What Does The Homer Barron Symbolize In A Rose For Emily

An important idiosyncrasy of Emily's that will help the reader to understand the bizarre finale of the story, is her apparent inability to cope with the death of someone she cared for. When deputies were sent to recover back taxes from Emily, she directed them to Colonel Sartoris, an ex-mayor that had told her she would never have to pay taxes, and a man that had been dead for ten years. Years before this incident, however, after her father had died, she continued to act has if he had not, and only allowed his body to be removed when threatened with legal action. Considering the fate of her lover's corpse, one suspects she would have kept her father's corpse also, had the town not known of his death.

This is evidently on the grounds that the character of Homer Barron is a Yankee and Emily slaughters him. Nonetheless, it is hard to contend that Emily's inspiration in dating Homer is to slaughter him on the grounds that he is a Northerner. The most evident clarification for her eagerness to date a man outside of her social rank would be that she is essentially a forlorn lady. A more subtle, however in any case sensible, clarification for her association with Homer would be that is her method for opposing her dead father. Amid his lifetime, her dad kept her from having an "adequate" suitor. In this way, she revolts by connecting with a man her dad would have considered an outsider: a Yankee day-worker. There is truly little to propose that the story is a moral story of the Civil War other than the way that a Yankee is executed by a Southerner. Faulkner himself, in his address on the story at the University of Virginia, denies such an elucidation. He said that he accepted that an essayist is ". Excessively caught up with taking a stab at, making it impossible to make fragile living creature and-blood individuals that will stand up and cast a shadow to have sufficient energy to be conscious of all the imagery that he may put into what he does or what individuals may read into

death, there is a discovery of Homer’s dead body laying in the bed upstairs. It appears

Homer is a character in the novel whose personality starts off as very stereotypical but changes as you get deeper into the story. Coming from a Greek background, Homer is forceful and domineering and has trouble dealing with other strong personalities. Although, he is a natural leader, brave and can even be a little insecure at times. In his teenage years Homer had built a front to hide behind, a front as a disrespectful, insensitive, uncaring guy. He starts to fall inlove with Fi, a refined and delicate

            Emily chooses a lover that resembles her father in many ways;  Homer is big, strong, outspoken, and domineering.  Initially, the townspeople are happy to know that Emily is dating Homer.  "Of course a Grierson would not think seriously of a Northerner, a day laborer."  When they realize that Emily is serious about him, they have a change of heart.  "Miss Emily with her head high and Homer Barron with his hat cocked and a cigar in his teeth, reigns and whip in a yellow glove."  Emily does not care about the people's reaction toward her affair with Homer.  Emily's affair with a "day laborer" is an act of defiance, toward her father and perhaps, even the toward the townspeople.  She wants to show everyone that she is in control of her life and will do as she pleases.

Homer was forced to change the way he handled every situation and his attitude towards everything because of the live event of war. He became the leader of the group when people looked to him for guidance as they relied on him. We see the kind of character Homer was before the war when Ellie is describing all the characters going to Hell. She used spoken thought when she says “Homer was Wild, Outrageous, He didn’t care what he did or what anyone thought”. This gives the reader an insight into how homer was barbaric and confident. Homer developed as a character because his friends relied on him. They needed him to make plans and decisions on how to save lee, one of their friends, and avoid the soldiers. Ellie notices these changes uses the technique of spoken thought when she says “Homer was fast becoming the teachers he despised”. This tells the reader that Homer was becoming organised, he was becoming the advisor, someone that helped everybody which is a big change from his old reckless ways. This is like teenagers in society as they become more mature through the life events they experience.Most teenagers need to change and become more mature as they need to grow up because they need to get a job, meet someone and move on in life. This is learnt from the experiences they have and the events that occur. As we grow older we mature at depending on the circumstances. Just like Homer,

It is noted in the passage that “Homer himself had remarked--he liked men, and it was known that he drank with the younger men in the Elks' Club--that he was not a marrying man” (4). First her father runs away men, then when a man finally comes around he is homosexual. One day Miss Emily goes to the druggist and says “I want arsenic” (3). It is after seeing this that the people in town started to think she was going to commit suicide (4). Homer barron leaves and returns after Miss Emily’s two cousins leave. The people in the town never see him again and they say “the one we believed would marry her … had deserted her. The body of Homer Barron was found on the bed with a piece of Miss Emily’s gray hair next to the body.

