Great writers create great protagonists. In “Average Waves in Unprotected Waters” and “A Rose for Emily” authors Anne Tyler and William Faulker create two short stories featuring complex protagonists. “Average Waves in Unprotected Waters” follows the story of a mother struggling with guilt and insecurity as she makes the difficult decision to place her mentally disabled son under hospital care; while “A Rose for Emily” is a third-person narration of the community-obsessed spectacle, Emily Grierson. While the characters maintain different traits, they are developed in the same way. In “Average Waves in Unprotected Waters” and “A Rose for Emily”, Tyler and Faulkner develop their protagonists through their actions, direct characterization, and …show more content…
After the disappearance of Homer Baron, the townspeople speculate that Miss Emily has inherited her father's reclusive habits. The narrator suspects that his influence had been “too virulent and too furious to die” (Faulkner 9). Miss Emily's persistence in her actions characterizes her as tenacious. Contrastingly, in “Average Waves in Unprotected Waters”, despite holding regret towards her marriage, Bet confides in her loyalty to her husband—even in his absence. Bet explains that “It wasn’t that she expected him back. She just took some comfort from enduring” (Tyler 2). Bet's comfort derived from staying in an adverse environment displays her masochistic personality. Bet’s feelings of guilt arise on the train ride to the hospital. She imagines Arnold’s disability as a byproduct of her genetics; as “she never could do anything as well as most people” (Tyler 2). The narrator’s depiction directly characterizes Bet as being average and insecure. The portrayals of Emily and Bet demonstrate their contrasting personalities. Faulkner uses direct characterization to portray Miss Emily as a stubborn, tenacious character; however, Tyler uses direct characterization to display Bet’s masochism and …show more content…
When boarding the train, Bet reflects on her marriage to Arnold’s father. In a self-inflicted fight of blame for Arnold's disability, she explains that she “can’t believe a thing like this will just fall on you out of nowhere” (Tyler 2). Bet’s disbelief that life happened to her by chance characterizes her as guilty. In “A Rose for Emily”, prior to Miss Emily's death, the mayor repeats one of many attempts to retrieve her taxes. His efforts are finally acknowledged in the form of a note; one written in “an archaic shape, in a thin, flowing calligraphy in faded ink” (Faulkner 1). While the description is seemingly just a notecard, Faulkner’s word choice can be applied to Miss Emily. The use of the words “archaic” and “faded” embody Miss Emily’s languid, but iconic reputation in her small town. As the townsmen leave Miss Emily’s house in an attempt to rid the area of a smell, they notice her figure in a seemingly omniscient position. Walking across Emily’s lawn, the men observed “her upright torso motionless as that of an idol” in a previously dark window (Faulkner 4). The narrator’s word choice further solidifies Emily’s status as an untouchable, iconic
In “A Rose for Emily”, Charles Faulkner used a series of flashbacks and foreshadowing to tell Miss Emily’s story. Miss Emily is an interesting character, to say the least. In such a short story of her life, as told from the prospective of a townsperson, who had been nearly eighty as Miss Emily had been, in order to tell the story from their own perspective. Faulkner set up the story in Mississippi, in a world he knew of in his own lifetime. Inspired by a southern outlook that had been touched by the Civil War memory, the touch of what we would now look at as racism, gives the southern aroma of the period. It sets up Miss Emily’s southern belle status and social standing she had been born into, loner or not.
William Faulkner emphasizes the characterization of Emily through figurative language. An example of this is a simile used
The mysterious tale, “A Rose for Emily”, focuses on the life and death of the main character, Emily, a stubborn and mentally unstable woman. . Throughout Emily’s life she has lived in the town of Jefferson for as long as the townspeople have remembered. The town develops and changes a lot while Emily lives there, but Emily does not. In “A Rose For Emily”; William Faulkner constructs Emily as a distinct character in order to show the theme of unwillingness to change as the town around her does.
