Blog Assigment #2: “What I liked most of the short story “A Rose for Emily”

Katheline I. Ramos Vázquez

Ingl 3104     Sec 060

Profa. Elizabeth Lenherr

February 14, 2011   

Blog Assigment #2: “What I liked most of the short story “A Rose for Emily” 

From the both short stories that we read in class, the one I liked most was “A Rose for Emily”, because I thought is a very unique, surprising and mysterious story. Most of the themes presented in the story that were too the reason why I liked it so much were mystery, fear and love.

From the beginning of the story it is present a mysterious mood, because it begins with Miss Emily’s death. It is described the house where she lived as a “big, squarish frame house that had once been white… set on what had once been our most select street” (Faulkner, 1). In my mind I pictured a beautiful big antique house from the eighties, but them it is told “the house was left, lifting its stubborn and coquettish decay” (Faulkner, 1) this means that the house turned old and creepy looking and it is when the mystery begins. Why Miss Emily left the house to decay? I personally like when the story begins to turn to a creepy mood with the house because I’ve always wonder what would be like to be in a kind of looking haunted house. Another mystery in the story is, why did Emily killed Homer Barron, her sweetheart? She loved him very much, but everyone in town felt sorry for her because they knew Homer Barron didn’t love her same and when he finished the construction work of the town he will go. Maybe Emily killed him because she didn’t want to be alone. After her father’s death she was left very lonely because her father didn’t let her to create a family of her own. So she preferred to have Homer dead, decaying in one room of the house than alive but not with her.

When Emily commits the homicide of Homer Barron by poisoning him with arsenic, it is clearly presented her fear of being alone. Earlier in the story it is presented this fear when her father died “She told them that her father was 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” (Faulkner, 2) Emily didn’t wanted anybody to take away her father from her although he was already not among the living. But she couldn’t accept to be alone; she couldn’t accept her fear of accepting changes. This theme of fear I like it very much in the story because it teaches the reader a very valuable lesson and that is that everything changes. We have to get use to what comes in life no matter what because then we can turn crazy like Miss Emily did or we could die for not adapting to change. It is very difficult to accept change from the first step, but life is a changing cycle all the time. Miss Emily’s fear of being alone and not accepting change consumed her and made her killed Homer Barron so he can stay with her forever although dead. 

I like very much when there is love involved in a story, but in this story love takes a sick turn because Miss Emily loved Homer Barron so much she didn’t wanted him to abandoned her. So she preferred to have him in her house, locked in a room, decaying slowly through the pass of time in a bed dead. It is very sick and horrible to do something like that. But what I like about this part of the story is that her love was so strong she was able to do that, but if she had been a mentally healthy woman she would have let him go to be free and love whoever he wants. Because the power of love is so strong that should be able to think for the lovers good and happiness. But Miss Emily wasn’t quite that reflexive, because she was blinded by the fear of being alone her whole life.

In conclusion what I liked most about the story apart from all the themes that make me like it so much, is the valuable lesson it teaches; if you love someone but that person is not happy with you or doesn’t love you the same you should let that person go and be free to find his or her happiness and good. Other lesson is that dead is an everyday ordinary thing, it is painful but we should accept it and continue life as it is. Surely that loved one is in heaven and it watches over his or her family from above.

Faulkner, William, “A Rose for Emily”, Missisipi: 1931. Web