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

In light of Homers feelings toward marriage Emily had been seen in town at the jewelers purchasing a men’s toilet set in silver with the letters H.B. on each

The symbolism between the past and the present was also shown in the beginning of the story when Faulkner wrote, "…only now Miss Emily's house was left, lifting its stubborn and coquettish decay above the cotton wagons and gasoline pumps – an eyesore among eyesores." It was ironic that the same description "stubborn and coquettish decay" could be a description for Emily as well (71). As the house fell into decay, so did Miss Emily, "She looked bloated, like a body long submerged in motionless water and of that pallid hue." Miss Emily was described as "a small, fat woman in black, with a thin gold chain descending to her waist and vanishing into her belt, leaning on an ebony cane with a tarnished gold head" (72). Traditionally, in the Old South people wore black while they were grieving the death of a loved one. The cane she used

When the town called in a construction company from up north to pave the sidewalks, they brought Homer Barron with them. He soon met Emily and they started spending some time with each other. The towns people were startled because he was a Yankee construction worker but happy because she had possibly found someone. In Faulkner’s version, after seeing the two around town, gossip started to form about the two lovebirds. The narrator described it as, “Then some of the ladies began to say that it was a disgrace to the town and a bad example to the young people. The men did not want to interfere, but at last the ladies forced the Baptist minister--Miss Emily's people were Episcopal-- to call upon her. “(Faulkner IV). It was not socially acceptable to spend so much time with someone if they were not going to get married. It was against the social norm of the community. The pastors’ wife wrote Emily’s family in Alabama and once the cousins left Emily’s house, the rumor was that they were married. Then Homer left town, then returned to Emily only never to be seen again. In the movie adaptation, there was no pressure from the community to marry Homer. It was not made apparent that it was against the social norm to spend extended amount of time with someone without being married. After Emily purchased the mans silver toilet set and monogramed under shirt for Homer, they assumed they were married, The narrator described him like,

Faulkner states that Miss Emily would tell the other people that “her father was not dead. She did that for three days, with the ministers calling on her, and the doctors, trying to persuade her to let them dispose of the body. Just as they were about to resort to law and force, she broke down, and they buried her father quickly,'' (Faulkner 804). This part of the story foreshadows another incident where Emily again refuses to let go of the deceased. Instead of Emily not being able to let go of her father, this time she couldn't let go of her close friend, Homer. The hint of Emily not being able to let go of her father in the beginning serves as an indication for the reader that Miss Emily is very isolated and will do anything to prevent that. Emily’s suspicious actions causes the reader to anticipate certain happenings and wonder what will happen next.

Miss Emily also shows how she is living in the past when her father dies.  She told everyone that came to get his body that her father was still alive, she refused to believe he was dead.  However, she eventually was forced to give them his body.  "After her father's death, she looked like a girl 'with a vague resemblance to those angels in colored church windows-sort of tragic and serene.'  This suggest that she has already begun her entrance into the nether-world"(Rodriguez 1).  The people did not know what to make of Emily.  Many thought she was

After living so long as a victim of loneliness perpetrated by her father, Emily decides that she will be vindicated-she will have her man. She orders a toiletry set to be engraved with Homer's initials, purchases an outfit and a nightshirt for him, and buys the arsenic that is to seal his fate. When the townspeople enter her house for the first time in forty years, they find a bridal tomb: a tarnished toiletry set, a neatly pressed suit, and a rotting Homer Baron clad in the nightshirt wearing a "profound and fleshless grin" (87).

“When Miss Emily Grierson died, our whole town went to her funeral- (Faulkner,1)”, this is the opening sentence to Faulkner’s short story. Immediately the reader is left wondering who is Miss Emily and how did she die. As the story begins to unravel, more suspense is built. The first major instance is after Emily’s father dies. She claims he is not dead