A Rose for Emily Option 2



Is Emily Grierson a sympathetic character? I would say that she is. Emily was a symbol of the days of the old South and the southern aristocracy in the time before the Civil War. She represents a lady, an upper class figure to whom many people placed upon a pedestal. I do feel some compassion for her. People in her town believed the Grierson family held themselves a little too high for what they really were. Emily’s father was probably the reason she had never married. No suitor was quite good enough for Ms. Grierson. Her father basically isolated Emily from any man, keeping her to himself. When he passed on she was left alone, inheriting the family home but without the resources to upkeep it. In fact when he did pass she refused to admit it and for three days she was in denial. The law almost had to take his body by force but finally she broke down and he was buried rather quickly. She also had a fall from grace becoming almost a pauper to which Colonel Sartoris invented a tale of her father’s generosity to spare her from paying taxes which she could not afford to do. As high and mighty as the Greirson’s thought they were, it was no fault of Emily’s that she was raised this way and became who she was, an old maid who would not accept charity directly, but received it from the town as sign of respect to a fallen monument.



In assuming that the town of Jefferson was aware of the murder of Homer by Miss Emily we can imagine that one of the main reasons they permitted it was that Homer was a northerner and a day laborer. In the years following the end of the Civil War and the surrender of the south, northerners were not a welcome sight in the south. A day laborer like Homer was beneath a lady like Emily. Homer was also seen with Emily driving a buggy on Sunday afternoons. For a Lady to be involved with a Yankee caused quite a stir with the old folks. And it is these senior residents of Jefferson who said that “not even grief should cause a real lady to forget noblesse oblige”. Yankee northerners were also known as carpet baggers among other things. Homer also worked with black laborers which did not do wonders for opinions about him in the Deep South. Homer’s comments about liking men while drinking with the younger men in the town’s Elks Club may have also contributed to the town looking the other way about his murder. The ladies of the town said it was a disgrace for someone of Emily’s stature to be involved with a man like Homer and sent a Baptist minister to call upon Emily. When that did not work they sent for her cousins in Alabama. With all these strikes against Homer I would say the town of Jefferson did not care about a murdered Yankee, a fellow who drank with young men who interested him sexually, flaunted his relationship with Miss Emily on Sunday afternoon buggy rides and was loud and boastful in his Northern accent. Who in Jefferson would miss him? Is he just another Yankee killed by a southerner?