"A Rose For Emily"

This is a story of a woman who the readers of “A Rose for Emily” really do not know that much about. The only information that we do get might be completely elaborated and misconstrued. The townspeople have retold and retold the stories of Emily Grierson’s life. She happened to be the town’s entertainment of the moment, the mysterious life of Emily. She is a woman who didn’t seem to handle change very well. When her father died, it took her three days for her to accept it. She wouldn’t accept the fact that times were changing and the people who use to take care of her, for example, Colonel Sartoris, were no longer around. This would mean that she should have to start paying taxes. However, we learn that she wasn’t going to accept that as an option. She had an agreement with Colonel Sartoris and that’s all that Emily cared about. When told that she had to start paying, Emily response was to kept repeating, “I have no taxes in Jefferson” (Faulkner, 207).
The most important moment of the story to me was the ending. When I first read the story by myself, I didn’t comprehend what it meant when she had kept Homer Barron locked in her house. It was a complete shock to find out that he was dead. I realized that Emily bought the poison for him so he didn’t have a chance to leave her. This was another change that I don’t think Emily was willing to accept. If he didn’t want to stay by choice, he would end up staying by force. The part of this situation that really got to me was in the class discussion when I realized that she was still lying with Homer. I didn’t realize the significance of the grey hair on the pillow. That really emphasizes that idea that Emily wasn’t willing to accept change in her life. The murder, in a sick way, kept him unchanged for herself.

Faulkner, William. "A Rose for Emily." Literature, reading, reacting, writing. Thomson Wadsworth. compact sixth edition. Boston: Michael Rosenberg, 2007. 206-212.