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Essay on Emily Dickinson's poetic technique
Essay on Emily Dickinson's poetic technique
Essay on Emily Dickinson's poetic technique
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“True realism consists in revealing the surprising things which habit keeps covered and prevents us from seeing.” This quote by Jean Cocteau provides an accurate summary of realism in American literature. Authors such as Raymond Carver and William Faulkner strived to expose their readers to defects, either internal or external. Their literature puts humanity under the microscope, and allows the reader to examine their daily life from a safe distance. Under examination, many shortcomings can be uncovered. Occasionally, an author will not only reveal these flaws, but provide a practical solution. More often than not though, realists will leave it up to their reader to formulate a cure. In A Rose for Emily, Faulkner looks back on the relationships of an aging southern belle, using third and second person narrative to comment on the happenings of the story. The title character of the story, Miss Emily Grierson, has two main relationships in her lifetime. The first, the relationship she had with her father, is described as controlling: “… that quality of her father which had thwarted her woman’s life so many times before had been too virulent and too furious to die.”(Faulkner 162) Emily’s second relationship was of a romantic nature. Her courtship with Homer Barron began with buggy rides through town and ultimately ended with his death at her hands. Even without details, it is plain to see that Emily suffered from a lack of healthy relationships in her lifetime. One present defect in the story is the inability of people to recognize and escape unhealthy relationship patterns. A Rose for Emily, though written almost thirty years before the development of the concept, tells the story of one woman’s struggle with codependent relationsh... ... middle of paper ... ...nging, forcing them to create their own cure for what ails society. In theory, this exposure to our many imperfections should create a society of self-improvement oriented individuals. Fortunately, for the modern-day realists, that is not the case, and there are still many more defects to expose to a growing readership. Works Cited Faulkner, William. "A Rose for Emily." The Seagull Reader: Stories. New York: W.W. Norton, 2008. 155-64. Print "Mental Health America: Co-dependency." Mental Health America: Co-dependency. Web. 23 Mar. 2011. . Klein, Thomas. “The Ghostly Voice of Gossip in Faulkner’s ‘A Rose for Emily’.” Explicator 65.4 (2007): 229-232. MLA International Bibliography. EBSCO. Web. 21 Mar. 2011. Carver, Raymond. "Cathedral." The Seagull Reader: Stories. New York: W.W. Norton, 2008. 84-98. Print
A Rose for Emily Life is fickle and most people will be a victim of circumstance and the times. Some people choose not to let circumstance rule them and, as they say, “time waits for no man”. Faulkner’s Emily did not have the individual confidence, or maybe self-esteem and self-worth, to believe that she could stand alone and succeed at life especially in the face of changing times. She had always been ruled by, and depended on, men to protect, defend and act for her. From her Father, through the manservant Tobe, to Homer Barron, all her life was dependent on men.
Some readers might find the title of Faulkner’s story, “A Rose for Emily,” ironic. As a Symbol, the rose usually signifies romantic love. Assuming that Faulkner is well aware of a rose’s symbolic meanings, why does he wish to name his story about a doomed and perverse love affair? Faulkner causes the reader to believe this is a classic love story. Faulkner then overturns the reader’s expectations by offering an unconventional heroine. Generally love stories involve a young woman, pure and beautiful, worthy of receiving love. In this story, however, the heroine is old and decrepit. Emily is introduced first at her funeral where everyone from the town has come to pay respects. Emily then is described as “a tradition, a duty, and a care; a sort of hereditary obligation upon the town”. (Faulkner 681) This meaning that the townspeople viewed her as more of a monument to the town that has been there for as long as they can remember and won’t be moved. Emily throughout the whole story is criticized for the way that she thinks she is more important than everyone else, but it takes a society to judge a person at the top in order for there to be any social ladder. When Emily meets Homer she again is criticized for being seen with someone who comes from a lower part of society, but she is also being criticized for thinking she is better than everyone else. The townspeople make her feel like an outcast, and that is why she isolates herself from the rest of society. Society criticizes her for what she does, but it is the society that makes her do it. When Emily buys the rat poi...
