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What do you believe is the purpose of this story? Why does it exist? What impact does it have on you? What is its goal? What does it convey to you, and why is that significant? Why should anyone care about some former Southern aristocratic lady who lost her fortune and disobeyed the standard expectations and mores of her culture? Why should we care about some lady who poisoned a Northern day laborer and slept with him after he was dead? What's the point of this piece? Explain.
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Janine Hull
ReplyDeleteI think the purpose of this video is to show the control of a woman in this story, and to show a different kind of love. In all the other stories we have read about there is love in the stories but not the kind of love Emily has for her dead husband. I think this story exists to show that even though this kind of control from a women is wrong she still has control and Faulkner wanted to show the readers that. It also shows that even though her husband is dead she still has the love and care for him, so it also shows the readers a different kind of love story compared to all the stories we have been reading. This story had a strong impact on me because I was able to connect with it really easily. It reminded me of the movie "Psycho" The main character lost his mom and loved his mom and kept her dead body in the basement. This story is similar to the reading and kind of freaked me out a little to know that there might be more people out there in the world like these two characters. In life we should care about people more often the same thing is going to happen to other people if we don't do something about it. With the girl from the video a lot of people might not know about their cultures or what happened in her life. With the video going on broadcast we found out all about it and we were able to see how she lives her life and maybe do something about it. It is the same thing for "A Rose for Emily" we should care about her story because she might do it to someone else eventually, or give some else the idea to do the same thing. By caring we found out what really happened and prevented that from happening. This story had a really significant point, it was to show a different kind of love, control of a woman, and when someone dies how many people care.
Anna DeFusco
ReplyDeleteThe purpose of Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily” is to portray the lengths one will go to in order to feel less alone. The character Miss Emily Grierson never married and lived a reclusive life. Her self-imposed isolation caused neighbors and townspeople to question her sanity, and they took pity on her loneliness after her father’s death. She was only accompanied by her servant, who would run errands for her because she refused to leave her house. According to the text, “None of the young men were quite good enough for Miss Emily and such. We had long thought of them as a tableau, Miss Emily a slender figure in white in the background, her father a spraddled silhouette in the foreground, his back to her and clutching a horsewhip, the two of them framed by the backflung front door”(Faulkner, 393). Their status among the community intimidated any suitors, preventing any man from pursuing her. She was thirty when her father died, leaving her without much time and many options to establish a relationship with anybody. Faulkner writes, “…and a short time after her sweetheart—the one we believed would marry her—had deserted her….after her sweetheart went away, people hardly saw her at all”(Faulkner, 392). This to me is the reason why she poisoned Homer Barron with arsenic. Miss Emily was probably so fearful that Homer would leave her, that she killed him in order to keep him near. Although the concept of necrophilia is disturbing and repulsive, I couldn’t help but empathize with Miss Emily. Her seclusion probably drove her to insanity, which led her to do such a thing.
Anna DeFusco (con.t)
ReplyDeleteThis short story can relate to the theme of enslavement because Miss Emily was enslaved by her community, her father, and her own mind. Miss Emily had a certain mystique to the people in her town. According to the narrator, who appears to be a member of the public, Miss Emily was often the topic of conversation. For example, “She carried her head high enough—even when we believed that she was fallen. It was as if she demanded more than ever the recognition of her dignity as the last Grierson; as if it had wanted that touch of earthiness to reaffirm her imperviousness”(Faulkner, 394). Miss Emily was aware of her status among the community; therefore, she was conscious of her enslavement by them. Also, the women in the town disapproved of her decision to be with Barron, who was a Northerner. Faulkner writes, “But there were still others, older people, who said that even grief could not cause a real lady to forget noblesse oblige” (Faulkner, 394). Noblesse oblige is French for noble obligation. It essentially means that one must act in a fashion that conforms to one's position, and with the reputation that one has earned. She is enslaved by the expectations of the etiquette of society. Miss Emily is not only enslaved by her father in terms of relationships, though. Of course, he was too proud to let her find love because of his title in the town. However, Miss Emily is also financially enslaved by his death and debt. For example, we can understand from the text that the city authorities visit her to collect her taxes. She refuses payment, because she cannot afford it and is in denial. Upon her deathbed Faulkner describes, “They held the funeral on the second day, with the town coming to look at Miss Emily beneath a mass of bought flowers, with the crayon face of her father musing profoundly above the bier…”(Faulkner, 397). I think that Faulkner does this on purpose to symbolically show how her father enslaved her. Maybe it was tradition in the old south to display paintings of family; however, I think he was trying to show how much her father dominated her life. Lastly, Miss Emily is enslaved by her own mind. She murders Homer Barron because she is insecure that he will abandon her like her other lover did. For example he writes, “The body had apparently once lain in the attitude of an embrace, but now the long sleep that outlasts love, that conquers even the grimace of love, had cuckolded him” (Faulkner, 397). Miss Emily was insane enough to murder Barron to force him to stay with her. She was not convinced that his love for her may have lasted and naturally have wanted him to commit to her for the rest of time.
