A Rose For Emily Suspense Analysis

Emily’s father, as well as the people of Jefferson, had always pressured Emily to marry. Her father was never able to find a match for her though, and he eventually passed. Emily then met Homer Barron, a contract worker for the town. They begin to see each other more often, and the townspeople are shocked that Emily would lower herself to being with a man of low class. This shows a bit of irony, in that there has always been pressure for Emily to marry, yet when she finally meets a man she loves, people think she is wrong in her decision. Another piece of irony in this relationship, comes after Emily dies. The body of Homer Barron is found in the attic of Emily’s home. Next to the body are signs that Emily had been sleeping next the corpse. It can be assumed that Emily did murder Homer with the arsenic she had purchased earlier in the story. It

When Miss Emily finds somebody, though, it quickly pushes her to desperation. Her relationship with Homer Barron is a result of the life and death of her father. Ironically, he is a northern, roughneck Yankee, the exact opposite of any connection a Grierson would consider. Unsuspectingly, Emily is attracted to him, which is an oddity itself considering her lack of personality and his obvious charisma, for “whenever you [hear] a lot of laughing...Homer Barron [will] be in the center of the group” (560). He is also the first man to show an interest in her without her father alive to scare him off. The town is doubtful that the pair will remain together, but Emily's attachments are extreme, as seen when she would not surrender her father's body. The circumstance exhibits how her feelings are greatly intensified towards Homer. However, he is “not a marrying man” (561). When it appears as though he will leave her, she kills him with poison. While seemingly the opposite effect of love, killing Homer is quite in line with her obsession. If he is dead and she keeps Homer all to herself, Emily will never lose him; he can never leave her. Other such details that express her extreme attachments appear as she buys him clothes and toiletries before they are even considered married. There is also the revelation at the end of the story that she has been keeping his body for over thirty years and sleeping with it, clearly demonstrating her overt desperation

The two cousins are forced to leave by Miss Emily with help from the townsfolk who could not stand the cousins. Homer is seen sneaking back into the house once the cousins are gone, and Miss Emily is not going to let him leave her again. Her insanity has driven her to the point that she poisons him one evening and lies in an embrace with him.

Faulkner used a setting and time to show Emily had a hard time accepting change and moving on with her life. They story took place right after the Civil War. Most African Americans were loathed and discriminated but Emily was relived from her father. Money showed a social statement back then and Emily’s father had money. Since her father loaned the town money she had become a well appreciated woman even after his passing. In stated in the story, “she had chosen not to come out of the house and when the townspeople had saw her they seen a different Emily.” As stated in the book

Homer entered her life by courting her publicly; by not wanting to marry her, he would have robbed her of her dignity and high-standing in the community. The ladies of the town felt that Miss Emily was not setting a good example for the "younger people" and their affair was becoming a "disgrace to the town" (75). The traditions, customs, and prejudices of the South doomed this affair from the beginning. Emily could not let Homer live, but she could not live without him. He was her only love. When she poisoned him with arsenic, she believed he would be hers forever.

Her relationship with her father is a total mystery, however it’s well implied that their relationship was more than the typical normal father and daughter relationship. For this reason the community wasn’t at all shocked that Emily was single and turning thirty. In denial about her father’s death, she refused to le the townspeople remove the body for three days. Once she met Homer Barron, Emily begins an undesirable affair. Many of the town people were happy she was with someone. Though it is soon found that Homer played for the other team, Emily goes to the pharmacist for poison, it is then that the townspeople think that she will kill herself. After buying the arsenic, the next time they see her it’s stated, “she had grown fat and her hair was turning gray” (Faulkner 521). This perhaps the result of Homer Barron’s murder and the loss of her dad. At seventy four years old, Emily died in her home “She died in one of the downstairs rooms, in a heavy walnut bed with a curtain, her gray head propped on a pillow yellow and moldy with age and lack of sunlight” (Faulkner 521). The major plot twist is that the townspeople find Homer Barron in a bedroom upstairs, lying in a lover’s embrace, with the indentation of a head upon the pillow next to him and one “long strand of iron gray hair” (Faulkner 522). Ms. Emily is “jilted” by the death of her father and Homer Barron leaving her. Since her father isolated her so well

