Another way we see Emily using the town for her own personal gain is when a few of the men go to fix the smell that begins to exude from her house. Miss Emily is so isolated from the town that no one wants to confront her about the smell. After a couple of complaints, one particularly adamant man approaches the judge in complete distress and says, “I’d be the last one in the world to bother Miss Emily, but we’ve got to do something” (Faulkner, 518). This man represents the town in a special way because he shows their fear of her. They are either terribly frightened of her or incredibly intimidated by her or they maybe even think she is too fragile to take what they have to say, but either way they are too scared to confront her directly. Instead, they have to sneak in the middle of the night in order to avoid her. …show more content…
She manages to call them out on their ludicrous actions without ever speaking to them at all. The story says, “As they recrossed the lawn, a window that had been dark was lighted and Miss Emily sat in it, the light behind her, and her upright torso motionless as that of an idol” (Faulkner, 518). Emily not only knows that people are sneaking around her house in the middle of the night, but she also shows them that she knows by turning the light on and making herself visible in the window. This image of her adds to the overall idea of Emily in the town; she is isolated from the rest of them while still always being there and it allows her to get away with things she normally would not be able to. In this moment, she is able to maintain a status of being something other than the rest of them while also getting them to fix a problem for her. The men of Jefferson are literally helping Emily cover up a murder while she sits in her house
In the end, with her death, which is where the story begins, Miss Emily is the talk of the town. Not because people truly mourn her, but because people are curious about the life she had lived in secret, in her big house, for all those years. People pitied her, it was as had been left alone in the world and seemed to have wished it that way.
According to Faulkner, “After her father’s death she went out very little; after her sweetheart went away, people hardly saw her at all” (805). Occurrences such as these are private instances that took place within Miss Emily’s life. They are very important instances that undoubtedly caused Miss Emily to shift to an isolated lifestyle. On the other hand, actions displayed by the townspeople provide a viewpoint of Miss Emily’s relationship with the public. “Arguably, the townspeople’s actions serve to protect Miss Emily’s privacy- by preserving her perceived gentility-as much as they effectively destroy it with their intrusive zeal” (Crystal 792). The actions of the townspeople fuel Miss Emily’s desire to remain isolated from everyone else in her
The information that we do have about Miss Emily's genuinely mysterious life was obtained through her prying neighbors. They did everything possible, without disrespect, to find out more about her. They knew where she had been, with whom, and when. The secrecy of Miss Emily's life fascinated everyone that knew her. The more that time went on and the more that neighbors pried, the less Miss Emily appeared until soon she was hardly seen at all and let no one into her home. Even at Miss Emily's funeral the whole town came to satisfy some of their curiosity. Miss Emily seemed to enjoy being secretive and did her best to be so.
Emily's stubbornness that prevented the city authorities from searching the house foreshadows the that Emily is hiding something . After all if she had nothing to hide, she would have allowed the search around her house, yet, she refused to allow her house to be searched or herself to be interviewed to completion. Emily interjects and cuts off her search: “I have no taxes in Jefferson. Iobe!” the negro appeared, “Show these gentlemen out” Emily limits the info that she gives to the searchers of her house.
Emily's father suppressed all of her inner desires. He kept her down to the point that she was not allowed to grow and change with the things around her. When “garages and cotton gins had encroached and obliterated…only Miss Emily's house was left, lifting its stubborn and coquettish decay above the cotton wagons and the gasoline pumps” (Rose 217). Even when he died, she was still unable to get accustom to the changes around her. The traditions that her and her father continued to participate in even when others stopped, were also a way that her father kept her under his thumb. The people of the town helped in
2) What does the title of the story suggest about the townspeople’s feelings toward Miss Emily? Why do they feel this way about her? (Or: What does she represent to them?) Is there anything ironic about their feelings?
This lead Miss Emily to being separated from the rest of the town. One of the situations that lead to her isolation was that her father didn’t allow her to have a lover, “We remembered all the young men her father had driven away, and we knew that with nothing left, she would have to cling to that which had robbed her, as people will.” (William, Faulkner A Rose for Emily.) If the town knows this information, then the men in the area were most likely very cautious when trying to begin a relationship with Miss Emily and decided not to confront her. Eventually, she was driven into her own madness and stayed isolated in her own home until she met Homer Barron, her new lover.