I believe the story “A Rose for Emily” exists to show us a difference in society. It is to show one’s quest to be loved and to never be alone, but not a “normal persons” quest, a person deemed to be “sick”, her quest. The goal of the story is to get people to look past the outside look of a person, and possibly help the person. Faulkner says “She carried her head high enough- even when we believed that she was fallen.”(394). The people in her community knew she was sick in the head but no one ever really tried to do anything or help. Emily was enslaved by her community, she was also enslaved by her father, but even more she was enslaved by herself. Her mind was her enemy. In all reality her father could have created the conditions in her mind because he pretty much kept her locked up. The story really disturbed me that Emily was sleeping with a man she had poisoned. I found it a little crazy that someone could write about something like that without going through something like it. Although now that I’ve thought about it the story conveys a story of a girl who was searching for love and married life, and she thought she had found it, but the man she had found was about to leave. So her only option to keep him close to her and with her was to murder him. All her life he’s been the only person to look beyond what everyone else see’s on the outside, but he might be trying to leave because he’s finally seeing the truth. We care because she was different and everybody saw her that way. Even though she was different and went against the norms of her society she was respected. In all honesty I cannot say what the author’s point for the story was, but I think this story has a couple of points, but they tie into pretty much one. The points are the control of a woman, her seek for love, and societies look on confinement. It all goes into the control of a woman, her seek for love, and what her society saw of her lead to insanity. Emily was so set on being loved, yet from being so controlled by her father and confined she could not easily find it. Even after her father died she still lived in confinement and when she found someone who loved her she murdered him. She went so far as buying men’s toiletries. She wanted this man to be with her forever. And when they found his body they saw “the body had apparently once lain in the attitude of an embrace” (397). Unfortunately, these things are not as far out of the ordinary as they may seem. Women kill their lovers and children kill their parents. This story I can relate to one I had seen on the news a while back of a woman who was hiding her mother’s already dead body in her house. Now this woman did not kill her mother, her mother died of natural causes I believe, but she did not want to lose her mother so she kept her mother’s body in her house with her. Such stories are not as odd as they seem. In the end some people are controlled by the thoughts in their heads, and some people murder based on those thoughts, because mental illnesses take over a person’s life. People start to believe the things they are hearing in their head.
ReplyDeleteAaron Mathieu
ReplyDeleteI think the purpose of “A Rose for Emily” was to show how far somebody will go for love, along with how people handle the loss of someone they love. In the story the woman loses her father but refuses anybody to go inside and take care of it. After a few days the smell gets so bad that the town has to take matters into their own hands and act upon this. “..Doctors, trying to persuade her to dispose the body” What the doctors are trying to do is prevent the smell of a dead man and do right by him and have him buried in the necessary way, but Emily doesn’t want it that way. Her love for her father is to strong I think and she isn’t ready yet to face the death of her father if she keeps him in the house dead and it takes the risk of law enforcement getting involved for her to dispose it. “Just as they were about to resort to law and force, she broke down, and they buried her father.”
