Southern Literature was focused on the significance of the role of family loyalty, southern history, and both social and racial class within the southern plantation traditions in the late-nineteenth century. The destruction of plantation tradition is the subject of Faulkner’s southern literature. For the purposes of this paper, I will focus on the characteristics that show the “southern myth” both in attitudes towards history and social class. The characteristics of William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily” and “Barn Burning” are a perfect illustration of “southern Literature” in its glory days. After the Civil War, southern aristocrats, the people that worked for them, and the surrounding communities had a difficult time removing themselves from …show more content…
The story is written in the southern plantation narrative as told in gossip form through flashbacks by an unknown narrator who serves as collective voice for the town. “When Miss Emily Grierson died, our whole town went to her funeral: the men through a sort of respectful affection for a fallen monument, the women mostly out of curiosity to see the inside of her house.” (998). In the period after the Civil War, Emily Grierson embodies the culture of the white, elitist Southerner that can’t seem to accept that the old south is dead, or at the very least on its death bed. For most of her life, Emily was dominated by her father and never questioned it because she had to uphold the noblesse oblige to which she was born into. She epitomized the stubborn refusal to submit to, or even acknowledge, the inevitability of change. The narrative shows how broken the south was and how the “southern ladies” and “southern gentlemen” constantly contended with the loss of their stature. The entire region was licking its wounds and in denial so much that no one knew how to act in the aftermath of the south’s downfall. The town is trying to figure out its legacy from the Griersons, and what the plantation myth means in their future, and what it owes to its past. Miss Emily was a “Lady” …show more content…
Emily is the aristocratic elite, she has a negro servant, lives in a big fancy house and people defer to her whims. Whereas Abner is among the lowest of the low class, on the same level as the freedmen/slaves. The Grierson family exemplify plantation class that drove the southern plantation narrative far after it had died off. Even after the world around them had embraced the views and moral traditions of the new south, Miss Emily and the locals continued to cling to the old class order and keep her above everyone around her. Miss Emily, who is the last in her family, represents the end of the ruling class of the South. “Alive, Emily had been a tradition, a duty, and a care; a sort of hereditary obligation upon the town” (998), which shows that they held to the old traditions. “In 1894 when Colonel Sartoris, the mayor--he who fathered the edict that no Negro woman should appear on the streets without an apron...” (998), Colonel Sartoris wanted to safeguard the proper class etiquette was practiced in public, while further degrading the status of the “negro” community. Tobe is disrespected and dehumanized in many parts of the story, Judge Stevens refers to him as, “…that nigger of hers…” (999). This shows the dehumanization of blacks in the old south era, Tobe’s identity is taken from him by the use of such a derogatory slur. Earlier in the story Faulkner wrote that her father was an elitist, an
The emergence of the Roman Empire in Italy and the Han dynasty in China represented key points in world history. Another empire that existed during this time was the Gupta empire in India, it shared similar characteristics to Han and Imperial Rome. Han and Imperial Rome were two of the largest empires that the world has seen up to that point in time. Although they initially arose from relatively small states, through conquest of additional territories each was able to unify a large amount of territory over which they ruled. Both Han China and Imperial Rome governed their empires using a similar bureaucratic system. Each had an emperor, but these individuals were viewed differently in China than they were in Rome. Although the military played an important role in both empires, the structure of each was quite different and this resulted in the army being a powerful political force in Rome but not in China.
William Faulkner was a 20th Century American poet, screenwriter, and novelist who won a Nobel Peace prize in Literature in 1949 and was an author of two Pulitzer prizes. He was part of a prominent family in Mississippi that lost its prosperity and power during the Civil War. “In his works William Faulkner used the American South as a microcosm for the universal theme of time…whose reappearing characters grow older and cannot cope with the social change” (Larinde 1). “A Rose for Emily” has an accurate portrayal of the historical period it was written describing the social attitudes, moral implications, and racism of the Old South during the post-Civil War time period.
