“A Rose for Emily” is a short story by William Faulkner that features a lady by the name of Emily Grierson and the strange things surrounding her life. In the five sections that the story is divided into, the narrator begins by flashbacking the death of Emily Grierson and how the whole town attended her burial. The people attended not because she was a great person in town but wanted to see her house and what was kept inside all the years. Then the narrator describes the earlier thirty years that Emily lived and notes how she resisted an inquiry after a powerful odor emanated from her house. It turned out that the odor came from the decomposing body of her father, whose body Emily had kept as a refusal to accept that he died. Also, Emily’s extended illness has been featured in the story and was linked to the death of her husband. This illness was probably linked to her mental trauma after her father’s death. As the story continues, it is notable that the townspeople are concerned with the poison Emily has bought. The after the death of Emily is also described. All these critical parts in this story have been essential to contribute to significant themes like time, murder, and patriarchy. These themes form a foundation that is important to understand the story.
As the story starts, time is one central theme that plays out. This is because the story begins with a narration of Emily’s funeral. This poses a serious thought about the time of events and the chronological way they are narrated. According to Harris Paul, the time comes into focus by describing the elderly men at Emily’s burial is described as having a sense of time that is “confused time with its arithmetical progression”; as a result, they see “all the historical events not as a dwindling road but, rather, as a massive meadow that no winter ever quite touches, divided from them now by the narrow bottleneck of the latest decade of years” (Harris, 173). This can be described as “the basic conundrum” of the narrative. It is also the overarching impression of the period that discourse’s reshaping of the narrative gives rise to. Also, Emily’s funeral serves as both the beginning and finish of the tale, as a framework to keep “time” in line while the intermediate sections of the story explain what happened before the burial. This contains a “time” made up of occurrences that are not shown sequentially; instead, they seem like a succession of pictures that have been juxtaposed (Harris, 173). The discussion, in contrast, specifically points out just how much longer Emily went without leaving the house or how long the upstairs room was left unattended, giving the impression that all these old pictures are being viewed through an inverted telescope or bottleneck. Therefore, reading the narrative is akin to shaking up the rotten contents of something left alone for a long time. The story’s audience is drawn into scenes infused with decay and death if the older men at the funeral gaze through a bottleneck at a golden field from the past.
In “A Rose for Emily,” death is among the dominant theme in the story. First, the story begins with the narration of how Emily died. The narrator describes how Emily lived and their untimely death in this scene. Also, the narrator describes the death of Grierson, Emily’s father (Faulkner). This was among the most shocking death because Emily had resisted accepting it for a long time, and she kept the body in the house for a long time until it started to decompose. The odor from the house attracted people whom Emily never wanted to enter to check what was happening.
Additionally, death is narrated through the murder of Homer Barron. Barron was Emily’s lover but was killed by Emily because she wanted to be alone. This was among the deaths that shocked the audience because it was unexpected (Dilworth 252). So, when looking at all these murder scenes, it is clear that Faulkner used death in this story to reveal that people can reject it, but it is not stoppable. Also, a murder like that of Homer can be described as a romantic murder because Emily wanted to have Homer in her mind forever, something that stuns the audience.
Additionally, in “A Rose for Emily” by William Faulkner, patriarchy is among the themes. The members of Jefferson’s Board of Alderman are all men and govern without the input of women. This demonstrates that this society was made of people who believed in men’s power and disregarded women’s leadership. This is supported by the fact that women were required by the law to wear their aprons while in public. In the story, Emily does not agree with the town’s patriarchal nature (Chenghsun Hsu & Ya-huei 85). This is demonstrated when she rejected her house’s mailbox installation and postal numbers. Also, when in a relationship with Homer, Emily does not appear as a woman who is submissive to him (Dilworth 253). This demonstrates that despite the existence of patriarchy, Emily lived to oppose it. Looking at all these, it is clear that society was grounded on the patriarchal rule. However, still, people like Emily, who lived their own life, disregarded the male-dominated society by deciding to make their own choices.
In conclusion, “A Rose for Emily” by William Faulkner focuses on the themes like time, death, and patriarchy to make the audience understand the significant aims of the story. Time was used in this story to explain various events and how people try to make up their own to fit their situations. Some characters, like Emily, tried to force time to fit them, but nature won because it was unstable. The theme of death dominates the story because it starts with the narration of a funeral service. The stunning part of the theme of death is when Emily kills Homer to have him in mind forever. This is shocking, and revelations open a conversation to many murders people commit. Also, patriarchy in the story was demonstrated by the fact that this society was grounded on men’s power. However, characters like Emily tried to resist it.
Works Cited
Chenghsun Hsu, and Ya-huei Wang. “The Fall of Emily Grierson: A Jungian Analysis of A Rose for Emily.” K@ta: A Biannual Publication on the Study of Language and Literature, vol. 16, no. 2, Jan. 2014, pp. 87–92. EBSCOhost, https://search-ebscohost-com.proxygsu-ecor.galileo.usg.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=edsdoj&AN=edsdoj.635b5f02332349b7a36c8999529c3f7a&site=eds-live&scope=site.
Dilworth, Thomas. “A Romance to Kill for: Homicidal Complicity in Faulkner’s ‘A Rose for Emily.’” Studies in Short Fiction, vol. 36, no. 3, Summer 1999, p. 251. EBSCOhost, https://search-ebscohost-com.proxygsu-ecor.galileo.usg.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=9220601&site=eds-live&scope=sit
Faulkner, William. A Rose for Emily and Other Stories.
Harris, Paul A. “In Search of Dead Time: Faulkner’s ‘A Rose for Emily.’” KronoScope, vol. 7, no. 2, Dec. 2007, pp. 169–83. EBSCOhost, https://doi-org.proxygsu-ecor.galileo.usg.edu/10.1163/156852407X249025.
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