The impact that this story has on me is to cherish the moments you have with the people you love before they are gone. In the story it talks about how after the death of her father Emily didn’t really come around and was saddened by the loss. So this story taught me to live every moment to the fullest. The goals of the story are to try and get the point across to you that you should live your life to the fullest with the people you care about because when they are gone it hurts you and could affect you in a bad way like it did Emily. We should care about Emily because she was a human being and we should treat one another with respect and even though she may have done some things like not paid her taxes or poisoned a northern laborer she is still a human and she deserves to some extent a type of respect. You don’t have to like or agree with what she did or does, but you should respect her because from the story she never did wrong to nobody she always just minded her business.
I think the point of this piece is to show how people judge other people. In this story so many people were quick to jump on the wagon of how Emily did this and Emily did that but people never really got the chance to know her. When she finally died it didn’t even seem like people cared all that much about her death they were just more interested in going into her house which had not been seen in 40 years. “…talking of Miss Emily as if she had been a contemporary of theirs” “…one room in that region above stairs which no one had seen in forty years.” It seems as if everyone just put on a front so that they could get inside the house and get a tour at what no had seen before.
Heather Feenan
ReplyDeleteI believe the purpose if this story is to show readers that there people like Emily out there. Emily is enslaved by her own mind. She is mentally sick. I don’t think she was always sick and if she was it didn’t really know until her father’s death. The people in her town pitied her. They thought about how her aunt and how she went crazy. I also think this story is a love story. It’s disturbing but she loved her dad so much she didn’t want to get rid of the body after his death. She must have been extremely lonely after her father’s death. The Negro man was the only one that ever went in and out of the house. When she stopped leaving the house the town started thinking she would never get married. But there was a man that she loved. She loved him so much that she poisoned him and after he died she kept him in a bed upstairs and would sleep with him. She did this to prevent him from leaving her. I feel like she needed to have a man in her life. She couldn’t be on her own. One of the points of the story was to show that stuff like this does happen. It could be happening to someone that lives near you, but you wouldn’t know because society now isn’t as close. We’re not as small, we don’t know everything about everyone that lives near us. In this story there is a feel of community that we don’ get now.
The significance of this story is to show some people dont have it all together. We as a society tend to single these people out. We attempt to help them but not always in the best of ways. For example sneeking into somebodys basement and sprinkling lime all over to get rid of the smell is embarassing for the individual who owns the basement. Also the women around the town consistently talk about Emily. When a people become bored they think of ways to amuse themsleves. Sometimes this leads to people becoming the subject of converstaion. In Emily's case she was different from the other women around the town so they would all talk about her because, in effect by talking about Emily's problems they wouldnt have to think about they're own. All this leads me to believe that people will choose to talk about others before themselves because we have all created an immage of ourselves. We want that immage to remain consistant. People do not enjoy change, but as a person you are constantly changing at every moment in your life. People make choices, like the saying if you kill a butterfly in the past the world will drastically change.
ReplyDelete-Marty Noenickx
Brendan Wixted
ReplyDeleteI believe the purpose of “ A rose for Emily” is to show us that there are people like Emily in our society today. People like Emily who is lonely and mentally ill. Also that the love she had for this man that she actually poisoned him so he would not leave her. I think the story exists simply to show a disturbing love story, and what people will do to make them happy. The impact this had on me was I was pretty disturbed that she actually killed someone purposely so she could always be with him and sleep with him. I think the overall point of this piece is to show us what insanity and love can bring someone to do. It doesn’t happen often and you never hear it happening around you, but things like this do happen. It shows that our society is so untrusting that you would need to kill someone for insurance that they stay with you. It could be a good possibility that the only reason this happened is because she is mentally ill, but sleeping with her dead lover is taking it to far and is beyond disturbing. A different look at the story is that maybe Emily killed the man because she felt that it was the only way to gain or take control of a man. This would tie in to our previous post of the women having no power and being controlled and basically slaved by her man.
