In "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner use of foreshadowing and metaphors prepares the reader for the bittersweet ending. Appropriately, the story begins with death, flashes back to the past and hints towards the demise of a woman and the traditions of the past she personifies. Through Miss Emily, Faulkner conveys the struggle that comes with trying to maintain traditions with radical change. Jefferson is at a crossroads by trying to embrace a more modern future while still preserving the past traditions. Emily herself is a tradition, staying the same over the years, despite the many changes in her community. “Miss Emily had been a tradition, a duty, and a care” (878). Miss Emily represents the traditions the older men in the community wish
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The Gothic serves to reveal the psychology of human beings on the fringes of society and their underlying and dark motives. As a character, Miss Emily is damaged psychologically by her intensely patriarchal environment in which suitors have all been turned away. When Miss Emily’s father dies, she refuses to let her father be buried, insisting he is not dead. “She did that for three days, with the ministers calling on her, and the doctors, trying to persuade her to let them dispose of the body” (881). Miss Emily also poisoned Homer Barron. The druggist tried to confront what Miss Emily was going to use the poison for but she said nothing. “Miss Emily just stared at him… until he looked away and went and got the arsenic and wrapped it up” (882). After a long time of being shut away, Emily dies in one of the downstairs rooms in a large bed with a curtain, "her gray head propped on a pillow yellow and moldy with age and lack of sunlight" (884). However, when the townspeople go into the house, they find upstairs the rotting corpse of Homer or what "was left of him, rotted beneath what was left of the nightshirt" (884). What was worst was the surprised ending “then we noticed that in the second pillow was the indentation of a head. One of us lifted something from it… we saw a long strand of iron gray hair”
The Gothic serves to reveal the psychology of human beings on the fringes of society and their underlying and dark motives. As a character, Miss Emily is damaged psychologically by her intensely patriarchal environment in which suitors have all been turned away. When Miss Emily’s father dies, she refuses to let her father be buried, insisting he is not dead. “She did that for three days, with the ministers calling on her, and the doctors, trying to persuade her to let them dispose of the body” (881). Miss Emily also poisoned Homer Barron. The druggist tried to confront what Miss Emily was going to use the poison for but she said nothing. “Miss Emily just stared at him… until he looked away and went and got the arsenic and wrapped it up” (882). After a long time of being shut away, Emily dies in one of the downstairs rooms in a large bed with a curtain, "her gray head propped on a pillow yellow and moldy with age and lack of sunlight" (884). However, when the townspeople go into the house, they find upstairs the rotting corpse of Homer or what "was left of him, rotted beneath what was left of the nightshirt" (884). What was worst was the surprised ending “then we noticed that in the second pillow was the indentation of a head. One of us lifted something from it… we saw a long strand of iron gray hair”