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A Thorn for Emily

I have decided that William Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily" is undeniably amazing and I will not be convinced otherwise. Let's look at the plot: Emily is a "middle-aged" (yeah, okay, sure) woman who needs to pin down a man because everyone says she does so obviously that means she has to. Her dad dies, so the town is like, "You know what, Em? Taxes? Don't even worry about 'em! We got it COVERED!" Then they come back and they're like, "Hey, remember how we specifically told you that you didn't need to pay taxes? We take it back. Jk, jk... unless...." And Emily's like, "Ha, hilarious that you think I'm about to pay you because I'm definitely not gonna do that." Then this Homer guy comes around and EXPLICITLY TELLS PEOPLE that he's gay, and they all talk about how hopefully Emily can "change his mind". Now, we don't have time to unpack how wrong that is, so let's move on. Emily buys Homer this monogrammed toilet set (so she basically proposed right there and then) and then no one saw him for a hot minute. Emily goes and ~casually~ buys some arsenic. When they ask her what it's for she REFUSES to tell them, which is not at ALL shady, and they decide it must be for rats. Her house starts to stink so, rather than ask about it, they go in the middle of the night and sprinkle lime around the house. You know, like all good neighbors do. She dies like 30 years later, and they find Homer's dead body in the attic on a bed, and they can tell that she's been sleeping next to the corpse. Okay, I know, Emily was insanely messed up. But come ON. You kind of can't help but root for her at least a little bit. The townspeople certainly did; it was so obvious she was doing something suspicious and they all just peeped between the blinds so they could see how far she'd go. Society essentially told her that, without a man, she was nothing. They wanted her to marry a GAY MAN just so she wouldn't be alone. She turned things upside down, and, while I obviously don't condone murder and sleeping with corpses, you've gotta admire her chutzpah. In conclusion, when patriarchal rules are enforced to such a gross degree, people get murdered with arsenic.

Comments

  1. SarahOctober 26, 2019 at 7:17 AM

    Scoreboard for A Rose for Emily:
    Emily-1
    The townspeople who clearly tried to force her to do stuff for their own amusement knowing they'd make her unhappy- 0

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ashley CarrNovember 15, 2019 at 1:06 PM

    Sometimes when I randomly throw out there that a character is secretly gay it actually sticks (I see you Homer).

    ReplyDelete

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