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A Rose For Emily By William Faulkner

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A Rose For Emily By William Faulkner
William Faulkner is a well-known American writer, Nobel Prize, and the Pulitzer Prize laureate. He is famous for his novels, essays, screenplays, and short stories. It should be noted that Faulkner was a representative of modernist literature and as we all know, literary modernism was driven by a strong desire to change traditional principles of presentation and expression of the sensibilities of the time. “A Rose for Emily” is a good example of modernist literature and one of the most well-known works by William Faulkner. This is a tragic story of conflict between old and new, between traditions and changes and between entrenched habits and a new way of life in a developing society. In general, the tone and atmosphere of the story are very …show more content…
Rose is considered to be the symbol of love but, Emily hardly ever experienced love from anyone but her father. After his death, she was a loner up until she met Homer Barron but as we all know from the text, this meeting can hardly be called a happy love story. So the rose here is a symbol of lost love in Emily’s life, it’s a symbol of her emotional suffering and struggle to be a happy woman.
Another symbol is Mr. Grierson’s portrait. Emily’s father always stood on her guard and had a great influence on her not only during his life but even after his death. His portrait in Emily’s house is also a symbol of time. It represents the past and reminds of the way they used to live when Mr. Grierson was alive.
The locked door room and the dead body of Homer is one of the symbols too. This scene symbolizes the dream that is not supposed to come true - Emily’s dream to be a happy woman. Faded rose color curtains, rose-shaded lights of the room, the delicate array of crystal and the man’s toilet things- all together, it is a symbol of a simple desire of a woman to love and to be loved. It’s a symbol of Emily’s pain. The corpse of Homer in this room is also a symbol of Emily’s struggle for her so-called happiness.
To sum up, it should be noted that each and every symbol plays a huge role in this text. Faulkner creates a story shrouded in mystery and uses symbols to enhance the plot and create a broad

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