《献给艾米丽的玫瑰花》及《一桶白葡萄酒》文学评论

Review of a Rose for EmilyA Rose for Emily is a very popular short story because of its style, climax, and plot. The author, William Faulkner, was a Southern writer from Oxford, Mississippi. Faulkner bases this story on the tale of Oxford's aristocracy Miss Mary Neilson. She married Captain Jack Hume, the charming Y ankee foreman of a street-paving crew, over her family's shocked protests. The style of this story is false romance. Miss Emily's father, before his death, would run off every man that tried to court her. Because of this, she felt any man she loved would leave her. After falling in love with Homer Baron, she feared he would run off like the others. To keep this from happening, she poisoned him and kept his body upstairs in the bedroom. The climax focuses on the room where the corpse was found. After Miss Emily's death, the town people were cleaning up the house and found a room that was locked. They had to break down the door. To their surprise, they found Homer Baron's corpse lying in the bed dressed in a night shirt. As the story progresses there is no indication that he had died. When they found the toilet things sitting on the dresser with initials H.B., it was well known that the corpse was Homer Baron. I first thought it was her father in the bed, but I realized that her father wasalready buried. I then knew it had to be her lover. I cringed on the thought of what she did while she was lying next to the corpse. Finally, the end of this story surrounds a woman's life from her mid twenties until her death at the age of seventy-four. It describes a prominent lady of a town who led a private life. I learned, while reading this story that this woman is crazy and had the mind of a child. She seemed to lose everything she loved.But I still have a question. The question is “Where is the rose in the A Rose for Emily?”Emily was never given a rose, even when she died there was no mention of a rose. In the story the only time a scented thing was mentioned was lime to cover a smell. Emily like the insinuated rose is never present in the story. Even when Emily has a line of dialog it is spoken thought the filter of the narrator’s perspective. The narrator or the town is concerned with what role Emily is playing, although since Emily is not present in the story, but through hearsay, the reader has to decipher between the roll assigned to her by the narrator and actuality of the role Emily fulfills.Everyone went to Emily’s funeral. No one went to the funeral out of respect for the dead. Emily became a person known only though hearsay between town folk. No one knew Emily. “Women went out of curiosity to see the inside of her house.” The women went to the funeral to fill a gap.In a time where entertainment wasn’t prevalent, Emily became the late night drama and sole topic of conversation for the town. The town did not morn, the person, Emily they mourned the personified topic of conversation. The town paid respect to the topic that took up time in their conversations.The town saw Emily as inseparable from what she was. The town saw Emily as, “…a small, fat woman in black…” as opposed to a woman with a small skeleton. The town could not separate the Emily they knew from the Emily that was present. The juxtaposition was fused into the town’s notion of Emily. T he druggist must have seen a hint of Emily’s shift in personality. The druggist either did not care about Emily or wanted her dead. The druggist gave her the poison thinking the probability that she was going to kill herself was likely. The druggist didn’t even consider another possibility before spreading the rumor to the town. The druggist would not have given up the poison to Emily before her father died, but now Emily was the same one the town sighed, “…Poor Emily…” for.Emily was a lady when her father was alive. Emily is only a lady, because of who her father was. She is a lady out of only legacy. The narrator knows what Emily did, yet the narrator sympathies with Emily up till the end trick the reader into sympathizing along with the story. In the end the reader and the narrator know Emily is a lady no longer, notonly because she is now dead but because she killed and kept a corpse for cuddling. Ladies don’t cuddle with corpses, but up until the discovery of the corpse Emily remained a lady in the ey es of the town. “They waited until Miss Emily was decently in the ground before…” the town opened the door to the room Emily was keeping her corpse. The town waited because they knew they were going to find something off kilter in that room. Something which could and eventually force change on their opinion of Emily, the town did not wanted to keep what they knew about Emily while she was alive separate from what they knew about her when she was dead.Upon the discovery of the body the fused juxtaposition the town carried with them was removed from their notion of Emily. Neither, the reader or the narrator can relate the Emily at the end of the story to the Emily that existed to hinted ideas of who Emily was before events of the story. There is no reconcili ation between the two Emily’s. They share different traits. The first, being the lady, the father’s daughter. The second Emily being an off kilter person struggling with craziness the only way