摘 要

1. Introduction 4

1.1 About William Faulkner 4

1.2 About A Rose for Emily 4

2. Literature Review 7

2.1. General Themes of A Rose for Emily 7

2.2 Controversial Themes of the Story 8

3. The General Themes of A Rose for Emily 11

3.1 Love 11

3.1.1 Emily’s father’s love for her 11

3.1.2 Emily’s brave pursuit of happiness and love 11

3.2 Pride and Glory 12

3.2.1 Emily's pride and honor 12

3.2.2 The reasons why Emily was arrogant and glorious 13

3.3 Death and Murder 14

3.4 Conflicts between the North and the South 15

3.4.1 The conflict of background of the charaters 15

3.4.2 The conflict of the background of the times 16

4. The Controversial Themes of A Rose for Emily 18

4.1 Brief Introduction to Xiao and Liu’s Views 18

4.2 Why Xiao’s Opinions Are Right Mostly 19

5. Conclusion 20

References 22

Abstract

A Rose for Emily is a famous short story. The story is mainly set in the American Civil War. This paper makes a comprehensive analysis of the novel from multiple themes, including love, arrogance and glory, death and murder, conflicts between the north and the south. It mainly compares the views of Professor Xiao and Professor Liu. Professor Xiao believed that Emily's tragedy originated from the people in the town and the old tradition, while Professor Liu believed that Emily was the embodiment of the old tradition. This paper is more inclined to Professor Xiao's views, and draws a conclusion that the decadent thoughts and indifference of the people around us as well as the failure of Emily's family education are the real causes.

Keywords: A Rose for Emily; multiple themes; decadent thoughts; dispute between

Liu and Xiao

中文摘要

献给艾米莉的玫瑰是美国意识流小说作家威廉福克纳所著的著名短篇小说，故事主要以美国内战为背景，讲述了艾米莉悲剧的一生。本文从多重主题方面全面的对该小说进行分析，分析了爱情，傲慢与荣耀，死亡与谋杀，南北方的冲突这几大主题，主要对比了肖明翰教授以及刘新民教授的观点，肖明翰教授认为艾米丽的悲剧源于镇上的人以及旧传统，而刘新民教授则认为艾米丽才是旧传统的化身，本文更偏向于肖明翰教授的观点，从而得出身边人的腐朽思想和冷漠以及艾米丽家庭教育的失败才导致了艾米莉的悲剧这一观点。

关键词：《献给艾米莉的玫瑰》；多重主题；腐朽思想；刘肖之争

Introduction

1.1 About William Faulkner

William Faulkner (September 25, 1897 – July 6, 1962) is one of the most celebrated writers in American literature generally and Southern literature specifically. Though his work was published as early as 1919, and largely during the 1920s and 1930s, Faulkner was not widely known until receiving the 1949 Nobel Prize in Literature, for which he became the only Mississippi-born Nobel winner.

William Faulkner, one of the most influential writers in the history of American literature, is the representative of stream of consciousness in the United States. He has written several short stories in his life, which have created numerous vivid female characters. A Rose for Emily is his representative work. This paper selects this representative work, analyzing multiple themes of it.

1.2 About A Rose for Emily

The story starts with a brief first-person account of the funeral of Emily Grierson, an elderly Southern woman whose funeral is the obligation of their small town. It then proceeds in a non-linear fashion to the narrator's recollections of Emily's archaic and increasingly strange behavior throughout the years. Emily is a member of a family of the antebellum Southern aristocracy. After the Civil War, the family falls into hard times. She and her father, the last two of the clan, continue to live as if in the past; Emily’s father firmly doesn’t allow her to marry. At the age of 30 of Emily, her father dies, which takes her by surprise. She refuses to give up his corpse, and the townspeople write it off as her grieving process. The townspeople pity Emily not only after her father's death but also during his life when he wouldn't let Emily marry.

