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A Rose For Emily And Hills Like White Elephants

Decent Essays

The short stories “A Rose for Emily” and “Hills Like White Elephants” are like two people suited for each other; puzzle pieces. I say this because they can be hooked together by their common similarities. The two short stories may be different in some aspects, but they are very similar to one another. These similarities being, the themes, symbolism found in each of the stories and the tragedies that occur. Prior to reafing a short story, one can learn valuable lessons that can be used for the rest of there life. The two short stories share a common theme of the mystery of others minds. In “ A Rose for Emily” the townspeople could not take the smell coming from Emily’s house any longer, so “They broke open the cellar door and sprinkled …show more content…

In “A Rose for Emily” Miss Emily Grierson live a life of quiet turmoil. Her entire life has revolved around an inexplicable loneliness mostly characterized by the harsh abandonment of death. The most vital imagery utilized by Faulkner demonstrates Miss Emily’s mental condition. She, being self-improsened within the confines of her home, is the human embodiment of her house; Faulkner describes it as “... stubborn an coquettish decay above the cotton wagons and the gasoline pumps--an eyesore among eyesores.” (Faulkner 308).
Miss Emily is also decaying, but it is subtle and internal--the awful smell that begins to permeate from her dwelling is a reflection of the withering woman within rotting. Perhaps most tragically, Miss Emily’s isolation is far from self-inflicted. Her blind devotion to the ones she loves; her father, her husband, her home; only serves to further condemn her actions. Her neighbors disregard toward her inabilty to let go of her father after his death, despite the delicacy of her being, caused for her madness to fester. “She told them her father was not dead.
For three days she did this, “We did not say she was crazy then. We believed she had to do that.” (Faulkner.311). Their negligence of all the warning signs; even after her lover vanished, the deterioration of her home, and Miss Emily’s inability to accept reality serves as the most prevailing form of repression in this story. Contrariwise, “Hills

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