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Early critics explored the gothic elements in the story and they compared the setting and tone of it with those of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher; Cleanth Brooks and Robert Penn Warren extended this parallel by citing how the respective houses of the two stories mirror the traits of their inhabitants(4). In this connection the story is interpreted as a symbolic, tragedy-tinted representation of the Southern tradition, Emily’s refusal to accept change, initially in the death of her father and then in the loss of Homer Barron, being viewed as a symbol of the South’s historical reluctance to embrace change and progress. Feminists like Judith Fetterley suggest that the murder of Homer can be regarded as Emily’s revenge against a tyrannical patriarchal system which has shaped her into a typical southern “lady.” Apart from these interpretations, other critics tend to interpret the story as a clash between a declining aristocracy of the old South and a thriving middle class of the New South, between normal and abnormal psychology. In addition, quite a few argue that A Rose for Emily is a reflection on the essence of time. “Although the story is only a few pages long, it covers approximately three-quarters of a century. Faulkner cleverly constructed the story to show the elusive nature of time and memory” (Akers 20).
Back to the domestic research done on A Rose for Emily, Liu Zhuo and Peng Changliu suggest that “the end of the American Civil War means the fading of the southern glory and the complete evaporation of the Southern mythology. However, most of the southerners cannot accept the reality” (223). The complex psychology of the southerners is summarized into two aspects: on the one hand, they realize with a bitter feeling the inexorable passage of the old idyllic times; on the other hand, they are unwilling to wake up from their sweet dreams of the past.
Other critics regard “Emily Grierson’s father as an emblem of the tradition and glory of the old South,” and they conclude that “her reluctance to admit the bereavement of her father stands for her refusal to the admittance of the collapse of the old southern society and the manifestation of her tightly clinging to the old things” (J. B. Liu 181).
Despite the abundance of research done about the story, too little attention has been paid to one minor but crucial figure in the story: the black servant, Tobe. Faulkner is a stalwart anti-racism intellect. Thus, his deliberate arrangement of an African-American slave must have an essential significance to the wholeness of the theme of the story. Besides, nor does enough attention have been paid to the emerging and preceding generations before Emily. The paper is going to elaborate the degradation of the nobles presented in Faulkner’s works through analyzing the different psychological states of three generations characterized in A Rose for Emily.
II. The Preceding Generations of Emily Grierson—the Glorious Past
The American Civil War cleaved the south in two distinct periods, the antebellum agrarian south and the post-bellum industrializing south. If one goes deeper into the separate features of the two periods, he is sure to encounter a transitional phase which incorporates the features of both periods. Although the story A Rose for Emily takes place in the transitional period, it runs its course from the antebellum era right to the twentieth century, covering nearly three-quarters of a century. Therefore, it is reasonable to discuss the economy and the ideology of the old South, for their influences in the generation of Emily and the townspeople are considerable, as Faulkner once said: “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.”
2.1 Slavery and Agriculture
“The old South—call it ‘Dixie’—came into being with the spread of cotton agriculture and slavery in the early 1800s” (Reed 2). The South was an agricultural region, and after 1865 it was a poor agricultural region, with unique racial and economic problem. Because of its scarce population, fertile soil, temperate climate and plenteous rainfall, the South was a perfect land for agriculture. Thus, the early immigrants and pioneers were all dedicated to the agricultural production. The owners of various sized plantations exploited a multitude of slaves. As a result, the agrarian economy, especially that of plantations, and slavery became essential to the antebellum southern society. The population then was composed of four segments: the plantation owners, yeomen, the poor whites and the Negroes. According to the American data of population done before the Civil War in 1860, there were all together 46, 274 plantations. One plantation then had at least 20 Negroes who were able to undertake agricultural production. Most of the white men were yeomen who were capable of supporting their families with a certain amount of land and some Negroes. They occupied a half of the total population. Whereas the poor whites, with or without a small plot of land, not able to afford a Negro, constituted 10 percent of the southern population. One third of the population was Negroes with a number of 3.9 million. Such a made-up of population reflects two basic elements of American South: agrarian society and slavery. They herald the future of the declining South, as well as that of the United States as a whole. They have played an important role in the shaping of the young nation’s politics and of the social life of its people, having an everlasting influence over the mind of the southerners, their life, religion, culture and art.