Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily” p. 716-722
After listening to the story, you will complete the following set of questions with a partner.
These questions will appear (in some form) on the upcoming test, so please take thisseriously.
Setting: Faulkner sets up “A Rose for Emily” in the Southern town of Jefferson, which plays an important role in the characterization of the townspeople and Miss Emily.
1)What can you learn about the standards of the town by its setting?
2)The story begins at the end of Miss Emily’s life, at her funeral. How do the men act? The women? How did the townspeople treat her?
3) What is the story behind Emily’s refusal to pay her taxes? Does she realize that the man named Colonel Sartoris died ten years previous? What does this demonstrate about Emily’s sense of time?
4) What do you learn about Miss Emily from the description of the house, first on page 716, and then again on page 718?
Emily and Her Father, the Southern Belle and the Man in Charge:
5)Why is the community’s reaction to the death of Miss Emily’s father one of satisfaction?
6)When the narrator refers to the smell emitted from Miss Emily’s house, and then gives the scene of the men spreading lye around the house, what do you suspect has happened? What does this symbolize about Miss Emily?
7)In the second paragraph on page 719, the reader is introduced to the Southern Aristocratic view of a father and his daughter. What does the reader learn happened to Miss Emily with regards to courting and marrying young men? (*The answer to this could explain Emily’s actions later on*)
8)What item does Mr. Grierson carry that displays his dominance?
9)What do the townswomen plan to do the day after her father dies? How does Miss Emily treat them?
Homer Barron Enters the Scene:
10)Who is Homer Barron? How does Faulkner describe him?
11)Faulkner is juxtaposing the North and the South with Homer and Miss Emily. What occurs between the two of them?
12) How do the townspeople react? What does the narrator believe has happened to Miss Emily’s reputation/virginity?
13) Symbolically, what does Homer’s last name also potentially mean for Emily if she marries him?
Arsenic and Old Lace—Miss Emily’s Solution:
14) On page 720, the reader sees Miss Emily go to the drugstore, and she asks for ______from the druggist, “the best” that he has. When he asks her what she is using it for, how does she reply? What is this substance usually used for?
15) Who do you suspect Emily is going to use this on? What do the townspeople (who somehow know what she purchased) suspect she is going to use it for?
Why Did She Do It?: One of the most debated parts of the story comes on page 721, where Faulkner explains that Homer Barron “liked men, and it was known that he drank with the younger men in the Elks’ Club—that he was not a marrying man.” Readers and critics have debated about Homer’s sexuality, and possibly whether or not this fuels Emily to poison him. The difficulty with this is that the narrator, along with everybody else, supposes that both Emily and Homer might marry and that their relationship has already reached a physical level. What the narrator must mean, then, is that he enjoys the camaraderie of their company. We are in an era where homosexuality is canvassed on a societal level that is generally accepting, whereas Faulkner, when he wrote this over 70 years ago. Homer represents Northern industrial capitalism and Emily embodies the genteel Southern aristocracy. Here is the issue:
16)How does Emily view the idea of marriage from reading this section: “Miss Emily had been to the jewelers and ordered a man’s toilet set in silver, with the letters H.B. on each piece”?
17)Homer rejects the entire institution of marriage, yet another relic of the olden days, and cultivates the society of “younger men at the Elks’ Club”
18)Emily, despite her apparent lapse, her “fallen[ness],” as the narrator quaintly puts in—believes in, clings to, the kind of romantic, chivalric love that outlasts death. Emily had been willing to forgive, or bear, his commonness and his geographical origins, but she cannot abide his willingness to commit, for whatever reason, to an eternal union with her. Emily has, throughout her life, been deprived of empathy and love required for psychic health and happiness. Emily is yet another aging, desperate Southern Belle who simply wanted one last chance at love, but lost.
Miss Emily Returns to Society:
19) What does Miss Emily open her doors to teach after she’s come back out of hiding? What does this confirm about the Southern society she lives in? What happens to the students?
20) Symbolism: In literature, houses can often depict the difference between a character’s private and public life. Write details from the story that describe the happenings above and below stairs.
Upstairs= private life
Downstairs= public life
21)On page 722, what do you notice about the people who come to see her? What types are they?
22)When the narrator says, “Already we knew that there was one room in that region above the stairs which no one had seen for 40 years, and which would have to be forced…” what do they find? How is this room described? What do they find?
23) What is the very last item discovered?
24 & 25)Faulkner creates numerous figurative portraits of Emily herself by framing her in doorways or windows. The chronological organization of Emily’s portraits visually imprints the changes occurring throughout her life. As you read, underneath each silhouette, describe (even cite the quote from the text) Emily.