The Giersons’ home parallels Emily and what she stands for: old traditions that are deteriorating and unwelcome in a changing country. Like the house, Emily grows up in the past, a time in which women had no rights and were under the complete control of the men in their lives. In the beginning, the house is “white”(75) , symbolizing Emily’s purity and innocence, a result of her sheltered and controlled life. However, the house, and patriarchal ideology it stands for, becomes “an eyesore among eyesores”(75) in the neighborhood, as “the next generation, with

However, though Emily symbolizes the past, she also symbolizes the future by being strong and independent. Throughout the story, Emily “carried her head high enough… as if she demanded more than ever the recognition of her dignity…”(78), and would never “have accepted charity”(75). Taking on the whole town, no one can make her pay taxes, go into her home, or put numbers on the house for free postal delivery. Even the druggist illegally orders arsenic for Emily, who “just stared at him, her head tilted back in order to look him eye for eye…”(78). Emily is able to get what she wants, standing up to the townspeople and aldermen who demanded taxes from her. Emily herself is caught in the middle of this shift in power for women, undertaking an adjustment, from completely under the whim of her father and Homer Barron, to being able to take on the community who, together, has tried to demand her to change.

Faulkner’s use of the Gierson’s home and Emily together symbolizes a critical issue dealt with during the time of the story and during the time in which the story was written. A Rose for Emily comments on how one society dealt with these dramatic changes, and how ultimately America deals with these changes; both, in the end, push out the past and move on to the future, with a more equal society for women. However, there are still reminisces of discrimination against women, like the Gierson house was still standing, a reminder of the past and all the beliefs it stood for.

Though the Gierson’s home encompasses characteristics of the past, it also hints at the future, showing that it is in the middle of a tra

Some topics in this essay:
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