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Analysis Of A Rose For Emily

Decent Essays

William Falkner who was born in New Albany, Mississippi, in 1897, wrote and published “A Rose for Emily” in 1930. He grew up in the South, and was interested in exploring the South as it came out of the Civil War and entered the Reconstruction era, the attempt to overcome the slavery stigma, and the people who changed with the new beliefs and those who stuck with their old-fashioned beliefs. William Falkner employs the story “A Rose for Emily” to portray the South’s refusal to acknowledge and accept the social and historical changes. “A Rose for Emily” does not follow the progression of a typical narrative. It begins with Emily Grierson’s funeral, the main character, and how the towns people remember her. Then the story shifts to time years before her death when the mayor and aldermen of the next generation reminded Emily of her taxes, by which she rebuffed them and insisted they see Colonel Sartoris (who has been deceased for a while) as they have an arrangement. When writing the short story “A Rose for Emily,” Falkner uses foreshadowing and flashbacks to address the city of Jefferson’s inability to leave traditional beliefs in the past. One of the many things Miss Emily represents is old Southern nobilities, along with her the town has trouble letting the southern beliefs. The town was showed an obsession with Emily and her family which shows the town trying to hold onto the old Southern values. In the story Falkner utilizes his theme to create a setting, which has

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