A Rose for Emily

A detailed Summary of A Rose for Emily

In "A Rose for Emily" William Faulkner writes about two lovers, Emily Grierson and Homer Barron, with conflicting personalities that eventually leads up to Emily poisoning Homer in his sleep. Faulkner discusses their dissimilar social backgrounds and emotional behaviors as well as symbolizing Emily with "the old times" and Homer with "the new times."

Emily Grierson was the daughter of a wealthy man of high social class in a southern town called Jefferson. He was a very overbearing man that didn't allow her to see men for any reason at all. He kept her locked away inside the house and never let her leave his side. The townspeople believed the Griersons thought of themselves too highly, that no man was good enough for Miss Emily. They thought of the Griersons as "tableau" or "fake." Soon her father died and when the woman came to pay their condolences Emily looked at them with no expression of grief on her face, she didn't believe her father was dead. After three days of convincing, Emily finally allowed the townspeople to remove her father from the house and they buried him. In a way the townspeople were glad, they were able to pity Emily. All she had left was the house, and the townspeople didn't think she was crazy for what s

For six or seven years, the front door of Emily's house remained closed. Every now and then the townspeople would see her black servant coming and going from the market to the house. He never spoke. When Emily was about forty she gave china-painting lessons to children. She had sealed off the entire top floor of the house, and when the town stared to get postal delivery, she refused to have a mailbox and numbers put up on her house. At age seventy-four she died. It had been ten years since anybody had been into the house. Now the house was old and decrepit. The house was filled with dust and mold and had a smell of "disuse." The top floor of the house had to be unsealed, the town was curious to see inside. Nobody had been upstairs in forty years. The townspeople broke through the doorway. The room seemed to be a tomb. Inside everything was set up as if it were for a bridal. Inside they saw a set of clothes hanging on a chair and the toilet set which Emily was seen buying laying on the table. On the bed was Homer, or what was left of Homer, dressed in a nightshirt. Beside him was an indention of a head on the pillow with a gray hair on it. Homer hadn't deserted Emily after all, she feared he was going to leave her and she couldn't accept it. She poisoned him so he would never leave and would always be there laying in the bed for her.

Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily," symbolizes the end of old times and the coming of new times. Emily Grierson symbolizes the "old times." She doesn't accept time and change. She didn't acknowledge the death of her

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Approximate Word count = 1048
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English