The first evidence of Miss Emily’s unwillingness to change is seen in her confrontation with the town of Jefferson’s Board of Aldermen over her taxes. Miss Emily is adamant that Colonel Sartoris, the mayor of Jefferson in 1894, pardoned her taxes. However, “When the next generation, with its more modern ideas, became mayors and aldermen, this arrangement created some little dissatisfaction” (Faulkner 242). The arrangement Miss Emily has with the dead

Colonel is suddenly unacceptable, and the townspeople attempt to collect their money. Yet, as shown in the passage below, Miss Emily is unwilling to change her previous arrangement:

Further indication of Miss Emily’s desire to hold on to the past and not change is seen when her father dies. Miss Emily wants to hold on to her father and keep her life the way it is. When the townspeople come to her house to “offer condolence,” Miss Emily tells them that “her father [is] not dead” (244). Even though it is he who has kept her from marriage, Miss Emily denies her father’s death because she knows her life will change without him. It is her father who has raised her to be a Southern lady, and her identity as such is wrapped up in him. She is an unmarried “old maid” because of her father. That is okay as long as he is there to reinforce how much “better” she is than others, but who is she when he is gone? Her way of life suddenly changes. The townspeople see her differently now that she is “alone, and a pauper” (244). She even wants to hold on to her father in spite of his death, but she is forced to consent to him being buried.

Even when the Board of Aldermen visit Miss Emily at her home, she continues to insist that the aldermen “See Colonel Sartoris” (243). She says, “I have no taxes in Jefferson” (243). Miss Emily does not seem to realize “Colonel Sartoris had been dead almost ten years” (243). Colonel Sartori

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