“EVERY ROSE HAS ITS THORN”

The role of Jefferson City as a repressive voice in William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily”

"...basically a battlefield (…) A dark-cellar in which a well-bred spinster lady (the superego) and a sex-crazed monkey (the id) are forever engaged in mortal combat, the struggle being refereed by a rather nervous bank clerk (the ego)." (Don Bannister, Freudian Psychologist)

IntroEmily Grierson is a misfit both in time and place. “Yes” and “No” fight an

endless battle within her psyche. Love seems to escape from her hands. Unable to be happy in the real world with his losses, disillusions and changes, she tries uselessly to overcome the inexorability of death and time, trying to freeze events by means of grotesque and macabre attitudes, like murder and necrophilia. Inside his gloomy and mysterious house, Miss Grierson tries to hide herself from condemnatory observers. Inside his conflicted mind, voices of disapproval and condemnation seem to reverberate endlessly. In William Faulkner’s dark and Gothic short story “A Rose for Emily”, these voices are materialized through the voice of the omniscient narrator, a member of Jefferson’s community, which plays an important role in the plot, observing and judging each and every move in Emily’s life, as a repressive conscience.

#1Miss Emily’s life is haunted by his own fears Her psychological nightmare

starts with an historical of sexual repression and overprotection, suggesting an incestuous relationship. A Freudian approach could lead us to interpret sexual repression and oedipean love as a possible cause to her mental disorders. Unable to accept the loss of her father, she tries to keep his dead body (people have trouble on making her to give up) Further on, she tries to bridge the gap with the presence of Homer, but they’re not able to surpass society moral code. Whereas he himself claims to be not marriable, probably due to his bisexuality (“he liked man”) and bohemian lifestyle, she’s out of her league, not of “her kin”. After all, “… the [Jeeferson’s ] ladies all said ( …) a Grierson would not think seriously of a (…) day laborer.” And she couldn’t also forget the “noblesse oblige”.The sensation of feeling herself observed “…Daily, monthly, yearly…” by its turn, suggests a persecutory disease. Over and over again, the judgmental voices of Jefferson people seem to haunt her mind. For a second time, the only way her insane mind sees to make time stand still (at least, they were happy during the Sunday afternoon buggy rides) and keep Homer (her father figure now) by her side is by murder and necrophilia.

(EXPLAIN WHAT THE CITY SAYS ABOUT THESE FACTS)

Though the narrator is not identified, by using the pronoun “we” he reveals at least that he’s part of Jefferson’s people. Furthermore, though the narrator seems not to know everything about Emily’s secret, this fact can be attributed to the constants shifts of time throughout the storytelling, keeping a daunting atmosphere of suspense, where the picture is revealed in a puzzle-like way.

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ConclusionTo conclude, we can infer that Jefferson plays an important role in the

developments regarding Miss Emily’s life, a rose that offers its fleeting beauty and smell as compensations to its hurtful spikes. A contradictory and oppressive force, the same community that represents the changes that Emily refuses to accept constrains her when she tries to pursue his happiness and observes and judges her acts. It represents her own internal struggle between her uncensored desires and the repressive thoughts of guilty and condemnation. Hence, her inner self collapses and her insane instincts prevail. Jefferson, the fictional city in Faulkner’s haunting story, is a character itself. It is personified through narrator’s voice. Even though the actual identity of the narrator is not revealed, his voice sounds like the city`s voice (example), or perhaps the echoes that reverberate inside Emily‘s mind in her psychotic deliria.”Poor Emily”

(Paraphrase ?) Jefferson, t he fictional city in William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily”, works a character itself. It is personified through narrator’s voice. Even though the actual identity of the narrator is not revealed, his voice sounds like the city`s voice (example), or perhaps the echoes that reverberate inside Emily‘s troubled mind in her psychotic delirium.

