Unit 2A Rose for EmilyWilliam FaulknerAdditional Background Information on William FaulknerWilliam Faulkner was born and brought up in the American South and lived there for almost all his life. On November 14, 1888, the local newspaper in Jackson, Mississippi reported a news story: “A terrible tragedy was enacted at Ripley on Tuesday afternoon of last week—the widely and well-known Col. W. C. Falkner being the victim.” Col. Falkner had run for the Mississippi legislature and had been elected. But before he took office he was shot dead by his rival. Col. Falkner had been a local hero and a legendary figure. He was a pioneer in Mississippi, organized a regiment to fight for the South in the Civil War, practiced law after returning from the battlefields, bought a large plantation, built the first railroad in his hometown, and wrote a novel, which became a national best-seller. This “widely and well-known” Col. W. C. Falkner was William Faulkner’s great-grandfather.On September 25, 1897, Faulkner was born in this distinguished family. He spent his youth in Oxford, a small town in Mississippi. Although the old colonel had died before Faulkner came into this world, the boy grew up listening to all sorts of stories about his great-grandfather and other people in his hometown. The stories that his Negro nanny told him and the gossip he heard from the townspeople resting and chatting in the small downtown square provided Faulkner with an oral tradition of storytelling as an important part of his education.During World War I Faulkner served in the Royal Canadian Air Force. After the armistice in 1918 he returned to Oxford, and for some time he led his life in a rather listless way. He attended the University of Mississippi but left the university within a year; he tried his hand at poetry but without much success; he went north to the cultural metropolitan city of New York, but was driven back home soon by loneliness. He became a postmaster, but after three years at most, he resigned from this post. All this time, Faulkner had been reading, first, whatever interested him, and, later, the great poets and novelists. In New York, Faulkner met Sherwood Anderson, a famous writer, and then when he traveled to New Orleans in 1925, he gained entry into this artistic center through Anderson. Inspired by Anderson, Faulkner began to write novels.Faulkner wrote 19 novels and nearly a hundred short stories. The setting of 15 novels and the majority of the short fiction is the American South. In his third book Sartoris (1929), he created the fictional Yoknapatawpha County. In the same year, he published The Sound and the Fury (1929), one of his masterpieces. This novel owes much to James Joyce and the stream ofconsciousness technique. In another major work As I Lay Dying (1930), Faulkner relates a terrifying comic story to a ritualized burial journey. In this novel he experiments with multiple-point-of-view narration. Light in August (1932) is also one of Faulkner’s major novels. The high point of Faulkner’s development is th e brilliant Absalom, Absalom! (1936). His other major works include The Unvanquished, The Wild Palms, The Hamlet, The Town, The Mansion, Go Down Moses, A Fable, etc.As the setting of most of his works is the American South, Faulkner is regarded as a regional writer. But the word “regional” is misleading because Faulkner deals with some of the major universal themes in literature so profoundly that his work is read and recognized nationally and internationally. As far as writing techniques are concerned, Faulkner is among the great experimentalists of the 20th century novel. His effective use of stream of consciousness, multiple points of view, symbolism and imagery, places him among the rank of outstanding modern writers along with James Joyce and Virginia Woolf. In 1950, Faulkner won the Nobel Prize for Literature.The Themes and Writing Techniques of “A Rose for Emily”Although “A Rose for Emily” is one of his most frequently anthologized short stories and is widely used in the American classroom, Chinese students may find it difficult to understand and appreciate. Some of them may think it is a bizarre story about an old eccentric lady in an American Southern town. It’s true that the setting of the story is the American South. Yet, the theme of the story is universal, transcending the boundaries of time and space. Like many other works of great literature, this short story tells about love, death, honor, pride, change, and loss.In “A Rose for Emily” we can see how the author tells the good story skillfully; how he creates the requisite atmosphere for telling the story; how he maintains the suspense and unfolds the conflict bit by bit; and how he digs deep into the social world of his characters. This story is a rich and modern 20th-century literary text. Those who are not very familiar with modern American literature may therefore encounter obstacles in reading this story: vague references, ambiguities, symbolism, imagery, experimental point of view, jumbled time sequences, avoidance of clear transition s, withholding of vital information, etc. By exploiting those “tricks,” Faulkner hopes to invite readers to participate in the process of seeking the truths of the inner life of the characters in the story. Once we do, we will surely enjoy reading the stor y. It’s like working at a puzzle: the more parts we start to figure out, the more interesting the puzzle will become.The 1950 Nobel Prize presentation speech called Faulkner as the “unrivaled master of all living British and American novelists.” He is regarded as a “deep psychologist.” “A Rose for Emily” lives up to that high praise.Implicit Chronology (approximate)The narration of “A Rose for Emily” does not follow a normal chronological order. Instead, it shifts in time frequently and gives out bits of information about the main character, Miss Emily, in such a way that the reader has to piece them together by himself/herself. The following implicit chronology has been worked out on the basis of the information from the text.ca. 1855: Miss Emily was born to the richest family of slave-owners in the town.1861: The American Civil War broke out; Confederate troops from the town were commanded by Col. Sartoris.1865: The American Civil War ended.1870s: Mr. Grierson, Miss Emily’s father, had the family house built in the Gothic revival style. ca. 1886: Mr. Grierson died; Miss Emily’s inheritance was only the house; she was over thirty.ca. 1887: Homer Barron, Northern construction foreman, arrived; he and Miss Emily started courting.ca. 1888: Homer Barron could be seen no more; the smell in the house was noticed.1894: The Young Colonel Sartoris, as mayor of the town, exempted Miss Emily from taxes for life.ca. 1919: The Young Colonel died.ca. 1927-1928: The tax delegation visited Miss Emily.ca. 1929-1930: Miss Emily died at the age of 74.Notes: “ca.” is short for circa, meaning “about” used before an approximate date or figure. We must remember that Faulkner is not always accurate about the exact time of a certain event. The purpose of working out this chronology is to give students a rough idea of the time frame in which the story took place.Structure of the TextP art I (Paras. 