“A Rose For Emily” by William Faulkner is a story I have read before. When I first read it it gave me a strange feeling mostly because I did not understand what was going on (I couldn’t keep interest in the book so I just read without thinking about it). But reading it again I was able to enjoy it more than before, it is a good story for Gothic Literature.
I read the book and saw a lot of symbolism which to me added more insight and meaning to the story. The house can be symbolized as Emily’s physical and mental health because they are both decaying. And the house was made in 1870 also symbolizing how she is trying to hold on to a vanished past.
The story mentions death from the beginning to the end. It seemed like an important topic for the story because it always set the tone and had you thinking about what is going on in that house. The first death you hear about is Emily’s father and then Homer’s. The neighborhood either got used to the smell of death from her house or the lime they spread around the home got rid of it. Either way, the smell of decaying bodies seemed to be strong and nobody bother her about it. The story after Emily dies makes things go weird. They break down the sealed room that has not been entered in forty years to find Homer Barron’s body stretched in the bed which seems to imply necrophilia. The story had me weirded out but in a good way.
I agree with you that the house represents and symbolizes the way that Emily is decaying. Emily was strange since the beginning of the story, but she seemed to get much worst after her father died. I think that her whole life was very sad and lonely; she was always waiting to get married, but that wish seemed to be impossible for her.
I haven’t put much thought of why he house is decaying. It does make sense how her house represents her life when he father was a live until when she died. She was a lonely person that didn’t have both her parents in her life anymore. It didn’t mention at all about her mother. That’s strange, and the smell, Im still a bit confuse with that part. Maybe she killed her first lover because she found out he’s homosexual and wasn’t attach to her.