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William faulkner research essay
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Critiques against William Faulkner
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Comparing the Setting of Barn Burning to that of A Rose for Emily
William Faulkner has written some of the most unique novels and short stories of any author, and, to this day, his stories continue to be enjoyed by many. Both “Barn Burning” and “A Rose for Emily” tell about the life of southern people and their struggles with society, but Faulkner used the dramatic settings of these two stories to create a mood unlike any other and make the audience feel like they too were a part of these southern towns. These two stories have many similarities in there setting, but they also have many differences to that make them unique and interesting.
In many of Faulkner’s stories, he tells about an imaginary county in Mississippi named Yoknapatawpha. He uses this county as the setting for his story “Barn Burning” and it is also thought that the town of Jefferson from “A Rose for Emily” is located in Yoknapatawpha County. The story of a boy’s struggle between being loyal to his family or to his community makes “Barn Burning” exciting and dramatic, but a sense of awkwardness and unpleasantness arrives from the story of how the fictional town of Jefferson discovers that its long time resident, Emily Grierson, has been sleeping with the corpse of her long-dead friend with whom she has had a relationship with.
Another point is, both stories take place after the civil war, but “Barn Burning” takes place in a more rural area. In paragraph 2 of “A Rose for Emily,” it says, “only Miss Emily’s house was left, lifting its stubborn and coquettish decay above the cotton wagons and the gasoline pumps.” This statement gives proof that Jefferson is an urban society that is moving into the industrial period. The Snopes family in “Barn Burning” lives in ...
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... about the stench coming from Miss Emily’s home, the conflict begins. The neighbor, being of a younger generation, feels that the courts should do something about it, but the eighty-year-old Judge Stevens responds by saying, “Dammit sir, will you accuse a lady to her face of smelling bad?” The social context of the story and the different feeling of the characters make for a unique setting and atmosphere.
Whether the setting of a story is insignificant or important strictly depends on the way the author develops the time, place, atmosphere, and social context. In Faulkner’s “Barn Burning” and “A Rose for Emily” the setting becomes a huge contributor toward the overall mood and timeline of the stories. Faulkner wrote these two short stories in such a way that the audience feels like they’re living in that dusty old house or the farming community in rural Mississippi.
6. West, Ray B., Jr. "Atmosphere and Theme in Faulkner's 'A Rose for Emily'." William Faulkner: Four Decades of Criticism. Ed. Linda Welshimer Wagner. Michigan State University Press, 1973. 192-198. Rpt. in Short Story Criticism. Ed. Laurie Lanzen Harris and Sheila Fitzgerald. Vol. 1. Detroit: Gale Research, 1988. Literature Resource Center. Web. 5 July 2011.
William Faulkner is widely considered to be one of the great American authors of the twentieth century. Although his greatest works are identified with a particular region and time (Mississippi in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries), the themes he explores are universal. He was also an extremely accomplished writer in a technical sense. Novels such as The Sound and the Fury and Absalom, Absalom! Feature bold experimentation with shifts in time and narrative. Several of his short stories are favorites of anthologists, including "A Rose for Emily." This strange story of love, obsession, and death is a favorite among both readers and critics. The narrator, speaking for the town of Jefferson in Faulkner 's fictional Yoknapatawpha
Growing up in Mississippi in the late Nineteenth Century and the early part of the Twentieth Century, young William Faulkner witnessed first hand the struggles his beloved South endured through their slow progression of rebuilding. These experiences helped to develop Faulkner’s writing style. “Faulkner deals almost exclusively with the Southern scene (with) the Civil War … always behind his work” (Warren 1310. His works however are not so much historical in nature but more like folk lore. This way Faulkner is not constrained to keep details accurate, instead he manipulate the story to share his on views leading the reader to conclude morals or lessons from his experience. Faulkner writes often and “sympathetically of the older order of the antebellum society. It was a society that valued honor, (and) was capable of heroic action” (Brooks 145) both traits Faulkner admired. These sympathetic views are revealed in the story “A Rose for Emily” with Miss Emily becoming a monument for the Antebellum South.
Faulkner portrays the townspeople and Emily in the southern town of Jefferson during the late 1800's to early 1900's. The town is more than just the setting in the story; it takes on its own characterization alongside Emily the main character. It is the main reasoning behind Emily's attitude and actions. It gives the reader an easier understanding into why Emily makes the decisions she does as the story unwinds.
The story is clearly an illustration of the passing of the old to the new, and of the real character of human nature - decadence. The townspeople had an equal share in the crime that Miss Emily committed, and they were instrumental in its cover-up. She is described as "dear, inescapable, impervious, tranquil, and perverse." (85) This description sums up the people's outlook of both her, and themselves in their willingness to embrace her. Even today the fetters of certain types of ignorance and other forms of evil acts are on view anywhere in the country if one looks. A Rose for Emily illustrates it in its purest form in its own time.