After her father's death, the only person seen moving about Emily's home is Tobe- a black man, serving as Emily's butler, going in and out with a market basket. Although Emily did not have a strong relationship with her community, she did give art lessons to young children within her town. The townspeople even referred to her as Miss Emily as a sign of respect that they had for her. With the acceptance of her father's death, Emily somewhat revives, even changing the style of her hair and becomes friendly with Homer Barron. The connection surprises some of the community while others are glad she is taking an interest; However, Homer claims that he is not a marrying man. Shortly after, Emily buys arsenic from a druggist in town, presumably to kill rats, however, the townspeople are convinced that she will use it to poison herself. Emily’s distant cousins are called into town by the minister’s wife to supervise Miss Emily and Homer Barron. Homer leaves town for some time, reputedly to give Emily a chance to get rid of her cousins, and returns three days later after the cousins have left. After he is observed entering Miss Emily's home one evening, Homer is never seen again.

Despite these turnabouts in her social status, Emily continues to behave haughtily, as she had before her father died. Her reputation is such that the city council finds itself unable to confront her about a strong smell that has begun to emanate from the house. Instead, they decide to send men to her house under the cover of darkness to sprinkle lime around the house, after which the smell dissipates. The mayor of the town, Colonel Sartoris, made a gentleman's agreement to overlook her taxes as an act of charity, though it was done under a pretense of repayment towards her father to assuage Emily's pride after her father had died. Years later, when the next generation has come to power, Emily insists on this informal arrangement, flatly refusing that she owes any taxes; the council declines to press the issue. Emily has become a recluse: she is never seen outside of the house, and only rarely accepts people into it. The community comes to view her as a "hereditary obligation" on the town, who must be humored and tolerated.

2. Literature Review

2.1. General Themes of A Rose for Emily

The author believes that in order to analyze the multiple themes of A Rose for Emily, We must analyze the views of different authors, especially Professor Xiao and Professor Liu, who have authoritative opinions in this respect. During the research, the author mainly refers to William Faulkner's English original A Rose for Emily and the Chinese translation of A Rose for Emily online. By inputting the title of the article - A Rose for Emily on the website, the author searched many articles directly related to A Rose for Emily with precise matching, and consulted some materials related to the subject of this study, such as Why Offer Emily a Rose written by Xiao Minghan(1999:56-78), Talk about A Rose for Emily again written by Xiao Minghan(2000:78-96), Theme, Character and Artistic Techniques written by Liu Xinming(1997:69-74) and so on. The following are their main ideas.

Wang(2014:74-78) claimed that the theme of A Rose for Emily could be roughly divided into four parts: Love, Pride and Glory, Death and Murder, Conflicts between the North and the South.

A Rose for Emily mainly told about the love between Emily and Homer Barron. The love between them was not traditional love. Homer Barron was unwilling to marry Emily. He preferred to say that he liked men. Emily, a noble lady, felt insulted and would rather buy poison to poison him and sleep with him, even though the end of the story was a tragedy. The theme of pride and glory referred not only to Emily's pride and glory, but also to Emily's father's pride and glory. When the new generation of government asked Emily to pay taxes, she had always treated them with an arrogant attitude, just a perfunctory attitude, and the other thing that reflected Emily's arrogance was that the people in the town thought Emily's house smelly, but they only dared to sneak into her house at night and spill lime secretly, while Emily's father's arrogance was that he did not allow Emily to get married

2.2 Controversial Themes of the Story

Xiao(1996:55-69) set out from Mr. Yang's translation, claiming that A Rose for Emily was narrated in the first person. Referring to people in Jefferson Town who were more traditional than Emily, but it was them and their spokesmen who regarded Emily as the embodiment of tradition. The narrator was the spokesman of the old Southern tradition. The narrator's point of view in the A Rose for Emily dedicated to Emily was not Faulkner's point of view. The narrator admired and respected men, but ridiculed and scorned women.