she knows how. But because the story is not written from Emily’s perspective the reader cannot see the shift into craziness directly until the end and is left wondering with the narrator what caused Emily to defy my notion of what a lady is supposed to be?In the end the “Rose” for Emily is just as absent from the sto ry as Emily herself. Emily is portrayed in flickers between the town folk’s skewed options about her, about her house, about her life style and about her choice in bed room arrangements. The lady Emily reveals two things about herself though out the story, she doesn’t like to pay taxes, and she is willing to kill and keep a corpse around. Creating an option based upon what Emily reveals about herself, it’s safe to say Emily was never a lady, and never thought of herself as a lady.ReferenceBrooks, Cleanth and Roert Penn Warren. Understanding Fiction, 2nd ed. New Y ork: Appleton-Century-Crofts, Inc, 1959:351Roberts, Diane. Faulkner and Southern womanhood, Athens and London: The University of Georgia Press, 1994:158Olga W. Vicky. The Novels of William Faulkner: A Critical Appraisal [M]. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1964Review of the Cask of AmontilladoThe Cask of Amontillado is a daring story by the ever-famous Edgar Allen Poe that shows the pain of hate and desire for revenge. Remember always though to not forget the Golden Rule and that prideful reaping will only bring about to you a large and painful fall. Many people have wanted to gain revenge but for a man to say that he is to conduct his action of revenge with full intention of making justice in one’s own mind is an accusation of pure madness. But what could one possibly do to receive such hate from another? The question is a mystery but you can’t tell me you aren’t interested about Poe’s story so please sit b ack and let me tell you about why it is so good. Poe makes his point clear in the Cask of Amontillado by his amazing use of literary elements such as plot, setting, and foreshadowing.Poe uses one the very planning parts of a story to tell his tail in an amazing way through the literary element of plot. Stories can have very strong, light, and any combination of types of plots. The Cask of Amontillado has a strong plot. The Story lines up in the plot perfectly. There is an explanation of why the character is wanting to get revenge fills strongly to act upon the other character. Montresor the narrator is seeking revenge after Fortunato who is the other large character in the story. His introduction starts saying,“The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as I best could, but when he ventured upon insult I vowed revenge.”The intention of your main character is clearly stated although reason is not; you have no doubt from the vocabulary that he is greatly offended. Then actions that follow bring about ability to carry out, but can he struggle past himself in morality, and can he struggle against his adversary to achieve his objectives? Poe uses the knowledge he possesses to carry his idea to the max and then fall into the next part of the story giving succession and strong plot to follow. He doesn’t introduce you with a setting but in the actions and the climax he uses foreshadowing and setting to assist the conducting of his plot properly.With the use of his plot he also teaches you the theme of the story, that you ultimately reap what you sow. For a story to really teach a life lesson in the theme of the story the author has to stay focused on his message and the idea while he is carrying out the actual actions of the story. It takes the entire story working together for it to be a success, and to me a successful story cannot be written unless you have to pay attention to every aspect to fully understand it. The characters are realistic and there is a proven sense of seriousness throughout the story and Poe’s extensive understanding of plot and use of it proves all of this. If you are to see the revenge in a story you have to have a seriousmood, that of hate, at the beginning and on into the conflict. Then you see the madness created and the climax will show if the revenge is truly a success or a failure that all results of over flooded hatred. “Nemo me impune lacessit”, or in English no one attacks me with impunity could be a statement of assurance or a statement of ignorant pride. When you read The Cask of Amontillado remember to first look at the plot that is used Edgar Allen Poe.Y ou can’t very well carry out a nursery rhythm in a dark mansion or a horror story in the sunny beautiful place that one would enjoy frolicking because set ting is another vital part of an author’s success in his/her story. Poe is an author that fully understood this element and used it also wisely. If you think of revenge you think of dark sinister thoughts. A story of revenge has a setting of scary eeriness and one that would cause fear because revenge is not a warm cuddly area and in composing a short story Poe knew that where the story took place was a vital piece of the puzzle and you can see that from these quotes I would like to pull out of the story:·“. . ., bowed him through several suites of rooms to the archway that led into the vaults. I passed down a long and winding staircase, requesting him to be cautious as he followed. We came at length to the foot of the descent, and stood together upon the damp ground of the catacombs of the Montresors.”