From what I understand, roses are a symbol of time in stories. This is the same case for "A Rose for Emily". Roses die pretty quickly if not taken care of properly. However a rose can also be preserved. I believe the towns people in the story tried to do this with Emily. Since she was the last symbol of the old school way of life, they wanted to preserve her in a sense and in doing so they covered up her mistakes. She has stayed the same over time while her environment around her is progressing and changing quickly. As you can tell, Emily does not handle change very well. This is probably also why she kills Homer. She wanted to preserve him and the good times they had rather than allow time to take its course. I am assuming that the narrator is one of the towns people who observed her life and/or one of the people who sent the tax papers to her. So you get an observers point of view of what happened to her after her father passed to the date of her death. Some areas are left open but the narrator hints at what happens to her over time. Time and change is inevitable. As much as the towns people, and even Emily, tried to stop time, the change was inevitable and that is what I think William Faulkner tried to express in this story.
True. Emily seems to want time to stop. She kills the man who loves her so that she can be with him forever and never have to fear that he will leave her. She also holds on to her dead father for as long as she can pretending that time has stopped. She even cuts her hair to try to turn back time and appear more youthful. Her life has been stolen from her and she is trying to get it back.
ReplyDeleteEmily seems to be a symbol for the old times and I think this is keeping her from moving on. She wants for things to be like the "old ways" so bad that she cannot stand the more modern way of living so she isolates herself in her house. If only she could understand that time does not stop for anyone, no matter how important you once were.
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