William Faulkner is widely considered to be one of the great American authors of the twentieth century. Although his greatest works are identified with a particular region and time (Mississippi in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries), the themes he explores are universal. He was also an extremely accomplished writer in a technical sense. Novels such as The Sound and the Fury and Absalom, Absalom! feature bold experimentation with shifts in time and narrative. Several of his short stories are favorites of anthologists, including "A Rose for Emily." This strange story of love, obsession, and death is a favorite among both readers and critics. The narrator, speaking for the town of Jefferson in Faulkner's fictional Yoknapatawpha County, Mississippi, tells a series of stories about the town's reclusive spinster, Miss Emily Grierson. The stories build up to a gruesome revelation after Miss Emily's funeral. She apparently poisoned her lover, Homer Barron, and kept his corpse in an attic bedroom for over forty years. It is a common critical cliche to say that a story "exists on many levels." In the case of "A Rose for Emily", this is the truth. Critic Frank A. Littler, in an essay published in Notes on Mississippi Writers regarding the chronology of the story, writes that "A Rose for Emily" has been read variously as ". . .a Gothic horror tale, a study in abnormal psychology, an allegory of the relations between North and South, a meditation on the nature of time, and a tragedy with Emily as a sort of tragic heroine." These various interpretations serve as a good starting point for discussion of the story.
As simple as it is to become a father, it takes a special kind of man to take on the role of being a dad. A dad has significant duties to love, protect, and to provide guidance for his family. Unfortunately, not all fathers are able to live up to these expectations to provide and set an example for their children. Both in William Faulkner’s short stories “Barn Burning” and “A Rose For Emily," the monumental influence and impact fathers have on shaping their children’s lives is addressed through the characters of Sarty and Emily and the struggles they face. Faulkner shows how two people with completely different lives can experience the same problems. In Sarty and Emily’s case,
In “ A Rose for Emily”, William Faulkner tells the complex tale of a woman who is battered by time and unable to move through life after the loss of each significant male figure in her life. Unlike Disney Stories, there is no prince charming to rescue fallen princess, and her assumed misery becomes the subject of everyone in the town of Jefferson, Mississippi. As the townspeople gossip about her and develop various scenarios to account for her behaviors and the unknown details of her life, Emily Grierson serves as a scapegoat for the lower classes to validate their lives. In telling this story, Faulkner decides to take an unusual approach; he utilizes a narrator to convey the details of a first-person tale, by examining chronology, the role of the narrator and the interpretations of “A Rose for Emily”, it can be seen that this story is impossible to tell without a narrator.
In "A Rose for Emily" and "Barn Burning," William Faulkner creates two characters worthy of comparison. Emily Grierson, a recluse from Jefferson, Mississippi, is an important figure in the town, despite spending most of her life in seclusion. On the contrary, Abner Snopes is a loud, fiery-tempered man that most people tend to avoid. If these characters are judged by reputation and outward appearance only, the conclusion would be that Emily Grierson and Abner Snopes are complete opposites. However, despite the external differences, these two characters have surprisingly similar personalities.
In “A Rose For Emily”, by William Faulkner, plot plays an important role in how
William Faulkner used indirect characterization to portray Miss Emily as a stubborn, overly attached, and introverted women through the serious of events that happened throughout her lifetime. The author cleverly achieves this by mentioning her father’s death, Homer’s disappearance, the town’s taxes, and Emily’s reactions to all of these events. Emily’s reactions are what allowed the readers to portray her characteristics, as Faulkner would want her to be
In Faulkner’s tale “A Rose for Emily” there are many historical elements throughout the story; Faulkner uses them to give an authentic feel to the story and to add to the setting. A recurring theme that I found was reference to the reconstruction of the South after the Civil War. The setting of the South after their demise in the Civil War adds character to the story and to the characters. The attitudes people had and the way people treated Emily with respect was a tradition of the “Old South” that is presented throughout this tale.
William Faulkner is concerned with the south and its problems with black slavery. The issues in Barn Burning deal with the conflict between father and son. The theme of this story focuses on justice. The boy, Sarty, objects to his father burning barns and wants people to be treated fairly. His father, Abner, believes his son should respect and support kin. Abner thinks family is right no matter what. Faulkner’s intent is to show that choosing between one’s own family and justice is very difficult to do, and in the end justice must prevail. The theme is best illustrated by its point of view, its characterization, and setting.
In a work of literature, setting is important because it shows where the characters interact, what events are happening at the time, and sets the mood and tone of the story. Through setting, William Faulkner weaves an intricate story about the life of Emily Grierson. Faulkner uses creative imagery and a collective “We” perspective much like Ayn Rand’s “Anthem”, in which all of the townspeople speak as one. The story is set in a post-civil war small southern town called Jefferson.
In "A Rose for Emily," William Faulkner's use of setting and characterization foreshadows and builds up to the climax of the story. His use of metaphors prepares the reader for the bittersweet ending. A theme of respectability and the loss of, is threaded throughout the story. Appropriately, the story begins with death, flashes back to the past and hints towards the demise of a woman and the traditions of the past she personifies. Faulkner has carefully crafted a multi-layered masterpiece, and he uses setting, characterization, and theme to move it along.