Emily Grierson Change

“A Rose for Emily,” written by William Faulkner, is a story that proves that a refusal to let go of the past and accept change can be self-destructive, and that rejecting the changing realities of life can lead to physical and mental anguish. During the story, the protagonist, Emily Grierson, is a static character and through her refusal to adapt to the changing social environment around her; she ultimately tears her life apart and in turn ends the life of another.
Death is a main theme throughout the story and Faulkner shows through the way that Emily acts and tries to exert power over death by denying death as a whole. Emily is a necrophiliac, or a person who is attracted to dead people. Emily’s necrophilia first appears when her father dies, she refused to accept the fact that he was dead for a while and finally gave up his body, reluctantly. At the end of the story, after she has killed Homer, the reader then experiences her profound necrophilism when some of the townspeople go …show more content…
Throughout the course of the story, Emily continues to remain the same person she was when she was younger and refuses to accept change. In her hometown of Jefferson, Mississippi, the townspeople are embracing a more modern, commercialized future while still sticking to the town’s history including the Grierson’s house and the cemetery to where Civil War veterans from the town have been laid to rest. Emily is continually refusing to accept the rapid changes of society. In the beginning of the story, Emily is trying to explain to the Board of Aldermen that she need not to pay taxes because of the agreement between Colonel Sartoris and that they are to “See Colonel Sartoris. I have no taxes in Jefferson” (2), even though Colonel Sartoris has “been dead for almost a decade” (2). Multiple occurrences are brought about in the story that shows Emily’s struggles to adapt to her ever-changing social