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In the story 'A Rose for Emily' major themes include death, isolation, and the decline of the Old South. Of these, death takes the cake, with the skeleton in Emily's bed reflecting the decay and corruption of the Old South. Imprisonment and destruction are two important aspects of the story as well. Meanwhile, the style and techniques throughout the story help to get a comprehensive idea of what old southern towns were like in this era. An example of Southern Gothic literature is 'A Rose for Emily'.
'A Rose for Emily' takes place in a southern town, and its decaying house left to her by her father signifies the Corruption of Miss Emily and the destruction she put upon herself. The house is more of a complicated and hidden symbol. The house is literally deteriorating the narrator even describes it as “an eyesore among eyesores.' The story further describes the house as 'encroached upon by garages and cotton gins, structures of industrialization, etc.' The house is a significant symbol for specifically how flawed the culture and history of the Old South are, its offensiveness, the corrupt, and ugly accuracy in its institution of slavery, and its irrelevance in the face of the modern world. There are many similarities between the house and Emily, the more downhill and poor the year's move, the frailer and worn out, both the house and owner present solely a pleasing face to the community which secretes unusual passions and appalling mysteries within.
Miss Emily refuses to admit the passage of time, She is locked in the past, by her own actions, by her father's actions, and by the townspeople's views towards her struggle with the present. Emily's isolation fuels the curiosity of the townspeople, who becomes more interested in her as she becomes more and more withdrawn. Other conflicts are also portrayed by Miss Emily versus the townspeople each part of the story more is revealed about the townspeople and their attitudes toward Miss Emily.
Miss Emily's engagement with the townspeople is a different one. They concurrently resent her, respect her, sympathize with her, and admire her. She is 'high and mighty.' Emily is in a perpetual battle with the townspeople, refusing to pay her taxes, denying to accept condolences when her dad dies, and opposing to justify why she buys arsenic, notwithstanding the townspeople's efforts to control her. Any affection they seem to have for her is compelled by curiosity.
The narrator pays particular notice to the length and color of Miss Emily's hair. The position of the hair, as well as its color and length, advises a progressive communication between Miss Emily and the corpse of Homer, again showing her opposition to accepting the entirety of death. Following the death of her father, Miss Emily's hair is cut short; several years later 'her hair was turning gray. During the next few years, it grew grayer and grayer until it attained an even pepper-and-salt iron-gray' (148). The value of this description is unveiled in the final words of the story when on the pillow near Homer Barron's decomposed body is found a long strand of iron-gray hair (150).
Faulkner uses imagery to show how Emily has started to take on an alike persona as her father. The narrator illustrates how townspeople envision Emily and her father. Emily, all in white, is in the background, while her father, all in black, rises in the forefront, 'his back to her and clutching a horsewhip, the two of them framed by the back-flung front door.' The grim thought unveils that Mr. Grierson possesses the upper hand and constraints Emily's life also within Emily's adulthood. Grierson is the guard of the household. While Emily ages, she develops her father's imminent nature. Meanwhile, when the aldermen confront her regarding the tax bill she 'vanquished them, horse and foot,' as though they signified troops and soldiers in the Civil War. The intensity of her behavior is more apparent. A light comes on in a darkened upstairs room, 'Miss Emily sat in it, the light behind her, and her upright torso motionless' essentially as if she signified a statue. Emily formed her individual cold glare ousting her father's foreboding image.
Faulkner strengthens the suspense by imitating the southern storyteller’s style of depicting people and experiences through situations that triggered recollections. The most striking symbols are the locked room in Miss Emily’s house. The room signifies the strangeness and mystery linked with Miss Emily’s house and her bond with Homer. The cotton gin near Miss Emily’s house connects this development, as it links the cotton culture of the antebellum South with the emerging industrialism of the frequently growing urban New South.
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