A Rose for Emily

Introduction

“A Rose for Emily” frequently anthologized and analyzed, is probably Faulkner's best-known story. Because of its elements of mystery, suspense, and the macabre, it has enjoyed a popular appeal. That Emily Grierson, an aging southern belle, murders the lover who spurned her and sleeps beside his decaying body for a number of years is only the most sensational aspect of the story.

Discussion

In “A Rose for Emily,” William Faulkner imitates associative Southern storytelling style as an unnamed first-person narrator speaks for the entire town of Jefferson, relating what all the townspeople know or believe. Unlike typical Faulkner stories that employ multiple individual narrators, “A Rose for Emily” achieves the effect of multiple narrators by combining them into a single narrative voice, an unnamed narrator (Lehr, pp. 77). First-person plural pronouns emphasize that this narrator represents the consciousness of the town. This style is similar to that used in Greek tragedy, wherein chorus and chorus leader provide the reader/audience with information, interpret the characters' actions, and express public opinion; thus, the narrator in “A Rose for Emily,” whose age and gender are never identified, can be designated a choric character (Faulkner, 12).

The narrative sequence in this story is not chronological; the reader learns Miss Emily's history in much the same way a newcomer to Jefferson might hear about her history. As the story opens, Miss Emily apparently has just died, and the townspeople are discussing her strange and sad life. Faulkner relates various incidents in her life, but these incidents are related thematically, not chronologically. Faulkner builds suspense by imitating the southern storyteller's style of describing people and events through situation-triggered memories (Kennedy, pp. 602); hence, the plot is associative rather than chronological (Faulkner, 12).

The story's primary theme, the destructive effects of time, most notably change and decay, is familiar to readers of Faulkner. Change is Miss Emily's enemy, so she refuses to acknowledge it, whether that change is the death of her father, the arrival of tax bills, the decay of her house, or even the beginning of residential mail delivery. Furthermore, her attitude toward the death of her father foreshadows her attitude toward the death of Homer Barron. Because Miss Emily is associated with the passage of time, one might consider her to be living outside the normal limitations of time or, perhaps, simply not existing. Thus, she appears to combine life and death in her ...