The core part of this story was the tragedy of love between Emily and Homer Buron. It not only led to Buron's death, but also caused Emily's life-long misfortune. The narrator blamed Emily's father for this tragedy. He repeatedly pointed out or implied that Emily’s father was in control of Emily before and after his death, Putting the blame on Buron, saying that he was a homosexual, Putting the blame on Emily and said she could do it for the sake of corruption, perverseness and a family history of insanity, he cleanly shirked his responsibilities and those people in the towns.

Xiao (1999:56-78) Negated Buron as the main responsible person for the tragedy, Buron was not only outgoing, joking, easy to get along with people, but also very responsible. So it was not Burong or his so-called homosexuality, but people in the town and their old traditions that were the real root of Emily's love tragedy.

In short, Xiao(1999:56-78) believed that the cause of Emily's tragedy is the people in the town, including the narrator, and their old tradition centered on Puritanism.

Qian(1995:28-34) started from the background of the times, the Civil War was over, the North destroyed slavery in the South and defeated slave-owner class. But this fact cannot be accepted by slave-owner. They can admit the defeat of the war and will never admit their total defeat. Faulkner pointed out the dislocation of Miss Emily's time everywhere.

A Rose for Emily are both tragic and comic. They are filled with funny tragedy. The incongruity and grotesqueness caused by dislocation are exaggerated in Faulkner's cold style. Qian(1995:35-40) viewed that Miss Emily, shrouded in mystery, was much like Faulkner's Southern tradition. She finally fell down, but even though she was a murderer, she was still a little sad and solemn, so it was reasonable to offer her a rose respectfully.

In summary, Qian(1996:56-60) viewed that he believed that the background of the present era led to Emily's tragedy.

Liu(1997:69-74) firstly mentioned two Articles written by Qian and Xiao. Liu agreed with dislocation theory of Qian. Then he analyzed what was the background Faulkner based on to write the novel. After the American Civil War, plantation economy and slavery in the South were collapsing day by day, industrial civilization and urbanization were booming, which became an irresistible historical trend. Liu viewed that Faulkner accurately grasped the law of historical development in this period, and through the re-creation of art, revealed the sharp contradictions and conflicts between the declining aristocracy and the emerging bourgeoisie from two levels.

And then Liu(1997:69-74) analyzed two articles written by Qian and Xiao concretely. He viewed that Emily represented the declining Southern aristocracy and embodies the old traditions and values. Although the general trend of the aristocracy represented by Emily had passed away, slave-owner class still reduced to accept social change.

Faulkner revealed the theme of the struggle between the old and the new order and the conservative mentality of the declining aristocracy by describing the contradictions and conflicts between Emily and Jefferson Homer. Homer represented the emerging bourgeoisie. They brought industrial civilization to the South, but also had a fierce conflict with the slave owners and noble families in the South.

Liu(1997:69-74) completely denied Xiao's view that the narrator was not the spokesman of the old Southern tradition. Emily's black servant Toby was not much mentioned in the story, but as far as the theme was concerned, he was a decisive figure. Toby's disappearance had a strong symbolic significance, further deepening the theme of the novel, the general trend of the old order has gone, and the slaves have ceased to exist with the disappearance of the aristocracy.

Qian's article(135-160) made some analysis of the novel A Rose for Emily, but it is not difficult to see that, as far as its theme and characters are concerned, the novel can be regarded as the epitome of the giant picture scroll displayed by Faulkner's Yoknapatafa lineage. Its symbolic metaphor, psychological analysis and inversion of time sequence lay a foundation for Faulkner's modernist writing techniques such as stream of consciousness, multi-perspective narration and counterpoint structure in the whole Yoknapatafa family to a great extent.

