Narration in “ARFE”

[msmiller13]

Discussion Prompt: How does Faulkner’s choice of POV illustrate the narrator’s power, perspective, position and what are the limitations in “A Rose for Emily?”

Talk to at least three different people.

[mirandaclue101]

Faulkner uses a first-person point of view of a townsperson. Being one of the townspeople that has lived as long as Emily and knows the little details about her life, it shows how wide Emily's business has spread in the town and the town's perspective of Emily. It shows how they see her more as an object of entertainment rather than a real human. Her father dying didn't humanize her as the story said but made her even more of a 'character' for the townspeople to watch. This first person point of view for the story is flawed because the obvious main character is Emily yet the story is told by an outside perspective. Emily's real motivations and emotions are hidden and instead speculated by the townspeople.

[amnakhan123]

Within the short story “A Rose For Emily”, Faulkner utilizes first person plural point of view in order to illustrate the public opinion on Emily Grierson. Through the use of words such as “our”, the narrator assumes the position of an involved townsperson which allows the readers to gain insight into the social circumstances and rumors that weigh down certain women, such as Emily and make it hard for them to live in privacy. The readers also learn that Emily’s father, Mr. Grierson, through his controlling presence on Emily, is the reason for her eventual descent into her home. Furthermore, the narrator’s descriptions show that the townspeople, while pretending to wish the best for the Griersons through their actions, have always viewed them more as mere entertainment rather than actual neighbors of the town. As for limitations, the POV in which the story is presented is problematic since we are only aware of the townspeople's thoughts on Emily and not Emily’s perspective which could reveal much more about her childhood, affairs, etc.

[Wesley Nguyen]

Faulker uses the perspective of the townspeople to narrate the story(third-party perspective). In the story, the townspeople's perspective was objective but sometimes subjective too. Due to this perspective, the narrator has the power to express what the townspeople feel about Emily. For example, the people openly pitied Emily for marrying Homer, who was considered lower-class: “...there were still others, older people, who said that even grief could not cause a real lady to forget noblesse oblige — without calling it noblesse oblige. They just said, “Poor Emily.” The limitation of the narrator is also due to the perspective of the townspeople. Since it is through a third party, the reader does not exactly know the thinking of Emily. The reader sometimes has to assume what Emily's mental state was in parts of the story. For example, after Emily committed murder, it said “ she had grown fat and her hair was turning gray. During the next few years, it grew grayer and grayer until it attained an even pepper-and-salt iron-gray when it ceased turning. Up to the day of her death at seventy-four, it was still that vigorous iron-gray, like the hair of an active man”. This leaves the reader to question whether it was Emily’s natural age or her mental state that was causing her body to become unhealthy and old. Although the reader may assume Emily’s state was caused by her mental illness, there is still no definite answer to this.

[jdong]

"A Rose for Emily," utilizes a first-person plural point of view that seems to focus more so on the thoughts and feelings of the town rather than the individual thoughts of the narrator; using a first-person plural point of view, allows the narrator to be biased without "compromising" the delivery of the story. By using a narrator that can presumably be assumed to be a townsperson, it is more appropriately able to explain and show the ever-changing and developing feelings of the town as the story progresses. Similarly, the reader is able to dissect the sentiments of the town, in example, when the town suspects Emily's mental health has taken a turn for the worse and has bought "rat poison," they believe "...the next day we all said, “She will kill herself”; and we said it would be the best thing." By using a first-person narrator, it expresses the sentiments of the town but at the same time, also gives us a biased viewing of the story.