Littered throughout the story is evidence that the murder took place. When Emily takes up with Homer Barron, a man whom the narrator makes clear was not the marrying kind; rumors start to fly about the two at a time when it was not considered proper for a man and woman to live together. The town, her relatives, and the Baptist minister disapproved of the relationship, and Emily was in danger of loosing Homer. A year after the relationship begins, and the pressures to either marry

William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily” is a wonderful mystery full of incomplete information. After meeting a man named Homer Barron, Miss Emily falls in love and refuses to let him go. Miss Emily presents Homer with a proposal: to either marry her or not; when it does not go as planned Miss Emily murders Homer. This is made apparent through the purchases Miss Emily makes before Homer goes missing, the arrangement of the room Homer’s body was discovered in, and the pillow beside his body.

There are many instances where Emily resists change, unable to let go of the Southern, antebellum lifestyle she grew up with. This creates a contrast between Emily and the rest of the town, which is progressing and modernizing as time goes by. Emily’s traditional nature puts an emphasis on her representation of the past. She actively resists modernization, choosing to reply to the mayor’s offer to call with a letter “on paper of an archaic shape, [written with] thin, flowing calligraphy in faded ink” (Faulkner 1). Emily’s actions represent the past and an inability to let go of it. She is stuck in the past, unwilling to accept the change that the future brings. Emily and her house are the last glimpses of the past in her town; as the town progresses, her house stood unmoving, “lifting its stubborn and coquettish decay above the cotton wagons” (Faulkner 1). The house continues to display the style of the past, despite the decay and progression of style. Emily and her house represent the past, when her house was new and in style. Emily’s resistance to change and longing for the past is appropriate, considering her age and upbringing. She is an older woman, who grew up during the Civil War era in the South. The reason the South fought in the Civil War was to protect their lifestyle at all costs. The South was unwilling to change, stubbornly clinging to the antebellum way of life. This philosophy shaped the

Then she met Homer Barron the man many people were hoping she would marry but were doubtful because he was a playboy. Miss Emily was seen buying clothing for him but no one was aware that that clothing was for his future funeral. She started going crazy and the townspeople weren’t happy nor worried about her they just pitied her. She bought arsenic for rats signifying that Homer was the said “rat.” Miss Emily lost not only her self awareness but completely lost her respect for herself and anyone trying to get close to her.

Faulkner’s use of southern gothic writing style helps the reader build a mental depiction of Miss Emily. When the town sent their ambassadors to discuss the taxes that were owed, Faulkner described Miss Emily as “bloated, like a body long submerged in motionless water” (2182). This description gives the reader the sense that the character is not well. Faulkner’s description that Miss Emily looked bloated achieves the desired effect on the reader to show how hideous she appears. This graphic description, combined with the author’s depressing description of the parlor (2182), makes the reader think of death. The reader gets the sense of being in a funeral parlor which helps to strengthen Faulkner’s narrative.

The story “A Rose for Emily” by William Faulkner would be drastically different if it was written from the point of view of Miss Emily. Her intentions and thoughts would be more pronounced, and because of this, the ending of the story may not come as such a shock. In addition, Miss Emily would be less distanced from the audience, and they would be able to understand her character in a way that the townspeople could not. Miss Emily being the narrator would immensely change the reader’s perception of the story’s ending and her character.

“She was sick for a long time. When we saw her again, her hair was cut short making her look like a girl” (32). Through this image the narrator portrays Emily regressing back to her youth. It is at this point that Miss Emily is being seen around town with a young contractor named Homer Barron.

When she finally found a male that showed some interest and emotion, she was attached to them. That’s where Homer Barron comes into the story. He would visit Emily and go for Sunday drives with her. When Homer told Emily that he must move on she found herself on the verge of loneliness once again. If Homer would leave it would be two men that have left her. When she realized that he was about to leave she poisoned him and would keep him forever.

Emily is destroyed by her father's over-protectiveness. He prevents her from courting anyone as "none of the young men were quite good enough for Miss Emily and such" (82). When her father dies, Emily refuses to acknowledge his death; "[W]ith nothing left, she . . . [had] to cling to that which had robbed her" (83). When she finally begins a relationship after his death, she unfortunately falls for Homer