Loneliness In A Rose For Emily

In William Faulkner’s short story “A Rose for Emily” it seems that Emily was plagued with loneliness most of her life. While she was happy as a child, she became lonely when her father passed. She began to isolate herself from everyone and her reclusiveness became worse when Homer Barron, her beau, left her. She did not go to the market but would instead send Tobe, her manservant to do the shopping. When people would come to visit, she would have Tobe turn them away. It seems sad and pitiful that Emily would choose to be a hermit and shut out the world
Emily’s last name provided her a high social status, or at least it did at one time. After Emily’s father donated a substantial amount of money to the town, their social status grew. It grew to the point that the former mayor declared the Grierson family taxes were paid indefinitely. While some of the older people in the town still considered her to be of high social status the younger generation did not. After her father’s passing, the younger generation, now mayors and alderman, no longer recognized the taxes as exempt. In turn, as the younger generation became mayor, sheriff, and alderman Emily did not recognize their social status.
The townspeople would relentlessly gossip about her. When her father was still alive, they would gossip about her being single. When he passed they gossiped about Tobe, her male servant. They gossiped about her great aunt being crazy. They gossiped about her courting Homer. They gossiped about Homer being gay. They gossiped that she would kill herself with the arsenic she bought at the pharmacy. They gossiped about her purchases of a men’s toilet set. They talked about her as if they knew her, but even with all the gossip and speculation, none of them truly knew