“a Rose for Emily�? by William Faulkner (Essay Example)

“A Rose for Emily” is a very interesting short story my William Faulkner. His characters and way with words really is what makes the story . Emily is alone, for the most part, throughout her whole life. Her dad died during the story. She had her love, Homer Barron, that didn’t love her. Emily really was stuck in the past with her thoughts and feelings according to the way the towns person decided to tell it. The setting is what really had a lot to do with this story.According to the article “what a setting tells us,” the narrator carefully describes the house that Miss Emily lives in. This description helps us picture a decaying Mississippi town in the post-Civil War South. We also learn about Miss Emily's resistance to change.”(“What a Setting Tells Us”) The story takes place right after the Civil War. Her dad had a lot of power back in the Confederacy. He had really close ties with the person in charge of the city. Emily Grierson had a mind set that she did not have to pay taxes because her family had never paid taxes. Emily could not grasp any other concept when it came to life outside that house.Her father really did not teach her anything that she needed to know to live outside the house anyways. When the townsfolk came to her wanting her to pay her taxes, she put up an argument. If the story took place in another time and setting, the story would not be the same. There are very racist people in the town.
Her dad was in the war, and powerful at that. The time and setting even go into effecting the way the townspeople think and act in the story. I believe that in a different time and setting, that Emily would have been viewed differently from the townspeople. The point of view has a lot to do with the story also. According to Jim Barloon, “the first-person narrator, who represents and reports the consensus view of the townspeople, assumes that Emily is what she appears to be: a fusty, antiquated Southern Belle”( "A Rose for Homer? The Limitations of