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Deidre-Marie Kaitlyn Langkamp

Professor Dekle

ENC1102-4100

February 13, 2011

Decay Is Never Genteel

“A Rose for Emily”

Faulkner’s tale of “A Rose for Emily” (Faulkner 391-397; additional references by page

number only) is one of defiance, and decay. Faulkner uses unconventional symbols and shifting

of time to give the reader a personal understanding of the setting of Jefferson, Mississippi and

the aura of Miss Emily. Faulkner uses Miss Emily to humanize defiance and decay, but his main

purpose is to comment on the South’s inability to accept and deal with change.

Faulkner begins by illustrating Emily’s physical home as “set on what had once been our

most select street” (391). By illustrating what the south had been architecturally, populated by

those possessing the upmost decorum, we begin to see how the South clung to superiority far

above those of the North. Yet those beliefs were not enough to combat the encroaching cotton

gins and garages which “obliterated the most august names of that neighborhood” (391) here is a

reference to General Robert E. Lee’s defeat by the Union. Emily’s house remained standing

among the dilapidation brought by the North. By Emily being the last standing reflects that

victory of the North was in name only. The South shall remain defiant, embracing tradition, duty

and care of generations passed.

The movement of time within “A Rose for Emily” lacks chronological flow

bouncing the reader from event to event. This is significant of the South’s wrestle with changes

that are coming post war. The symbolism of time is first reflected in the character Colonel
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Sartoris, Mayor of Jefferson. He takes it upon himself to remit Emily’s taxes from the death of

her father until the next generation seized control. “When the next generation, with its mire

modern ideas, became mayors and alderman this arrangement created some little dissatisfaction”

(391) this is reflective of Jim Crow and the Reconstruction Era of the South, both brought a great

deal of dissatisfaction to the South. Miss Emily’s dismissal of those who came to collect her

taxes is defiance of post-civil war fiscal government.

To make things worse, Homer Barron, a northern day laborer, has come to pave roads

forcing modernization on the South. The description of Homer’s person being loud and

deplorable is the view of the citizenry of Jefferson of the North’s Army rule and reconstruction.

The pairing of Emily and Homer is to show that the North and South could never be together.

When the ladies of the town refer to “noblesse oblige- without calling it noblesse oblige” (394)

they are sighting beyond manners and duty there is trust, which surely a proper southern belle

such as Miss Emily surely could not trust a northerner. Homer spurns her with his deplorable

ways, as the North has the South, leading Emily to extract justice with her own hands. The

purchase of Arsenic and the defiance of abiding the dispensary laws illustrate an uprising and

desire to preserve time.

As change progresses, it violates the south, and threatens to continue to move on and rape

lady south of her heritage; the north must fall before it can defile her any further. The poison is

mixed and served. The stench of death is overpowering to the town leading its figures to cover

up Miss Emily’s sin with lime instead of addressing her directly, as the South would prefer to

ignore the presence of the North.

When the monument fell, its secrets were released. The death chamber opened,

symbolizing the release of secrets, behind its door, the truth. A shell of what was, with the
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remains of what is. The revenge exacted upon one who desires change against those unwilling to.

Yet left behind a single slate grey hair next to the decay that threatened all she knew there was

no other way in her twisted sense of duty to accept what was to come.
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Works Cited

A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner." Short Story Criticism. Ed. Jenny Cromie. Vol. 42.

Detroit: Gale Group, 2001. 72-135. Literature Criticism Online. Gale. . 2 February 2011

http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/LitCrit/lincclin_spjc/FJ3594050004

Burduck, Michael L. "Another View of Faulkner's Narrator in 'A Rose for Emily'." The
University of Mississippi Studies in English 8 (1990): 209-211. Rpt. in Literature Resource
Center. Detroit: Gale, 2011. Literature Resources from Gale. Web. 3 Feb. 2011.
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