol and setting.
Emily is an embodiment of the south, the old and tradition. At the very beginning of this story, the writer recounts the decoration of her house which is still 1870s style, isn’t change any more. Besides, she is also obstinate. When the new government compel the taxes on her，she refuses to pay the tax and even ridiculously mentions a colonel who has been dead almost ten years. Another example is that she prevents people from installing mail-box on the wall. She keeps the traditional views all the long，but resists to change anything. However, poor Emily is a determined woman. Regardless of people’s criticis
m, she insists on marrying a northerner whose social position is apparently lower than her. It is known that in that period of time, hierarchy is prevailing and deep-rooted through out the society. It particularly has a profound influence on marriage. When someone chooses a partner, he or she must consider the social position of the other party to the marriage. However, Emily chooses to disobey the convention and challenges tradition. Given this situation, her failure is quite expectable. However, she cannot get rid of the shackles of the Southern conventions. After all, she captures her lover in her own way and the love is treated with honor.
Her father, the old Grierson, is also an incarnation of the South, patriarchy and tradition. He was very fastidious about her daughter’s marriage and drove away every man
who caught the fancy of her. “When she got to thirty and was still single”. Obviously, both her body and mind are enslaved by her father’s traditional concept. Therefore, she feels released when her father is dead, and there is no “trace of grief on her face”.
In this novel, Emily symbolizes the South, old and tradition, the Yankee represents the North, new and modern. Both young guys might be interested in each other when they first meet. But they possess altogether different values or concept of lives. So they inevitably separated before long. The conflict be
the rose mp3
tween the two partners symbolizes the conflict between the South and the North. And the absurd murder aggravates the contradictions.
The “Rose”, that is never mentioned in this novel, is always interpreted conventionally as a symbol of love. It might be used as the love Emily gets from her lover. But in my opinion the rose mainly represents decay and death. At the time the villagers went to her room and found the valance curtains of faded rose color and the rose-shaded lights in the room. Actually, the author plays a trick on Miss Emily. In fact, she doesn’t really get any love from any man whether it is from her lover or her father. Emily could have a favorable marriage but for her father’s interference. She could have got her deserved love from Homer. But on account of her obstinacy and pride, she receives tiredness and indifference, instead of affection---rose, from him. Thus, as an outsider, the author or the villagers, they give a rose as a tribute to Emily. Besides, the rose also stands for the author’s and villagers’ pity, sympathy and lament for Emily, whose mind is imprisoned in the past and fails to adapt to the change. What’s more, the author, “William Faulkner objectifies his complicated and emotional involvement in the South and in the people who grow up and live there ever since”. (英美文学选读应试指南，P237)
The story teller begins his story when it is post-civil war. In Jefferson Town, in the South, which is defeated by the North, everything including concept and some sense of value is gradually replaced by
the new concepts from the North. In this background, due to the restriction of the traditional ideas, some people are imprisoned in the past and ignore the passage of time. And Miss Emily is one of them. The whole story is set in Emily’s house. But the story has a time span of over two scores. Her house is depicted as
old but grand. Seen from the outside, the house is really outdated and is not in accord with other residential buildings—it’s really an eyesore. The house perfectly mirrors Emily’s isolation from the outside world. From the inner decoration of her house, everything is covered with dust and the air is humid. Besides，there is a crayon portrait of Miss Emily’s father. The description of the house paves a way for the development of scenario. As a reader, I might feel ghastly. Therefore, it’s conceivable that the spine-chilling story happens there. At the end of the story, out of curiosity, people go into her chamber，seeing faded rose color curtains, the rose-shaded lights and delicate array of crystal and the man's toilet things backed with tarnished silver. The whole room speaks the life Emily goes through and indicates the decay of the Southern aristocrat.
When I finished reading the story, a sincere sympathy emerges in my mind. Emily is totally a tragedy of the old traditions. She is a prisoner of the past, of the social and moral taboos of the South. Not only because she is purely a woman, but also the stubborn conventions manacle her that result in her frustr
ated life. Even so，she could have a better life after her father’s death. However, she doesn’t get out of the tower her father built for her. On the contrary, she builds another one, and locks her soul. In our daily life, everything is changing everyday. As an individual, we can only adapt ourselves to the protean environment and should learn to accept new things. Only when we keep learning everyday can we survive in this world which is full of competition.
Reference
戴桂玉Examinee’s Guide to Selected Readings in English and American Literatures（2005）P237