Example + CommentExample + Comment

FACTS – Father figure /sexual repression/ incestuous relationship/ she doesn`t accept

her father`s death and resists to release her body to burial/

She is unable accept Homer’s departure/ keep his lover by killing him and sleeps with the corpse;

She tries to be happy when she tries to be happy, society judgments – Jefferson

She doesn`t accept her father`s death and resists to release her body to burial/ She tries to be happy when she tries to be happy, society judgments - Jefferson

she doesn`t accept her father`s death and resists to release her body to burial/ she is unable accept Homer’s departure/ keep his lover by killing him and sleeps with the corpse;

Paper Topic:

A Rose for Emily by William Faulker

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A Rose for Emily A Rose for Emily A Rose for Emily

A Rose for Emily by Faulkner is a conventional Freudian explanation of incest and necrophilia . The incestuous relation between Emily and her father had indelible impact on the future life of Emily . Her father 's motive to indulge her in assumed incestuous relationship is considered a protective tool . In to protect Emily 's inviolability from future potential suitors , he must turn against her , unaware of the consequences on the psychological and emotional life of Emily

Freud asserted that sexual repression causes psychological abnormality. Emily 's overprotective and domineering father deprives her of a normal liaison with the opposite sex by chasing away any probable mates . So denial of a normal relationship and incestuous relationship with her father makes her an introvert and outcast for society . She takes refuge in solitude . Since her relation with father was so intimate , her aberration at the death of her father is a natural phenomenon . She refutes his death and keeps his dead body . Later in the story , she wants to develop a normal mundane life , when she allowed the children to come in to her house for painting and herself extended her relation with Homer . But again social actors remain a hindrance in her way . Certainly the storyteller proposes that Homer himself may not exactly be enthusiastic about marrying Emily . Finally , Emily 's poisoning Homer can be taken as necrophilic act as she waited for the body to decompose before endorsing her oedipal fantasy . The discovery of a strand of her hair on the pillow next to the rotting corpse suggests that she slept with the cadaver or , even worse , had sex with it . In the fantasy of necrophilism , she might have played the imagined coitus with her father

Emily 's repressive life therefore adds to her psychological abnormality necrophilia . Even if she commits a hideous crime, Faulkner portrays Emily as a victim of her circumstance

References

Summary:   In William Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily," Emily Grierson's is not allowed to develop a normal relationship with a man, because of her father's belief that no man was good enough for her. This led to Emily's psychological problems that resulting in having poisoned a suitor in order to not be jilted.

In William Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily," the setting hurts Miss Emily Grierson's emotional state. The story takes place in a county in Mississippi during the decline of the Old South after the Civil War. This is important because her family represents the decline itself. Her father dies leaving her penniless and alone. Emily is a victim of the circumstances surrounding her, of society, old costumes and her own father. This contributes to her psychological abnormality; the disfiguration of her emotional state.

After Emily's father dies the ladies in town say "We remembered all the young men her father had driven away." According to Freudian psychoanalysis sexual repression often causes psychological damage. Fallowing old southern costumes Emily's father was to choose a suitor for her; however he found that none of them were good enough for her.....

Faulkner , William contributing editor , Noel Polk . A rose for Emily The Harcourt Brace casebook series in literature . Fort Worth : Harcourt College Publishers , 2000...

A Rose for Emily, Example Essay

In his short story “A Rose for Emily,” William Faulkner writes of a daughter keeping the body of her dead father for couple of days. Nonetheless, Emily Grierson’s reason for holding on to her father is much different from my family wanting everyone to say farewell to my great-aunt. Emily’s seclusion from others and dependency on her father is what kept her from letting go. Without her father, she felt like she had nothing, which is a common feeling amongst mourners. However, Emily is not a normal person and because of this, her dependency causes her to go to the extreme. The death of her father is the first major change in Emily’s life and it leads to many events in the story as well as Emily’s own death. As a result of Emily’s lack of a maternal figure, isolation from society, and her disturbed relationships with men, Emily loses her mind and her will to live.Emily’s childhood without a mother causes her to be clueless to the ways of society and develop dependency issues with her father. It seems that Emily grows up without the manners of a woman of her stature. One reason for this assumption is that

Emily cuts her hair, “When we saw her again, her hair was cut short, making her look like a girl […]