3. The General Themes of A Rose for Emily

3.1 Love

3.1.1 Emily’s father’s love for her

In American traditional culture, roses are symbols of love, admiration and love, so we can clearly understand the theme of love through the title of the novel A Rose for Emily. The author describes the process of Emily's acquaintance, acquaintance, dating and courtship with Homer Buron. As a former aristocrat, Emily's father believed that isolating Emily from the outside world was the best way to protect her and show her love for her daughter. Perhaps Emily had resisted, but because it had become a habit to protect Emily for a long time(Wu,1999:79-83).

Emily was used to her father's education. Although part of Emily's tragedy was due to her father, we couldn't deny her father's love for her. In view of this point, it was Emily's father's love for her and his sick education that led to Emily's tragedy in her life.

3.1.2 Emily’s brave pursuit of happiness and love

When Emily’s father was alive, he opposed and obstructed Emily’s dealings with other men for selfish purposes. Emily did not get her own love. This depressive feeling finally erupted after his father's death. She was determined to pursue her happiness. She met Homer Buron and they fell in love. Emily, who grew up in the south, certainly knew what it meant to be with a northerner, how much risk it would take to fall in love with a northerner, how much courage it would take to marry a northerner, and how much it might cost. But as a woman, the power of love had triumphed over everything. She did not hesitate or waver because Homer was a Yankee. Despite all kinds of pressure, she remained loyal to love. In this way, Emily, who longed for happiness, was willing to take risks and bravely confronted the people in the town amid all the opposition.

Emily built another castle for herself after her father died. But the emergence of Homer Buron and the arrival of love have made Emily tired of her life. So when people in the town saw Emily again, her image was refreshed. People noticed that Miss Emily was traveling by car with Homer Buron on the weekend. They noticed that Emily had gone to the jewelry store and ordered a set of men's toiletries. They noticed that Emily had bought a full set of men's clothes and so on. All this told us, Emily. In love, in love with Homer Buron. For any woman, regardless of her origin, age and appearance, love and marriage should be important experiences in her life. Although Emily was 30 years old and had always insisted on noble pride, she has failed to resist the temptation of love and fell in love with a black worker, Homer Buron. It was also the emergence of Homer Buron that made Emily's life full of sunshine and hope again. Although the ending of the story was sad and love was short, Emily's brave pursuit of happiness and love added a certain romantic color to the story.

3.2 Pride and Glory

3.2.1 Emily's pride and honor

In fact, Emily had always maintained the pride and honor of nobility and everything she had done. This was revealed according to time order. Before Emily’s father died; with the advent of a new era, until the members stammered out their intentions, and when the neighbors around her reported the smell.

The traditional aristocratic education and the aristocratic concept all made Miss Emily maintain the arrogance and glory of the traditional aristocracy even under the strong impact of the northern economy and culture. Before Emily's father died, the old mayor of Santares specifically said that she would be exempted from taxes before Miss Emily died, and invented a grand reason that Emily's father had lent a lot of money to the town to exempt her from taxes as a way of repayment. Emily's tax exemption was not based on sympathy and compassion for her, but on the privileges and honors bestowed on her aristocratic status. In time, when the new generation of town councillors specifically visited the door, Emily still stood proudly at the door to listen to them. Until the members stammered out their intentions, Emily held her head highly and told them that Mayor Santares had paid her taxes since confiscation. Please bring the dead Mayor back. Emily's arrogance and fearlessness in the face of danger will bring down a new generation of town councillors. So even though at the end of the day the government handed Emily the bill every month, they never received a reply. When the neighbors around her reported that her family smelled so bad that they gave it to the government, people could only sneak into Emily's house at night and sprinkle lime on it. Whether it was a face-to-face confrontation with the government or a disregard for people's stealing of lime, Emily has always maintained the pride and honor of nobility and everything she has done. Always safeguarding the dignity and glory of the Grierson family in the past. It is precisely because of this that Emily is regarded as a monument to commemorate the declining Southern tradition(Ma,2008:99-103) .