Faulkner, William. “A Rose For Emily.” Literature Reading, Reacting, Writing. Kirszner, Laurie. Mandell Stephen. 4th edition. Sea Harbor: Harcourt College Publishers. 2001. 87-94
Faulkner, William. "A Rose for Emily." Literature and Its Writers. 6th ed. Boston, New York:
Emily was drove crazy by others expectations, and her loneliness. ““A Rose for Emily,” a story of love and obsession, love, and death, is undoubtedly the most famous one among Faulkner’s more than one hundred short stories. It tells of a tragedy of a screwy southern lady Emily Grierson who is driven from stem to stern by the worldly tradition and desires to possess her lover by poisoning him and keeping his corpse in her isolated house.” (Yang, A Road to Destruction and Self Destruction: The Same Fate of Emily and Elly, Proquest) When she was young her father chased away any would be suitors. He was convinced no one was good enough for her. Emily ended up unmarried. She had come to depend on her father. When he finally died, ...
Faulkner, William. “A Rose For Emily.” An Introduction to Fiction. 10th ed. Eds: X.J. Kennedy and Dana Gioia. New Yorkk: Pearson Longman, 2007. 29-34.
The philosophy of Realism is known as non-transcendental. Non-transcendental is not the focus of the intuitive basis of knowledge as independent of experience, whereas transcendental is just that. The belief of Realism is based on people’s ability to control their own individual desires (Penrose). The authors of Realism exploited the larger-than-life heroes in their work. These writers did not use romance simply for entertaining purposes, but for a revelation of the truths that were hidden in a realistic story. A new generation of writers, known as realists, came about after the Civil War. Realists are writers who had the intentions of achieving the common course of ordinary life (Beers and Odell 389). They believed in human rights and the abolition of slavery. Idealists have a firm belief in making things the way they should be. In other words, they believed in doing what’s morally right. (“The Rise of Realism”). They wrote about subjects such as the increased population of cities, factories that were drastically substituting farmlands, and also about the lives of people who are far from idealized characters—poor factory workers and untrustworthy politicians (Beers and Odell
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” Miss Emily Grierson faces the struggle of living a life in the shadow of her father. The earliest is instance is alluded on page 120, where she is a figure in the background with father “in the foreground, his back to her and clutching a horsewhip.” While this story is set in the time of horse and buggy, his domineering image and the whip bring to mind a girl who was under constant threat of a beating. Her father also isolated her by chasing off any suitors as not being good enough for her (Faulkner, 123). Her father had a fallout with family over her great aunt’s estate so she is left her isolated from her any of her kin (Faulkner, 125). When her father dies it is his death seems to be the stress that pushes her over the edge. For three days she denied to those that came to offer their condolences that he was dead before she finally broke down (Faulkner, 124). For whatever the reason she falls in love for a foreman named Homer Barron who comes to town to pave the sidewalks. They are seen together and she buys him ...
William Faulkner’s short story “A Rose for Emily” displays themes of alienation and isolation. Emily Grierson’s own father is found to be the root of many of her problems. Faulkner writes Emily’s character as one who is isolated from the people of her town. Her isolation from society and alienation from love is what ultimately drives her to madness.
Faulkner, William. "A Rose for Emily." The Norton Anthology of Short Fiction. Shorter 5th ed. Ed. R.V.Cassill. New York: W.W. Norton & Comp., 1995.
In “A Rose for Emily”, by William Faulkner, Emily Geierson is a woman that faces many difficulties throughout her lifetime. Emily Geierson was once a cheerful and bright lady who turned mysterious and dark through a serious of tragic events. The lost of the two men, whom she loved, left Emily devastated and in denial. Faulkner used these difficulties to define Emily’s fascinating character that is revealed throughout the short story. William Faulkner uses characterization in “A Rose for Emily”, to illustrate Miss Emily as a stubborn, overly attached, and introverted woman.
Faulkner, William. "A Rose For Emily." The Bedford Introduction to Literature: Reading, Thinking, Writing. Ed. Michael Meyer. 9th ed. Boston: Bedford/St. Martins, 2008. 91-99. Print.
Faulkner, William. "A Rose for Emily." Literature: Reading, Reacting, Writing. Ed. Laurie G. Kirszner and Stephen R. Mandell. Compact 4th ed. Fort Worth: Harcourt College Publishers, 2000. 81 - 88.
Many time periods have set the bar high for today’s authors, such as the revolutionary time in Europe when Realism was brought into play. More specifically, the creation of Realism has inspired authors and artists alike to create a sense of honesty and reality within their works of fiction. Realism has set the standard for literature and art, all around the world, because of ...