In the short story A Rose for Emily, by William Faulkner, there are many underlying indications throughout the whole story that foreshadow many of the events that occur at the end. There is one paragraph in particular that shows us what is to come of Miss Emily and the ones around her. It somewhat discusses her familys background, showing us what they thought about themselves. This paragraph foretells the events that occur at the end of the story by giving the readers information as to what is to become of Miss Emily.
In this story, Emily is not a social butterfly. She keeps to herself in her old eyesore of a house. She keeps to herself so much that no one has ever seen the inside of it. Emilys house is the only one left on that street in the whole neighborhood; the rest is garages and cotton gins. Her father brought her up on his on his own in the same house. He had much influence on what she did later on in the story.
One of the key importances to the story is the relationship between Miss Emily and her father. The towns people thought of them as a tableau, a motionless living picture. They had them depicted as and emotionless family, which they were. In this tableau, Mr. Grierson was holding a horse whip turning his back towards his daughter, who was wearing all white in the background. Emily and her father were placed between an open door. This tableau represents the type of relationship they shared. By the horse whip you can tell that he was the dominate one who controlled the whole household. Faulkner writes None of the young men were quite good enough for Miss Emily. This obviously puts strain on the bond they have and pulls them emotionally far apart. Not being able to enjoy the company of any men and feeling lonely led Miss Emily to find her darker side.
This specific type of relationship Emily shared with her father was very unhealthy. Emotional distance in a relationship can lead to symptoms of depression, which clearly was the case for Miss Emily. For instance, she never went outside of her house and no one ever came in to visit. Her case of depression caused her to go in a state of being crazy.
We learn that crazy runs through the Grierson family. Faulkner writes about Emilys great-aunt Wyatt. He explains that she went completely crazy. Since Emilys father thought so highly of the family, as stated before, no one was ever good enough for his little girl. Every time a man would come to the house asking to court her, her father turned them down.
Her fathers selfish ways created her warped ways of life and the way she thought about people. In the story it states that even with insanity in the family she wouldnt have turned down all of her chances if they had really materialized. This makes it look like she did not care about love, but instead what the gentlemen had to offer her.
For someone to stay cooped up in a house hearing day after day about how this man is no good for you and no you cannot date her has to were you down. This is why Miss Emily did what she did when her father finally died. Miss Emily went out to experience what is was like to live in the real world. She finally got to feel what a relationship felt for the very first time. What makes this so ironic is her first love, became her last.
Since her father was clearly the only one in Emilys life, this made the towns people very prying. They seemed to always be in her business and concerned with her taxes and such. The people thought of Emily as a tradition, a duty, and a care; a sort of hereditary obligation upon the town. They took care of her, but at the same their intuition told them something was wrong with her, whether it was mentally or emotionally.
Towards the end of the story, everything the readers had read in that one paragraph starts to fall into place and make sense. Her strange ways became a little clearer. She acted the way she did because that was all she knew. This paragraph also helps us understand why she was so stuck up towards the people of the town, and why she never wanted any help or long a friendship from any of the people from the town.
Not only in this paragraph would statements catch the readers eye, but the entire story Faulkner. This paragraph just makes all those hints fall into place and gets the readers minds turning. It helps us understand that she is a very lonely person that does not get out very much and that she is most likely going to have some crazy tendencies, as did her aunt. She did however have one servant that stayed with her all for most of her life.
The main reason that this paragraph is of significance is that is represents the personality of the family that she was raised by and it foreshadows what is to come of Miss Emily. The function of this paragraph is to prepare us for the upcoming events and have readers guessing what will become of Miss Emily.
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