From the above two things, the new generation of government collected taxes from Emily and Emily's house smelt bad. People only dare to sneak into her house. We could see Emily's arrogance and glory in this noble lady. Emily was well protected by her family from childhood. Her arrogance was born with her. So she intuitively felt superior and unwilling to associate with ordinary people. It was one of the important themes of the novel. It was Emily's inherent arrogance that made her unable to accept Barron's betrayal and killed him cruelly, which led to Emily's tragedy. The author believes that this is also one of the important themes of the novel.

3.2.2 The reasons why Emily was arrogant and glorious

There are many reasons for Emily's arrogance. The first one is Emily's father's education to her. Emily's father expelled all the young men and robbed her of everything before she died. Even after her death, Emily was still lonely. All she had was isolation and the charcoal portrait of her father. This "deified" authority deprived Emily of her freedom to choose life. As a result, she became very arrogant, unwilling to associate with ordinary people, even more and more isolated, more and more dark. She was only part of her family, property and honor, and represented the tragic fate of daughters who are unable to break away from the patriarchal society. "Father" never appeared as a living character in the novel, but his influence ran through, far-reaching and everywhere. In the impression of "us," Miss Emily, slender and wearing white clothes, stood behind her. Her father crossed his feet in front, with his back to Emily and a whip in his hand. The whip in her father's hands drove away her youth, leaving her alone as an old virgin. When her father died, she insisted for three days that "we" should not bury the dead father. As a typical image of patriarchy in the South, he successfully firmly controlled his daughter's life.

Another more important reason was that the background of the times, Emily's family was very rich, which was a traditional aristocratic family, not to mention that in that era, people are very respectful of such a family, even think that the noble family is nobler than ordinary people, which led to Emily's arrogance and glory, but for the outbreak of the American Civil War and her father’s death, she would not fall in love with Barron.

Hence, in view of these points, Emily's father's education and the background of the times led to Emily's arrogant character.

3.3 Death and Murder

Emily, an eccentric and lonely old woman, and the body found in her room many years later all suggested Gothic elements in this novel. The novel began with Emily's death, the whole people in the town came to her funeral, an ever-increasing number of people were curious about Emily.

Before Emily's death, no one had stepped into her house for more than 10 years, except a silent black cook and part-time gardener. All these things gave the house and Emily a mysterious color. So after Emily's death, when people broke open the locked room, a shocking scene emerged. Thick dust, mottled silver toilets, stiff neckties and corpses lying in bed, which had decayed for a long time, brought the theme of death to a climax. Finally the truth came out that when Buron said he didn't want to get married, Emily chose to kill Buron and put the body in her bedroom to sleep with him. Love was selfish, Emily eventually chose to murder her lover, because death would not betray, which existed longer than love.

Emily murdered her lover because she couldn't get it. Emily's dark personality led to her tragedy all her life. We can see that Emily loved Barron very much. Otherwise, she would not give up the noble lady's reserve and want to marry him and spend her life with him. Unfortunately, Barron didn't want to marry her, so she was angry and decided to poison him and kill Barron. The theme of death and murder ran through the whole text. The novel began with Emily's death and ran through the clue that Emily murdered Barron. It is obvious that this is a very important theme of the novel.

3.4 Conflicts between the North and the South

3.4.1 The conflict of background of the charaters

After the outbreak of the American Civil War, a new northern culture swept in, and Emily's house, standing between the air workshop and the cotton-binding machine, with its round roof and spiral balcony, undoubtedly became ugly. Emily, as the descendant of the declining aristocracy, is arrogant, supercilious, stubborn and conservative.The change brought about by the rejection of time is undoubtedly the representative of the South. Buron, with northern characteristics, is tall, bold, sociable and energetic. Although there is a spark of love between Emily and Buron, and Emily loves Buron deeply, Alice under the traditional southern aristocracy still has a deep disgust and resistance to the northern culture. So when Buron shows that she likes to associate with men and has no intention of marrying, Emily chooses to murder her loved ones in order to keep them alive. The conflict between Traditional Southern Civilization and modern northern civilization is obvious, which also indicates the short and tragic ending of Emily's love.