Emily had depression and was dealing with it in her own way by closing herself off. Looks could be very deceiving and in this case, Emily surprised the town when she died. The townspeople realized that there was more to her than they thought and were quick to judge.
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
Criticism from the townspeople caused Emily to go insane. What did Emily ever do to the townspeople? They were always criticizing her in how she was to who she dated. She was already in a struggle with herself, the environment and all those who surrounded her. The society was forcing her to stray in her role of “noblesse oblige.” When Emily’s father died the “people were glad…they could pity Miss Emily. Being left alone…she had become humanized.” Townspeople were jealous that she always had money and her life was set good unlike them. Not knowing the struggle she was going through they made it worse for her by criticizing. She
She has a fear of being abandoned or alone. She lied about her father’s death for 3 days so they wouldn’t be able to take the body. In the story it says, “The day after his death all the ladies prepared to call at the house and offer condolence and aid, as is our custom. Miss Emily met them at the door, dressed as usual and with no trace of grief on her face. She told them her father was not dead.
The townspeople often gossip and whisper about her, and there are many things they do not know about Miss Emily. They whisper, “‘Do you suppose it’s really so?’ they said to one another. ‘Of course it is. What else could…’” (Faulkner 4). There are many more examples of the townspeople making assumptions about Miss Emily, because she is a complete shut-in and speaks to quite literally nobody. Throughout the entire story, there is almost a veil between Miss Emily and the rest of the townspeople and the reader. It is only somewhat dropped at the end of the story, when the murder and body are discovered. Nobody really even knows Miss Emily’s feelings and emotion. The reader only knows her actions, and that is not enough to assume most of her feelings. However, if the story was written in the first person point of view of Miss Emily, by the very nature of the narration, the reader would be clued into every emotion that passed through her mind. This way, they would be able to understand her, and maybe why she did the things she did, like staying confined within the walls of her home for most of her life. This may also make the ending more predictable. Instead of the reader’s initial reaction being shock, horror, and disgust, it may now be a grim reality that only slightly shakes the reader. Miss
Unfortunately, the next mayor did not agree and set a group of men to call on Miss Emily for payment. Faulkner paints an image of a forgotten house with forgotten inhabitants using strong sensory details, “It smelled of dust and disuse-- a close, dank smell…and when they sat down, a faint dust rose sluggishly about their thighs, spinning with slow motes in the single sun-ray.” The use of sensory detail shows the decay of the house and the decay of Miss Emily. The image of “a tarnished gilt easel before the fireplace stood a crayon portrait of Miss Emily's father” provides a hint to the character of Emily as being childish or suffering from some sort of mental dementia. Of course, Miss Emily did not accept the request to pay the taxes and asked the gentlemen to leave.
William Faulkner mentions earlier in the story that Emily is symbolic to a fallen monument meaning the people of her society honor her. She gives them nothing to remember her by, besides the Grierson legacy, because of her inability to build relationships with the local townspeople, “she dies, alone, scarcely remembered, in the house filled with dust and shadows” (Faulkner, section IV). What stands out the most is how she is “scarcely remembered;” you live life to the fullest (forty plus years) and the surrounding people of your community hardly have anything to remember you by, not even a first impression. Knowing that impressions and actions define who a person is; why not leave the townspeople with a great impression? Helen Beker mentions that Miss Emily is “Inescapable [to her contemporary protectors] and tranquil [in her madness]” (Beker 8).
The town citizen’s relationship with Emily evolves throughout the story due to the themes of tradition and change. The beginning of the story presents Emily as a creature of tradition; she remains trapped within her hereditary obligation to keep her family’s tradition alive. The townsfolk are also aware of this, but they treat her with an odd sort of respect. “Alive, Miss Emily had been a tradition, a duty, and care… when Colonel Sartoris, the mayor… remitted her taxes due to the dispensation dating from the death of her father on into perpetuity.” The town folk start out accepting Emily and her traditional ways even to the point where the mayor allows her to live without paying any taxes.