1-14)This part begins with the death of Miss Emily, the daughter of an eminent Southern family andindicates who Emily was.When Miss Emily died, all the people in the town went to her funeral. (Para. 1)Miss Emily lived in a big old house on one of the best streets of the town. (Para. 2)When Miss Emily was alive, the older generation treated her as a tradition, a duty, a care anda sort of hereditary obligation. The mayor remitted her taxes. (Para. 3)When a new generation came along, its members wanted her to pay taxes like everyone else.A deputation visited her, but she firmly dismissed them. (Paras. 4-14)Part II (Paras. 15-28)In this part, there is a time shift to thirty years before the visit of the deputation.There was a bad smell from Miss Emily’s house. That was two years after her father’s death and a short time after her sweetheart disappeared. (Para. 15)The neighbors complained about the bad smell, but the town authorities didn’t want to embarrass Miss Emily by telling her straightforwardly. (Paras. 16-23)So, one night, four men secretively crossed Miss Emily’s lawn and sprinkled lime, and soon after that the smell was gone. (Para. 24)The townspeople felt sorry for Miss Emily because her father was so proud that he drove all her suitors away, and when he died, he left her almost nothing apart from the house. (Paras.25-26)The day after her father’s death, people came to offer their condolences, but Miss Emily refused to let them in the house, telling them that her father was not dead. (Paras. 27-28)P art III (Paras. 29-42)It describes how a construction foreman named Homer Barron, a Yankee, courted Miss Emily and how she behaved after her sweetheart disappeared.Because Miss Emily was courting a day laborer, a Northerner, people began to pity her.(Paras. 29-33)One day Miss Emily went to the drug store and bought poison. When asked what it was for, she refused to answer. (Paras. 34-42)P art IV (Paras. 43-53)This part describes in more detail how Emily and Homer Barron were seen together and what happened to Emily after his disappearance.When people saw Emily and Homer Barron together without any signs of their getting married, they thought she was providing a bad example to the young and asked Emily’s relatives to persuade her to get married. They were relieved to see that there were preparations for a marriage. (Paras. 43-45)Homer Barron went away and came back, and was admitted into the house one evening. That was when he was last seen. (Para. 46)Miss Emily did not appear on the streets for a long time. She grew older and her hair grew grayer. She died at the age of seventy-four. (Paras. 47-53)P art V (Paras. 54-60)This part describes what happened after Emily’s death—in an upstairs room, which no one hadentered except Miss Emily herself, the dead body of Homer Barron was found. It had been lying in that bed for forty years.Detailed Study of the Text1.What is the meaning of the title “A Rose for Emily?”The meaning of the title is ambiguous, and can be interpreted in various way. A rose is a cliché, symbolizing love and a pledge of faithfulness. From the story, we can see Miss Emily was denied by love. So, in this sense, the title has an ironic meaning. A rose can also mean a kind of memorial or an offering in memory of someone. Then, who offered a rose to Emily? Faulkner intentionally leaves the answer for the readers to find out. But different readers may arrive at different answers. Ambiguity is one of the characteristics of this story. Students should be encouraged to give their own interpretations and give answers to questions that may arise during their reading and class discussion.2.Who is telling the story?You learn a lot about many 20th-century literary text by asking, “who is telling the story?” That is not a very important question as regards 18th-century fiction or even 19th-century fiction because the narrator in stories written in those periods is usually a person who knows everything at any given moment. This is called “the omniscient (all-knowing) narrator”. Modern writers of the 20th-century, such as Faulkner, like to experiment with different narrative voices. In his long fiction, Faulkner often uses several narrative voices. In “A Rose for Emily”, he chooses to use “we”, the people of the town, as the collective narrator. The first sentence of the story is, “When Miss Emily Grierson died, our whole town went to her funeral...” In the following sections, “we” frequently appears as the narrator.3.Why did the author choose to use this collective narrator?“We” are the ordinary people of the town, representing the gossip of the town. They are, m ost of the time, not participants but observers of events. They are detached from Miss Emily, and therefore different from the “ladies” or “older people” mentioned in paragraph 31, who are more socially involved with Miss Emily, thus tending to be more judgmental. The townspeople are mainly interested in keeping track of events and sharing the information with people coming from outside the town. Yet, as people living in a small town in the South, they have their own values and attitudes. On the whole “we” should be regarded as a reliable narrator. However, “we” are unable to tell the story in a straightforward and systematic manner. As non-participants in the major events, this collective narrator does not know everything, hence this narrative point of view is limited. For example, none of “us” had been inside Miss Emily’s house until her death. So inevitably there are gaps in the narration that are bound to cause confusion among readers or listeners. That leaves a lot of room for readers to participate. As readers, we have to fill in the gaps and piece together the scattered bits of information by ourselves. This is the burden the author places on us, and at the same time, it is part of the enjoyment in reading such a story.4. When Miss Emily Grierson died, our whole town went to her funeral: the men through a sort of respectful affection for a fallen monument, the women mostly out of curiosity to seethe inside of her house, which no one save an old manservant—a combined gardener and cook—had seen in at least ten years. (Para. 1)save: prep.formal except for. e.g.: She answered all the questions save one.Translation:埃米莉·格里尔森小姐去世时，全镇的人都去送葬了。