In A Rose for Emily, Faulkner implies to readers that Emily's misfortune should be attributed more to the whole southern society than to herself through all the narrative paving. Faulkner reveals Emily's inability to get rid of the contradictions between the present, the past and the future, and how these contradictions afflict her inner world and make her degenerate and distorted, so as to show the similar life experiences of a generation of Southerners under the same social contradiction background. After her father died, Emily, who was born in a declining aristocratic family, lived alone in a dilapidated wooden house left by her father, with only one dumb black housekeeper. She cut off any contact with the outside world and refused to pay attention to social changes: no mailbox, no taxes. Forty years later, she died proudly all her life. After the burial of her, the townspeople finally entered the enclosed wooden house with curiosity. Opening a dark and mysterious bedroom, a white wedding dress came into our eyes. A decayed man was lying in bed in horror, beside which there was a pinch of white women's long hair. It seemed that someone had just slept. She had been sleeping with the body of her poisoned lover, Homer Barron.

The conflict between Emily and Barron's characters and their different backgrounds led to the impossibility of their future, which resulted in the tragedy of the story. Their love ran through the whole story. The conflict between their personalities was the center of the novel.

3.4.2 The conflict of the background of the times

Because Emily lived in the South, in a particular era. She was not only a woman, but also a thorough Southern woman. After her father's death, Emily, who gained personal freedom, seemed to be able to control the outside world without scruple and fear the siege of any outside forces. However, she did not get real freedom in spirit. In her heart, she was always under the control of an old Southern traditional morality. She knew that the southern rule was that women could only have husbands but not lovers, and she risked Southern taboos to find lovers, so there had been a deep sense of guilt in her heart. The only way to eliminate this sense of guilt was to turn the lover into a husband. So while she was fighting with the people in the town, Emily had been preparing for her wedding and had even bought all kinds of wedding supplies. Nevertheless, to her great surprise, the people she loved at such great risk abandoned her mercilessly. In this way, her psychological sense of guilt is bound to be stronger, and even further "deterioration" as a concrete action - she killed Homer, in this extreme but no alternative way to retain the lover, and a corpse for husband and wife, in order to eliminate the guilt in her own heart with this superficial perfection.

The Puritan view of women's Taoism has also engraved a brand on Emily. The worship of women's chastity is highly praised by Puritan women's morality in the South of America. Women's morality requires that women should have no passion and no sexual desire. White women in the upper classes can only be "pure and pure" ladies, whose chastity is above everything else and carries the honors of history, family and tradition. Women's chastity and innocence, not their life or rights, are the first things men strive to uphold. "Ladies' demeanor" aims to cultivate women as male subordinates. They can only maintain the pride and reserve of ladies, but can not face life. Emily was born to be a lady with her surname under the heavy yoke. She had only the past, faced with change and nowadays at a loss, could only close the door, arrogantly reject all new things, and maintain the illusory glory of the past, which reflected her powerlessness in Puritan doctrine. From beginning to end, Emily represents the traditional incarnation and the symbol of obligation, and is also the object of concern (Wei,1998:72-78) .

The outbreak of the Civil War led to the intensification of the contradictions between the characters, so the background of the times was also a theme that could not be ignored.

The Controversial Themes of A Rose for Emily

4.1 Brief Introduction to Xiao and Liu’s Views

Professor Liu's article published in the 6th issue of Appreciation of Masterpieces in 1997. He put forward different views on Mr. Xiao's article, Why to present a rose to Emily, published in the 6th issue of Appreciation of Masterpieces in 1996, and discussed with Mr. Qian. The question seemed to focus on Emily's motives for killing Homer, the implication of their conflict, why she was a monument in the south, why she should be given a rose, etc. Mr. Xiao(1999:56-78) viewed that the real cause of Emily's love tragedy was the people in the town and their old traditions.

