Burduck's Point Of View

An important aspect in “A Rose for Emily” is the narrator's gender is left a mystery; this allows the reader to openly interpret the story from a different aspect, more specifically, through the mind of a feminist. Emily is subtly portrayed as an admirable woman who defies society's expectations of gender roles. Faulkner's use of the nosy women and the respectful men at the funeral, without further inquiry, may seem like it is in favor of a patriarchal society. However, Faulkner's main goal was to encourage the reader to understand that a woman, Emily, was capable of controlling her own behavior without society's influence.

“A Rose for Emily” by William Faulkner presents yet another example of a woman who possesses feelings of adoration and hatred but is constantly in despair and isolation because of the male influences in her life. Like the woman, Delia, in “Sweat”, she holds these hateful and even fearful feelings held up inside of herself until she acts out and does something drastic, for example, murdering Homer Barron (913). In “A Rose for Emily”, like in “Sweat”, the male figures are characterized as being very authoritative and controlling, in the case of Emily, her father is this male figure. The narrator provides a detailed description of him next to Emily as others pictured them, as a “tableau”. “Miss Emily a slender figure in white in the background, her father a spraddled silhouette in the foreground, his back to her and clutching a horsewhip, the two of them framed by the backflung front door.”(909). The imagery of the father clutching the whip next to the fragile Emily against a such a pure white background brings one to see and acknowledge the dominating and controlling nature of their relationship, better than any passage of conversation ever could

My ultimate take is that Faulkner portrayed her to have a dark soul. Emily lived in disgust for someone who held themselves to such a higher standard than most people. He portrayed this not only by her actions but also on the description of her home inside and out. The people in the town felt sorry for her quite possibly because she was alone, perhaps this is why they put up with her in the manner they

Miss Emily is a mysterious character in “A Rose for Emily” by William Faulkner. She is the protagonist in this work. Emily used to be a vibrant and hopeful young woman, but something has changed with her. She had plenty of potential suitors, but her father rejected them all. After her father’s death, she is devastated and lonely. It is almost as if she is depressed, but then she meets homer Barron, a foreman from the north. They spend a lot of time together and the town certainly notices. The town talks about these two and it spreads around like wildfire. One day, Homer is seen going into Miss Emily’s house and he is never seen again. Loss can affect anyone and it certainly affects Miss Emily. Miss Emily’s psychological resilience to anything remotely traumatic is very low. She has a very high for need to get love from anyone. Miss Emily is a dynamic character; her mind and body both change throughout the story, but they are very slight changes that someone rarely notices at first.

The changes in life are inevitable and it is senseless to attempt to avoid these changes. Avoiding changes can be just as disadvantageous possibly even worse than complying with the changes happening in this world. In “A Rose for Emily” William Faulkner illuminates Emily’s inability and unwillingness to change through character development throughout the story, he does this by developing not only Emily’s character but also the supporting characters in a way that enables Emily to stay the way she is. In this short story it seems that everyone is fascinated by the life of Emily and it appears as though nobody really knows her

A statistic shows that “by summer of 1863, in New Bern, N.C., only 20 of the 250 white people remaining in town were men” (Abbott). In a depletion of man, the appearance of Homer Barron is like a light to Emily’s heart. She does not mind about Homer’s origin, as long as she has a man whom can live with her. However, it is not easy to own a man in this period. Abbott states that “widowed women in their 30s faced stiff competition for available men in their age group and suffered constant reminders of their grim odds” (Abbott). This fact explains Emily’s action of poisoning her lover, Homer. She wants to keep him beside her forever. Killing Homer is the only way, she can get him away from all other women and do not lose him. Due to the effect of war on men, Emily is trying to fight over her destiny to own a man for herself, but she seems to go too far with it.

When her father dies, “she told them that her father was not dead. She told them that for three days…just as soon as they were about to resort to law and force, she broke down, and they buried her father quickly” (Faulkner 36). Her reaction to her father’s death gives insight to why she killed her lover, Homer Baron. She has finally gotten used to having someone to be with and love her. When he is about to leave her, she fears of the change back to being lonely again. Killing Homer, and leaving his body in the bed next to where she sleeps fixes her problem of being alone. “Then we noticed that in the second pillow was indentation of a head. One of us lifted something from it…a long strand of iron-gray hair”(Faulkner 40). That is Emily’s way of grieving and dealing with her fear of being alone once again. Emily does not keep her lover in just any bedroom; she keeps him in her bridal suite. “This room decked and furnished as for a bridal” shows her passion for finding love, and the “thin, acrid pall” shows how she never really finds it (Faulkner 39). She lets her emotions control her actions because she desperately wants love and attention from her

