Download “A Rose for Emily”

“A Rose for Emily”
By: William Faulkner
PowerPoint presentation compiled from PPT’s by
Mrs. Ma’s former students 2008
William Faulkner
(1897-1962)
Biography
• Born in Oxford, Mississippi.
• Never Finished High school.
• Enlisted in the British Royal Flying Corps, but
WWI ended before he had a chance at
combat.
• Wrote screenplays in Hollywood to make
money.
• Won a Noble Prize in literature for “his
powerful and artistically unique contribution
to the modern American novel“ in 1949.
Biography
• Oxford, MS, helped him create the fictional
county Yoknapatawpha.
• Moved to New Orleans and befriended
another author Sherwood Anderson.
• Anderson encouraged Faulkner to move
forward in his writing & helped Faulkner
get his first novel Soldier’s Pay published.
• Faulkner wrote screenplays in the 1930s
and 1940s in Hollywood to earn extra
money.
• In 1948, Faulkner won the Nobel Prize for
Intruder in the Dust.
Southern Gothic
• Faulkner refined the genre of Southern
Gothic
• Literature that builds on the traditions of
the larger Gothic genre, typically including
supernatural elements, mental disease,
and the grotesque.
• Often deals with the plight of those who
are ostracized or oppressed by traditional
Southern culture, especially blacks and
women.
Literary Devices
• Stream of Consciousness
• Foreshadowing
• Symbolism
• Ambiguity
• Allegory
Stream of Consciousness
• Faulkner is known for his use of
stream of consciousness in his
works.
• The story is read like a
townsperson is telling the story
of Emily.
• It is like listening to his/her
thoughts.
Flashbacks
• Faulkner is known for the use of
flashbacks in his writing, as seen
extensively in “A Rose for Emily.”
• For example, the story begins at
her funeral and then jumps to the
Board of Aldermen appearing at
Emily’s house demanding taxes.
• What other flashbacks appear in
the story?
Chronological Order
• Appropriately, the story begins with death,
flashes back to the near distant past and
leads on to the demise of a woman and
the traditions of the past she personifies.
• After carefully building such descriptive
statements, Faulkner flashes back in time
and examines the events that lead up to
the moment of death.
• This toggling of events has been skillfully
constructed, building suspense in a way
that a straight forward chronology could
not.
Foreshadowing
• An example of foreshadowing is
when Emily buys rat poisoning which
is later seen as the cause of Homer’s
death.
• [What is the irony of her response to
the druggist about a rat?]
• What is another example of
foreshadowing in “A Rose for Emily”?
Foreshadowing
• In the opening characterization,
many descriptive words
foreshadow the ultimate irony at
the climatic ending.
• “Her skeleton was small and
sparse”
• “She looked bloated, like a body
long submerged in motionless
water, and of that pallid hue.”
Foreshadowing
• “Her voice was dry and cold” and she
did not accept no for an answer.
• Her house, a fading photograph,
“smelled of dust and disuse—a
closed, dank smell,” and when her
guests are seated a “faint dust” rises
“sluggishly about their thighs.”
• All of these terms suggest neglect,
decay, entropy
South
• Faulkner despised slavery and
racism, but he admired much of the
chivalry and honor of the old South.
• Wealthy northern businessmen were
called Robber Barons, as they were
called in those days.
• That could possibly be where Homer
Baron got his name .
Symbolism
• The Grierson house is used to symbolize
Miss Emily's physical attributes.
• The house is described as “smelling of dust
and disuse,“
• Evidence of Emily's own aging is given when
her voice in similarly said to be "harsh, and
rusty, as if from disuse.”
• At the time of Emily's death, the house is
seen by the townspeople as "an eyesore
among eyesores,"
• Miss Emily is regarded as a "fallen
monument.”
• Both are empty, and lifeless.
Symbolism
• Just as their physical characteristics, Faulkner
uses the Grierson house as a symbol for Miss
Emily's change in social status.
• In its prime, the house was "big," and
"squarish," and located on Jefferson's "most
select street"
• This description gives the reader the impression
that the residence was not only extremely solid,
but also larger than life, almost gothic in nature.
• The prestige and desirability of the Grierson
house fell right along side Miss Emily's
diminishing name.
• The members of the Grierson family, especially
Emily, were also considered to be strong and
powerful. The townspeople regarded them as
regal.
Symbolism
• Faulkner also Grierson house is used to symbolize
Emily Grierson's unwillingness to accept change.
• A good example of this occurred when
representatives were sent to her home to collect her
delinquent taxes. She completely rejected her
responsibility to the town by referring the men to a
time when the since departed mayor, Colonel
Sartoris, "remitted her taxes"
• the house is presented as "Lifting its stubborn and
Coquettish decay above the cotton wagons and
gasoline pumps".
• The cotton wagons and gasoline pumps in this
description are undoubtedly used to symbolize what
Emily must surely see as the mostly unimportant and
purposeless townspeople. This single comparison by
itself provides indisputable evidence that Emily
Grierson and her family's house are strongly related
with one another.
Ambiguity
• “I want some poison,” she said to the
druggist. She was over thirty then, still a
slight woman, through thinner than usual,
with cold, haughty black eyes in a face the
flesh of which was strained across the
temple and about the eye sockets as you
imagine a lighthouse-keeper’s face out to
look. “I want some poison,” she said.
• Emily never mentions what she will use the
poison for. But when the druggies asks her
what she was going to do Emily only looks
at him.
Ambiguity
• Homer Barron is a Northerner who is
not married to Emily, however Emily
teats Homer like a husband because
she buys him expensive things such
as the silver toilet seat and clothes.
Allegory
• Some readers have interpreted the
story as an allegory of the relations
between the North and the South.
• This is apparent because the
character of Homer Barron is a
Yankee and Emily kills him.
North and South Allegory
• Living in Mississippi, Emily represents
the part of the South that does not
want to change after the Civil War.
• Homer Barron does not want to be tied
down to Emily and tradition, which
represents the North’s willingness to
change.
• As the town changes, she becomes
known as the recluse with a secret.
• Emily’s killing Homer represents the
South’s unwillingness to accept the new
things to come.
Chronological Order
• Miss Emily is born.
• She and her father ride around the town in an old, elegant carriage.
• Her father dies, and for three days she refuses to acknowledge his
death.
• Homer Barron arrives in town and begins to court Miss Emily.
• She buys a man’s silver toilet set—a mirror, brush, and comb—and
men’s clothing.
• The town relegates her to disgrace and sends for her cousins.
• The cousins arrive, and Homer leaves town.
• Three days after the cousins leave, Homer returns.
• Miss Emily buys poison at the local drug store.
• Homer disappears.
• A horrible stench envelops Miss Emily’s house.
• Four town aldermen secretly sprinkle lime on her lawn.