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?Of course a Grierson would not think seriously of a Northerner, a day laborer.?But there were still others, older people, who said that even grief could not cause a real lady to forget noblesse oblige\ No matter how strong the opposed voice was, she still persisted her own love and ignored what people said.

Emily was such a lady with conflicts. She was afraid of changes, but desired for love; she wanted to get rid of the fetter of the tradition, but isolated from the community. Finally, the conflicts distorted her into the psychological twist that led her to commit the murder of Homer and to sleep with his body in her rest life.

IV.A Thematic study

A Rose for Emily seems to be a story of horror and Emily is the victim in this story. However, it can not just be viewed as a horror story. As we known, most of female characters in Faulkner's novels are victims. They are the victims of the traditional Southern Values. From their tragedies, Faulkner launched a fierce attack against the cruelty and brutality of the Southern tradition and treated the women with great sympathy. 4.1 A Dirge for Emily 4.1.1 A \

There is a question. The title of the story is A Rose for Emily, but there is no mention of rose in the story. Then why does Faulkner give such a title? What does it really indicate?

The meaning of the title is ambiguous. A rose for somebody can mean a kind of memorial, in memory of somebody. Just like Faulkner's own respond to the title:\It was just 'A Rose for Emily'—that's all\his tribute to his character.

A Rose for Emily seems to be a bizarre story about an old eccentric lady in Jefferson, an American Southern town. Emily murdered her lover, slept with his body, and separated herself from the community. She was insane, but actually she has been

twisted in personality by forces beyond her control, including the society, the family and her own conflicts. From Faulkner's deliberate construction, the secret is gradually disclosed in front of the readers. The more closely readers approach to the truth, the more clearly they understand that she is a victim, a tragic woman who deserves sympathy. In the critical landmark Understanding Fiction, Cleanth Brooks and Robert Penn Warren stressed Miss Emily?s position within the community as \of idol and scapegoat\refusals to let herself be pitied, and the narrator, who is a spokesman for the community, recognizes the last grim revelation as an instance of her having carried her own values to their ultimate conclusion\ 4.1.2 A Satire of Love

There were two events that totally change her life and led it to a tragedy. One was the death of Mr. Grierson, the other was the discard of Homer, her lover. Her father's control trapped her into a lonely traditional world which only contained her and her father, while the death of her father did not liberate her from the world, but made her lost. Until Homer turned up, she got her hope again. She tried to catch her love and live a different life. But Homer was \discard her. This cruel fact destroyed all her hope. She was angry with his betrayal and afraid of losing him as well. The anger and fear controlled her, driving her to the extreme. After reading the whole story, we can not help but sighing \

\Actually, Emily did not get any love whether it was from her lover or her father throughout her life. Readers can easily find in the story that there was a great gulf between Emily and her lover, Homer. Homer represented a totally different life from Emily's resting one. So their love doomed to be a failure. Homer did not accept Emily's love, all the people did not allow this, and Emily herself also struggled in the inner self. Eventually, she fulfilled her romance by killing and then sleeping with her lover.

4.1.3 Dignity and Struggle

\refusal to submit to ordinary standards of behaviour\Robert Penn Warren in understanding fiction.

Despite her tragedy life, to some extent, Emily remains admirable. As an aristocrat, she insisted on meeting the world on her own terms. She has never begged for people's sympathy and refused to accept the community's judgments or values. The people in Jefferson wanted to pity her, after her father passed away and left her alone with a bleak house and an old Negro servant, but she turned her back on them. They sighed \she had actually become a fallen woman. However, her reply of totally ignoring made the people disappointed. Her aristocratic dignity also can be found in some actions. For example, while dating with her inferior lover, Homer, she was always keeping her head up to maintain her noble style. Moreover, even when the druggist asked her the use of the poison, she just stared at him arrogantly, until he looked away and wrapped the poison up.