In conclusion, Miss Grierson is able to maintain her ways of the Old South, she refused to abide to the new laws from the new generation. Emily Grierson is a symbol of the Old South. William Faulkner sympathizes Miss Grierson by showing us that she was an elderly woman who refused to change her ways, and in the end she is recognized as a fallen
William Faulkner is known as one America's greatest authors. In fact, his short stories, "Barn Burning," and "A Rose for Emily," are two of the best-known stories in American literature. Both are examples of the reflection of contemporary Southern American values in his work. “Barn Burning” and “A Rose for Emily” are two stories both written by William Faulkner. “Barn Burning” has a theme of family loyalty verses loyalty to the law. “A Rose for Emily” has a theme of power by death. Emily is thought of as a monument, but at the same time she is pitied and often irritating, demanding to live life on her own terms. Awkward and eerie, versus exciting and dramatic, though written by the same author, the two stories have very contrasting themes,
The difference between tradition and change in Faulkner’s short stories “A Rose for Emily,” “Barn Burning,” and “That Evening Sun.” In “A Rose for Emily” Miss Emily wanted to have her ways of being more traditional, although the younger people in the town wanted to change most of the ways Miss Emily has been treated since her father past away. “Barn Burning” ‘can be used to awake students to the race, class, and economic turmoil of the decade,’ for example the white family has a black servant, the servant does what the family wants his to. During the time “That Evening Sun” was written few couples were black and white, which made conflict between them. Although many people don’t realize the changes in our time from when our grandparents were our age, these short stories are a great example of how much traditions have changed
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
William Faulkner begins the story by describing the characters of Miss Emily. He divides the story into five parts which all talk about the life of Miss Emily. At the first part, he describes her as, “A tradition, a duty, and a care; a sort of hereditary obligation upon the town.” (Faulkner 217). He further discusses that Miss Emily not wanting to pay any taxes to the city until the Board of Aldermen had called a special meeting about the issue. But Miss Emily kept saying that she had no taxes to pay what so ever and tells her servant, the Negro, to “show the gentlemen out.” (Faulkner 218). She did not show any respect and manner for the Aldermen. The
Emily was kept confined from all that surrounded her. Her father had given the town folks a large amount of money which caused Emily and her father to feel superior to others. “Grierson’s held themselves a little too high for what they really were” (Faulkner). Emily’s attitude had developed as a stuck-up and stubborn girl and her father was to blame for this attitude. Emily was a normal
Faulkner uses Emily’s character to represent the Old South in health and death. Her stubborn attitude and her decorum both reflect the characteristics of the Old South. When the men go to her home and confront her about her unpaid taxes and she asks them to leave, she represents that women in the Old South were not argued with and not questioned as not to insult them. The way that the people of the town treat her reflects this even further. The people of the town treat Emily as a monument just as they had seen the Old South. “It was another link between the gross, teeming world and the high and mighty Griersons.” They see her as something to observe and only interfere when she does something they do not like, such as dating a Northerner. Even in death The Old South follows her. “And now Miss Emily had gone to join the representatives of those August names where they lay in the cedar-bemused cemetery among the ranked and anonymous graves of Union and Confederate soldiers who fell at the battle of Jefferson.”
Culture is also important to the setting in the story being told. Miss Emily was a Grierson. The high and might Grierson’s as they were known in Jefferson. Faulkner talks about how “Miss Emily had gone to join the representatives of the august names where they lay in a cedar-bemused cemetery among the ranked and anonymous graves of the union and confederate soldiers who fell at the battle of Jefferson.” By describing this culture setting Faulkner is setting the tone for what kind of character Emily is, and what kind of family she had. The Grierson’s were a powerful family in Jefferson, royalty if you will, and Emily was the last of this great family.
Miss Emily is a young girl, who’s devastated after her father’s death, she is an object of pity for the townspeople. Since then, Emily hasn’t paid any of the property taxes because of past favors that her father had done for the town. After her father’s death, Miss Emily continued to portray herself as a very dignified woman. Even when she became ill she was determined to maintain her status in the community and the townspeople realized that she continued to demand their recognition of her as the last Grierson remaining in the town. “She carried her head high enough even when we believed that she was fallen.”
When one thinks about the Old South, often what comes to their mind is images of Confederate Generals and their families standing in front of their beautiful, elegant mansions on the most exclusive street in town. The fathers of these families were usually very wealthy, well known Generals in the Confederate Army, while the children and wives were the most privileged women in town attending the finest china painting classes the South had to offer. This image of an Old Southern family is one that Miss Emily Grierson was once a part of. After Miss Emily’s father passed away when she was thirty years old, she had no one. While the town around her was prospering and transitioning into the “New South”, she stayed locked up inside her once marvelous mansion. The members of the new Southern society do not know what to think about Miss Emily, considering she holds such different values. They all look at her as a piece of history, being she comes from an older age and came from a very prominent family. As the story goes on, the people in her town are
As an image of decrepit grandeur, Miss Emily’s house is used to symbolize Miss Emily’s character herself, the historical setting in which the story takes place, and some of the story’s central themes. Described as “a big, squarish frame house that had once been white, decorates with cupolas and spires and scrolled balconies” (Faulkner 1), the house is ornate and grand in design, even being located on what was once an exclusive street in Jefferson. However, over time, it had become dilapidated and unkempt, with the interior being dark and full of dust, possessing “a close, dank smell” (Faulkner 1). Similarly, Miss Emily was once a young lady of high standing, opulent in her own ways, but slowly aged and lost her grandeur, becoming “a small, fat woman” (Faulkner 1) whose hair was turning grayer as the days went by. Much like her home, Miss Emily was losing her charm over time, showing that her character was stubbornly grasping on to the idea that she still retained an image of splendor she no longer possessed, all while isolating herself from the rest of the town.
The manner that Faulkner applies point of view in "A Rose for Emily" provides the readers with the idea of the dying values, traditions, and customs of the “Old South”.
Miss Emily lived her life almost throughout on display before the town of Jefferson and ultimately this resulted in her lack of socialization and human interaction. The fault in this matter lies with her father, the respected mayor of Jefferson, who protected her and kept her under thumb, driving away every suitor that came to call. People came to picture poor Miss Emily as “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 back-flung front door” (Faulkner 35). In this visualization, her father clearly stood between her and the real world as a threatening and domineering figure. One might believe that such a prominent figure would interact with the public on a daily basis in a positive manner, but it appears that the Grierson status only encouraged the prying eyes of the townspeople to impede on Miss Emily’s