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Greed: Narcissism and Young Man

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Greed: Narcissism and Young Man
English
September 25, 2005

Greed Greed can be any person 's eventual downfall. Greed does not discriminate between race, wealth, age or sex. According to Webster 's Dictionary, Greed means "excessive desire, especially for wealth". The identified characters will have their lives evaluated, and how greed has caused them to suffer a great downfall. The stories I have derived the characters from are "A Rose for Emily", "Good Country People", "Story of An Hour", "The Necklace" and "Godfather Grimm". In "A Rose for Emily" Miss Emily Grierson grows to be extremely selfish and covetous after her father dies. Her greed begins to surface when she denies her fathers death, and refuses that he be buried for three days for fear of losing him. Emily has soon fallen in love with a "Yankee" by the name of Homer Barron, and fears that he may someday leave her. Due to her insecurity, she poison 's her love interest so he that he will never have the opportunity to part from her. Miss Emily 's ' desire for him to always be with her has driven her to be somewhat insane, as the townspeople described. After Emily dies, her servant lets her friends and family in to her home to pay their respects. To their surprise, they find the body of her lover rotting away in her bedroom. The room in which he laid was decorated like a honeymoon suite. Next to his head were a few of Emily 's hairs on the pillow. Miss Emily only cared for her own happiness, not what anyone else thought, including Homer. Emily 's greed causes her take her lover 's life just to satisfy her own. Not only is this insane, it is also cruel to just leave Homers family wondering what happened to him. Emily poisoned someone, just to calm her insecurities. Greed has consumed the lives of not only one, but two of the characters in "Good Country People". Joy Hulga Hopewell is an extremely selfish, egotistical and of course greedy character. She is crude to her mother in an extremely personal


Cited: New Jersey: Salem Press. 1986. 902 Faulkner, William
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