Marisa Simpson
ReplyDeleteI think the purpose of this story was to show how people love and control and what people would do not to be alone. In “A Rose for Emily” Miss Emily she was very alone. Her father died, and she didn’t really have anyone significant in her life. When she was thirty and single, people found it vindictive then her father died. She was left the house and in a strange way people were glad because now they could at least pity the woman. The body of her father was residing in the house and for three days she did not allow people to take it. She was willing to keep a the dead body of her father inside the house. I think that shows how much she loved him but also how much she did not want to be alone. Then she starts seeing a guy named Homer Barron. She ends up poisoning him and his body remains in the house. At the end of the story, Miss Emily dies and the people learn that she had Homer’s body in her house. “Then we noticed that the second pillow was the indention of a head…we saw a long strand of iron -gray hair.”(397 Faulkner). She must of stayed and laid next to the body the whole time it was there. I think this shows how judgmental people can be. All the people say was the surface of Miss Emily. Nobody took the time to get to know her and understand how very alone this woman was. We should care about her because nobody else to the time to care about her besides probably her father and Homer. Not even her kinfolk, who lived in Alabama, made an attempt to visit and comfort her.
Linda Palushaj
ReplyDelete" A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner is a story about a women Emily. The author tells the story of Emily Grierson's life. Emily lived a sort of crazy life. Her father dies which might have caused her to lose her mind a little. When her father died she didn't believe it was true. When people called her to say they were sorry or went to her door to say sorry "...with no trace of grief on her face she told them that her father was no dead (393)". Then the story goes on to tell how her father didn't pay taxes. It also shows how Emily was enslaved by her community in a way. Emily kept to herself while the community kept as a whole. People often talked about her and how they felt sorry for her but no one really went to see how she really was people just talked about her. Finally one day Emily falls in love with Homer Barron. But people of the community kept saying "poor Emily" (394). But Emily "...carried her head high enough- even though [society] believed she was fallen (394)" But this love was a crazy love story. Emily's mind enslaved her so much. Her mind really made her become mentally sick. Emily poisoned Homer Barron and slept with him this is kind of crazy and sick that someone would actually do that. But her mind and love made her. This is a way different kind of love then we since in any of the other story. I believe the purpose of the story was to show that they are people out there that are so enslaved in their minds that they would do anything. Emily was probably so fearful that she would lose the love of her life so she poisoned him so he would always be with her. It was crazy though when she died how they found Homer in the room and sad that she would go that far to try to keep love. When I read this story it made me think that it is really crazy that she was enslaved so much and the community just kind of left her out. They would all talk about her but none really tried to truly help her to be her friend. It was said that when she dies the whole town went to her funeral. But did they go out of respect of did they go just to see her house that wasn't seen in the last ten years. I believe the significance of the story is to portray love but a different love from what we have seen when we read the other stories. People should care about the lady who "lost her fortune and disobeyed the standard expectations and mores of her culture" because there are people out they who are like Emily. Some society's and cultures ignore people when they are crazy but this can lead to serious crazy problems. The person's mind can lead them to do unbelievable things. I think the point of this piece was that the author wanted to write about Emily's life so we can see how enslaved she was and how she was.
The purpose of Faulkner’s story “A Rose for Emily” was to display the length one will go for the sake of love and loneliness. Emily’s denial for her father’s death, and storing of a her husband’s dead body are prime examples of the lengths she went to to keep herself from being alone. She probably would have kept her father for as long as she kept her husband but the fact the town knew of his death made it harder for her to keep him in sec ret so was forced to eventually give in to his death. Later and later in her life she kept to herself and refused to travel in town, which made it easier for her to conceal her loved one after his passing. Emily disobeyed the norms of society by not recognizing the town authorities and neglecting to pay her taxes. Because of her insubordination within the community she was viewed almost as a threat, people only seem to notice those who are different and not those who seem to just follow along.
ReplyDeleteThe norms of society were that Emily should have been seen frequently outside of her home and in town and that she should obey the town officials and pay her taxes. Because she did not follow these “rules”, society in a way shunned her. Just by trespassing on her property to eliminate the smell the neighbors smelled, they were disregarding her and her property. The over rode her own authority over her own property and took matters in to their own hands, but carefully. They did not want to upset her so they in turn went at night, hoping she was unaware of their visit.
Michelle Spadaro