William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily” employs indirect characterisation to create a detailed picture of not only Emily but also of the narrator. While she is described in seemingly direct ways, the comparison between the vision of her in the past and her present appearance reveals further characterization than the descriptors themselves. When she is young and pure to the town, she appears as “a tableau, Miss Emily a slender figure in white in the background” (page 767). She is almost granted an angelic aura by her virginity, and when the town believes she has lost it her image it is turned entirely on its head. They see her as tarnishes and no longer consumable or fit to find a man. She is no longer svelte and desirable, but a “small, fat woman in black” (page 765). The transformation of Emily from slender to fat, and a white dress to a black dress mirrors that of the marriage set’s tarnishing. Emily’s

It is a fact, that the narrator makes judgments both for and against the protagonist and also present outsides observations when he stays “Alive, Miss Emily had been a tradition , a duty , and a care ; a sort of hereditary obligation upon the town “(Faulkner,82) being this to emphasize the responsibility that the people of the town felt whit her and stays also his point pf view in the situation . The narrator is sympathetic to Miss Emily, never condemning her actions. Sometimes unabashedly and sometimes grudgingly, the narrator admires her ability to use her aristocratic bearing in order to vanquish the members of the city and an example is when she go to buy the arsenic and the druggist ask her to tell him for what she is going to use it ,and she just look him eye to eye and the man go and give her the arsenic without ask her anything else . As we could see it is hard to determine the gender of the narrative voice because is talking as the people and never use a word for describe himself . He uses the words “we” and “they” and changes it continuously because he does not want to be involved in all the things the community did and he is blaming the community for Emily’s behavior. Faulkner uses the perfect kind of narrator for develop his genre , a mysterious and creepy narrative voice to develop

“Who is the narrator? Not a single person because Faulkner uses a first- person plural point of view, "we"; that "we" is townspeople, but only such as are in position to watch Miss Emily constantly for fifty or sixty years; they are anonymous townspeople, for neither names nor sexes nor occupations are given” (Sullivan, 160).

Even though, when reading through the story it seems that the whole town is the one narrating the life of the protagonist, since the word we is utilize often. Besides, the narrator is never acknowledged as male or female. In the other hand, Burduck argues that the narrator is female because “despite their bitterness toward Emily, the ladies of Jefferson feel some degree of sympathy for her” (Burduck 4). Another Burduck’s debate, is when Emily went to purchase the rat poison, the narrator “sympathize with Emily somewhat because she believes that Emily did what she could to retain Homer's companionship and insure that he would not give her up for another woman” (Burduck

One way that Faulkner manipulates the point of view within the story is by having the narrator use an omniscient first-person narration that tell us the events from the perspective of the townspeople. The narrator relays information about Emily to the readers in a gossip-like manner, where they only receive small bits and pieces of information. An example of this is when the townspeople are talking about the reason as to why Ms. Emily Grierson went and bought arsenic. The townspeople had thoughts that “'She will kill herself'”, but little did they know of the true intentions she had for the poison (Faulkner 35). There is also the time when Ms. Grierson is seen being intimate with Homer Barron, and the townspeople

In William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily” the story is revolved around the character Emily Grierson. The story is told by the townspeople where Emily lives. These people are attending her funeral and pitching in memories and tales they remember from Emily’s life. It is through the collective voices and opinions of the crowd that the reader is able to interpret Emily’s struggles. With Emily Grierson’s choices the reader can tell that she is a dependant woman, with psychotic tendencies, and does not take the thought of change and rejection lightly.

When Emily finally did find a husband that seemed to match her high standards, she disappeared, “but for almost six months she did not appear on the streets. Then we knew that this was to be expected too; as if that quality of her father which had thwarted her woman's life so many times had been too virulent and too furious to die”(Faulkner 3). The fact that Emily suddenly never escaped from her home after becoming married is very concerning to feminists everywhere and the general public of the story. No one sees her for years, this comes off as very controlling. Emily seems to be a free bird until her first husband, Homer Barron comes along. Feminist critics would claim that Emily was just fine and even happy when she was single, and now that she is married she is forced to live with and abide by a man that does not even make her very happy. As her marriage progresses, people begin to downgrade her by saying, “poor Emily,” and other meaningless phrases. These phrases downgrade Emily’s character and make her seem like a Damsel in Distress, and not a respectable

Faulkner cannot be criticized for the creation of a bad vision of women in the case of Emily Grierson. The character was a victim of circumstances, where the gender issue was only one of several factors. But it played its role in tragic events. From the lens of feminist theory, the major problem of the story was the fact people believed women cannot deal with their problems (even personal) by themselves. As Faulkner focused on Miss Emily, it is hard to claim, if this attitude was limited by female representatives of noble families. But it is possible to suggest women of all social classes were closely watched by moral crusaders. Forcing women to follow customs, like marrying before thirty, they simultaneously disrupted their attempts by additional requirements. It could be the social status, like in the case of Miss Emily, or any other feature. But the result was the same: the community felt sorry for woman, who could not satisfy its requirements, despite the fact the society made it impossible or too difficult by itself. Miss Emily’s actions were extreme, but they reflected a strong pressure a woman could feel in such