ARoseforEmilySummary

A Rose for Emily Summary

The story begins at the funeral of Miss Emily Grierson. Nobody has been to her house in ten years, except for her Negro servant. Her house once was the best house but now looks old. There is a special relationship between Emily and the town ever since the cease of collecting her taxes in 1894. Whereas, the new generation didn’t agree with this settlement, so they visit Miss Emily and tried to get her to pay the debt. She flatly refused to pay. About two years after her father died, and her lover disappeared from her life，the townspeople had a strange encounter with Miss Emily about a bad smell at her place. Anyhow, the stink got stronger and complaints were made. The authorities didn't want to bother Emily, so they sprinkled lime around the house and the smell was eventually gone.

Everybody felt sorry for Emily when her father died. He left her with the house, but no money. When he died, Emily refused to admit it for three whole days. The town didn't think she was "crazy then," but assumed that she just didn't want to let go of her dad. Next, the story flashes back and tells us that soon after her father died, Emily begins dating Homer Barron, who is a Yankee paving the sidewalk of the town. The town heavily disapproves of their relationship and brings Emily's cousins to town to stop them. Then, Emily is seen buying arsenic at the drugstore, and the town thinks that Homer is leaving her, and that she plans to kill herself. When she buys some men's items, they think that she is marrying Homer. Homer leaves town and then comes back. At last, he is seen entering Emily's house. After that, Emily rarely leaves the house, except for the period when she teaches painting.

As Emily gets older and older, she eventually dies in a downstairs bedroom without sunlight. The story reverses back to the beginning —her funeral, when Emily's servant lets in the town women and then leaves forever. After she is buried, the townspeople go upstairs and open the room closed for forty years, in which they find the rotted corpse of Homer Barron. On the pillow next to Homer they find an indentation of a head and a long gray hair.