McDonald 1
Alyssia McDonald
Professor Aby Boumarate
202010 Freshman Comp II
15 September 2019
Reader Response Criticism
A Critical Analysis of “A Rose for Emily”
William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily” is a short story that revolves around the life and
death of a completely isolated woman from the perspective of her peers. Emily was socially
deprived by her father at an early age and she continued to be for the rest of her life. This
deprivation caused extreme mental and physical deterioration in her health that was noticeable to
her fellow townspeople. These peers in her community continued to watch over her as if she
were a sacred tradition that they had to monitor, due to her high social ranking, but in actuality,
they felt nothing but scorn and haughtiness from her presence. The story consists of strong
recurring themes of isolation, death, and evolution in a non-chronological order that manipulates
time in a way that stretches the plot over several decades. This technique ultimately allows for
the reader to see each moment of the protagonist’s life in great detail. A Reader-Response critical
analysis can surely be conducted on this piece because of the reader’s interaction with the text
and the author’s techniques that are revealed in the plot.
Faulkner’s work is unique because of the writing style and how he used a series of
flashbacks to not only foreshadow the events within the plot, but also to evoke a response from
the reader that will allow them to piece together the purpose of the text. Faulkner chose this
method to convey the inner lives of each of his characters and to depict their motives in the story.
Each flashback in Emily’s life exhibits how her take on reality grows more tenuous over time,
Alyssia McDonald
Professor Aby Boumarate
202010 Freshman Comp II
15 September 2019
Reader Response Criticism
A Critical Analysis of “A Rose for Emily”
William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily” is a short story that revolves around the life and
death of a completely isolated woman from the perspective of her peers. Emily was socially
deprived by her father at an early age and she continued to be for the rest of her life. This
deprivation caused extreme mental and physical deterioration in her health that was noticeable to
her fellow townspeople. These peers in her community continued to watch over her as if she
were a sacred tradition that they had to monitor, due to her high social ranking, but in actuality,
they felt nothing but scorn and haughtiness from her presence. The story consists of strong
recurring themes of isolation, death, and evolution in a non-chronological order that manipulates
time in a way that stretches the plot over several decades. This technique ultimately allows for
the reader to see each moment of the protagonist’s life in great detail. A Reader-Response critical
analysis can surely be conducted on this piece because of the reader’s interaction with the text
and the author’s techniques that are revealed in the plot.
Faulkner’s work is unique because of the writing style and how he used a series of
flashbacks to not only foreshadow the events within the plot, but also to evoke a response from
the reader that will allow them to piece together the purpose of the text. Faulkner chose this
method to convey the inner lives of each of his characters and to depict their motives in the story.
Each flashback in Emily’s life exhibits how her take on reality grows more tenuous over time,