Throughout the story, the actions of Emily are very absurd. However, Faulkner’s setting helps the audience understand how Emily was able to live the way she has for so long and understand the actions of the town. Emily is very reclusive after the death of her father. She has never been without her father’s constant control. Emily’s father thought no one was worthy of his daughter. As a result, she was been kept away from the rest of the world by her father. When Emily’s father died, she could not
Faulkner develops the character of Emily and events in her life not only to tell a shocking story but also to portray his view on the Antebellum South. Emily is a figure of the world that struggles with a change. Both Faulkner and Williams by creating those two female characters shared with readers and the audience their reflection on the after-Civil War South — the place where they were born and
Many stories share similar themes. In “Through the Tunnel,” Doris Lessing develops the character of Jerry through his experiences with the older boys on the beach. In “Average Waves in Unprotected Waters,” Anne Tyler explores the character of Bet and the events that lead to her tough decision to take her son to a home. Tyler and Lessing evolve their characters and add detail to their experiences through their subjects. In “Through the Tunnel” and “Average Waves in Unprotected Waters,” Doris Lessing and Anne Tyler explore the subject of insecurity.
The Reconstruction Era pushes away the refinement of Emily’s time and leaves her obsolete in a culture where she feels foreign and ostracized. Because of the Civil War and the following Reconstruction Era, the transformation of society challenges Emily’s strength of character, but she stays true to herself and her upbringing. Out of desperation to preserve her way of life and yet acquire a husband, she attaches her affections basically to the first man who comes along and even murders him rather than risk losing him. Only after her death do the townspeople discover how truly impervious and perverse she has been in her total dedication to forever remain a genteel antebellum Southern belle even though it makes her an anachronism. William Faulkner utilizes his own understanding of the Old South from his Mississippi roots and the stories of the strong southern women in his family to create believable, memorable characters who could not exist in any other place or
William Faulkner implies Emily?s stubbornness with subtle clues in description and through symbols. Faulkner would like us to take notice of
The same description "stubborn and coquettish decay" can be a description for Emily also. Just like her house, which had at some time been white and on a "select street", Emily had been young women dressed in white, but she fell into decay as the house did. Faulkner's Emily did not have the confidence, or maybe self-esteem, to believe she could stand alone and triumph in life especially in the face of changing
Miss Emily Grierson, the leading character in “A Rose for Emily”, is a bizarre woman to say the least. Faulkner begins this story with Miss Emily’s funeral, and continues to tell about the interesting events in her life. All throughout the story, Miss Emily exhibits many traits of a mentally ill person, but is never medically diagnosed. Faulkner writes, “Miss Emily had been a tradition, a duty, and a care” (245), meaning that she stuck to her Southern-raised ways. She refused to conform to the modernization of the world around her. The narrator of this story seems to be a person that knows Miss Emily and her family very intimately. The narrator also considers themselves apart of the townspeople referred to as the “we” throughout the story. This story tells about the ups and downs in the extremely intriguing life of a woman that refuses to leave her past.
In the short story, “A Rose for Emily,” William Faulkner uses a modernistic style of writing combined with Southern Gothic themes to show how strange or “perverse” of a character Emily Grierson is. The story is split into five parts which all take place throughout Emily’s life. These five parts are not in chronological order. Not until the story is looked at in chronological order will the reader understand the full personality and life of Emily Grierson.
William Faulkner’s A Rose for Emily is a warning of the grotesque fate that idolizing someone for the sake of tradition may lead to. Much of what Miss Emily “gets away with” so to speak is because of the way the townspeople view her. Miss Emily is held in high regard, just as her family members have been for generations. She does not pay taxes and her actions often go unquestioned. The locals see her as a sort of town icon.
In William Faulkner’s, A Rose for Emily, you quickly learn that something is not right with Miss Emily. Miss Emily goes from a regular outsider to an mysterious, secretive, and depressed person. She is very distant from everyone and stays at home all the time. Miss Emily has a black man bring her things from the store, so she does not have to go out. After her father died everyone says that she is not the same “She vanquished them… “ (paragraph 15).
Faulkner uses symbolism to compare Emily and her home to the Old South and their resistance to social change. “A Rose For Emily” belongs to the genre of Southern Gothic literature. Encyclopedia Britannica defines Southern Gothic as “a
Faulkner then continues to build shape our opinion of Emily through the metaphorical comparison of her with a “Fallen Monument.” Such a comparison unsurprisingly leads the reader to think of Miss Emily as some sort of tarnished noble, or