It is not difficult to conclude that whenever or wherever she was, Emily was always keeping her dignity as the last Grierson, which had already become the subconscious personality of herself, deeply from her heart. Although the independence of spirit and pride twisted the \to accept the herd values carries with it a dignity and courage at the same time. Thus, Brooks later also elaborated that Emily Grierson was more sinned against than sinning, and was not willing to face the great warping of her life; it had been imposed upon her. And her insistence on meeting life on her own terms had something heroic.

What's more, the murder of Homer can be regarded as Emily?s revenge against a tyrannical patriarchal system that has made her into a stereotype of the southern “lady”. Emily experienced the repression and abuse at the hands of Mr. Grierson, or in another words, she suffered a lot from the patriarchal system. So, it is not difficult to conclude that the tragic conclusion of the relationship with Homer is a logical

consequence in such a society.

As an anti-traditional female image, Emily Grierson was full of contradictions in herself. She was pitiful because her life was totally ruined by the tyrannical patriarchy, while she was criminal because she committed a murder. And she was also admirable for fighting against the traditional fetters. Through her image, Faulkner offered a rose to express his sympathy and appreciation for the woman who struggled under the tyrannical patriarchal system.

4.2 A Eulogy Dedicated to the Demolished World

4.2.1 Patriarchy and Moral Concept of Southern Woman

The rose can represents decay and death. At the end of the story, when the villagers broke into her room, they found the valance curtains of faded rose color and the rose-shaded lights in the bridal room. This blighted room witnesses the death of Emily and her lover. Furthermore, it can also symbolize the culture that she represents including concepts and some values of the Old American South is gradually replaced by the new concepts from the North.

The story happened after the American Civil War, in Jefferson Town. It reflects the decline of the southern society and reveals the conflicts between the two different value systems and two societies after the American Civil War. Some critics believe that the novel is an epitome of American society, and it represents that in the irreversible historical process, people cherish the memories of the southern tradition, and shows Faulkner's love and hate for his native land.

The traditional culture and Puritan doctrine is an important part of the culture of American South. The core content is patriarchy, moral fetters of the southern woman, and racism. They control people's material and spiritual life through influencing people's thought and life style, and rule both the interpersonal relationship and the code of conduct in the southern society.

Living in the traditional southern town where people were strongly influenced by the Puritanism, Faulkner condemned the inhumane traditional code of ethics and the ruin of humanity of Puritanism in his works. In A Rose for Emily, we can see the patriarchy and the moral fetters of southern woman result in Emily?s tragedy. Patriarchy was an important part of Puritanism. According to Puritanical beliefs, the father was the sole power in a family. In the patriarchal society, women were generally ignored, because they were usually considered as an object of man. Throughout the whole literature, we can easily find it still a male history. In literary works, almost all female images were under the oppression of male. They did not have the rights to love and to be loved. All that they could do was to passively accept what the male gave to them in charity. So when Margaret Mitchell created an anti-heroine, Scarlett, her powerful, enduring story of love and survival set in the pre- and postwar South immediately made Gone with the Wind one of the most popular novels in American history. Different from Scarlett, Emily was the victim of the cruel system. She tried to fight against it, but eventually failed. What it brought to her was more persecuted and pain, and even ruin.

In the story, her father, Mr. Grierson, was the typical symbol of patriarchy of the American South. Under the patriarchy of her puritanical father, Emily was deprived of everything that a woman desired and deserved. The death of her father symbolized the decay values in the American South. It was a turning point of Emily?s life and made her determine to try to establish the connection with the outer world. But, soon we find that his influence was so profound that her love was still destroyed and her personality was totally twisted after his death.

Besides the patriarchy, the moral fetters of the southern woman were another important factor that contributed to Emily?s tragedy.

In the southern society, “Southern Lady” was generally considered as an ideal of the southern cultural. She was a woman whom all young men are sought after. The “Southern Lady” was a product of the glory of the Old American South. The white women were considered cute, elegant, sacred, and respected just because she was pure. What the southern men admired and what they wanted to protect were neither