·“Its walls had been lined with human remains, piled to the vault overhead, in the fashion of the great catacombs of Paris . . . From the fourth side the bones had been thrown down, and lay promiscuously upon the earth, forming at one point a mound of some size . . . It seemed to have been constructed for no especial use within itself, but formed merely the interval between two of the colossal supports of the roof of the catacombs, and was back by one of their circumscribing walls of solid granite.”Setting pulls you in the story, and make inferences, and gives you a sign of foreshadowing on the events to follow. Symbolism is a big element that lies right within the barriers of setting and gives symbolism of things to come. The settings presented in these two quotes of the story show you signs of death and evil by describing objects surrounding, colors, and even the setup of the setting itself. Y ou can’t tell your story and have it ma ke any sense if you don’t have the proper setting.Poe also uses foreshadowing along with his uses of plot and setting to bring across his message and to make this story one that you will read and enjoy. A well-written horror story has to have suspense or it just doesn’t give you that jumpy or that scared feeling. Poe brings to you in this story foreshadowing and that creepy suspenseful feeling. This is hard for a writer to do but Poe does it anyway with such a way that just makes his story much better. Look again at the setting quotes that I brought out ofthe story and you can see the coming of death and misery but you aren’t able to see the result of the conflict because while he gives you sign of the defiant success of the main character Poe doesn’t let you know quite yet because he throws in shadows of doubt and questioning.In Poe’s use of foreshadowing he also used the plot to aid the device by letting some of the major rising action be direct foreshadowing events to use the two device as one and enlighten ideas of mystery. Y ou read the story trying to break it apart because you want to know if Montressor will succeed in quest of receiving revenge, but you just can’t see for it to happen or to not happen. Y ou can see how just in these three elements I mentioned that Poe molded together and let each literary device hold up the other. But why would an author feel so strongly to write a story of revenge and it was just an act of justice?Edgar Allen Poe lived a very short and tragic life that was compiled by attributes of dislike, loneliness, and death of the few people that he allowed himself to get close to and love. Poe had to experience a lot of self-conflict that defiantly pushed him to his all and all. He had a list problems compelled that consisted of gambling, drugs, alcohol, and constant depression because he could not take revenge on the thing that caused him the most pain and that was fait itself. Everyone he loved was taken by the incurable (at the time) disease of tuberculosis.I beli eve that this story was Poe’s way of saying he didn’t know how todeal with the inability to take revenge on his opposing force, which was fait. He seemed to hurt himself to an unreal level by taking into his life things like gambling (which he probably might have at a time was what he compared to life), drinking (to probably forget his pain), and maybe drugs (because he would probably seek a realm that had to be better than the reality that he lived in). He begins this story, “The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as I best could, but when he ventured upon insult I vowed revenge.”I don’t know the approximate time that Edgar Allen Poe wrote this story but it was probably a time that he may had thought of suicide or even before he was found dead with alcohol in his system on a street corner. It seems that Poe could obviously not take revenge on fate and had no one to blame so he took out the bubbling hurt and made himself his own source of source of pain which would be his life itself and his own identity his outlet because he felt shut out from others because everyone he had loved left him in death. Some authors seek an inspiration for their writings but I believe that Poe just expressed his life and experiences and that is why he is notorious for his horror stories, scary isn’t it.I have given and supported my opinion to you as best to my ability and I know that when you read this story you will enjoy. Remember when you read to get the message that something is trying to teach you and after you enjoy a piece break it down in your mind. Poe used his ability toexpress himself in this story through the use of the literary element devices of setting, plot, and foreshadowing made it the story for me. I give The Cask of Amontillado my ballot and would venture to say that it is an example of how a short story should be written.ReferenceBenton, Richard P. "Poe's 'The Cask of Amontillado': Its Cultural and Historical Backgrounds." Poe Studies 29.1 (June 1996): 19-27. Bonaparte, Marie. The Life and Works of Edgar Allan Poe: APsycho-Analytic Interpretation. London: Hogarth, 1971.Davidson, Edward Hutchins. Poe, A Critical Study. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1957.。