The so-called "monument" was just a "chastity archway" erected by Southerners for Emily. In the eyes of these southerners, Emily's failure to marry the Yankees in the end was a sign of "feudality" and just fulfilled the "obligation" of a southerner. Emily became the "object of concern", reflecting the restrictions on women's personal freedom and rights in Southern society precisely, because her close relationship with a northerner seemed to them to be beyond the scope of personal love relations, which greatly violated the tacit understanding of Southerners (not only for Southern women) in dealing with northern and northerners after the Civil War. For the sake of standardization, it is intolerable. As long as it did not violate this premise, as long as it did not lose the festivity, her indifference, arrogance and other eccentricities are completely understandable and acceptable. So the local government even exempted her from the tax at that time, in order to honor her.

Nevertheless, Mr. Liu(1997:69-74) believed that this novel reflected the conflict between the old and new orders between the North and the South of the United States and the conservative mentality of the declining aristocracy in the South, while Emily represented the declining aristocracy in the South, and was the embodiment of the old tradition and values. What she did was a portrayal of the unyielding mentality of these declining nobles.

4.2 Why Xiao’s Opinions Are Right Mostly

Emily's father drove out all Emily’s suitors and destroyed her chances of living as a woman many times. The people in the town saw the relationship between the father and the daughter as a quiet place: Emily, a delicate woman, dressed in white, stayed behind; her father was silhouetted, legs crossed, standing in front, back to her, holding a whip tightly. After his death, Emily decided to start her life again and fell in love with Barron. However, the people in the town interfered, first by talking behind her back, then by forcing the priest of the Baptist Church to come to her door, and finally by writing to call Emily's two stubborn cousins, which finally destroyed Emily's last chance in life. In people's eyes, Emily was a monument, a symbol of the past times, reflecting their traditions, obligations and responsibilities. Under the control of such family and traditional forces, all hopes in Emily's life were destroyed. In order to have Barron, she had to kill him. Faulkner did not express her inner pain directly, but his implication of Emily sleeping with Barron's corpse for many years to satisfy her desire was more striking than any direct description of her inner pain.

In the novel, Emily was always a traditional incarnation, a symbol of obligation and a target of attention when she was alive. In fact, it was those Southerners she hated to see who kept her from marrying a Yankee again and again. The so-called "tradition" was the old tradition of both conservative and harmful in Southern society. The so-called "obligation" was the duty that the Southerners think their women should fulfill. And all this was just wishful acceptance. Emily would not accept it, and Faulkner made a mockery of it. So the author agrees with Mr. Xiao that the so-called "monument" is just a "chastity archway" erected by Southerners for Emily. In the eyes of these southerners, Emily's failure to marry the Yankees in the end was a sign of "feudality" and just fulfilled the "obligation" of a southerner. Emily became "the object of concern", which just reflected the South.

Conclusion

By consulting the above literature, the author draws a conclusion that A Rose for Emily has multiple themes. The first one is traditional theme. The first one is love(Wang,2014:74-78), Emily's father's love for her, Emily's love with Barron and Emily's determination to pursue love bravely. Although the final outcome is tragedy, it is undeniable that love exists in this novel. The second one is arrogance and glory(Wu,1999:79-83). Emily was born in a noble family, her arrogance and glory are inherent, not to mention that ordinary people thought Emily is superior to them, which adds to Emily's arrogance. The third theme is death and murder(Wei,1998:72-78). Emily loves Barron very much and is willing to give up everything for him. But Barron abandons her heartlessly. Emily can't bear it. Finally, she buys poison to murder Barron. The fourth theme is the conflict between the North and the South(Ma,2008:99-103). This is the background of the novel. Because of the outbreak of the American Civil War, the conflict between the North and the South is becoming more and more acute. The conflict of between the North and the South not only refers to the conflict of the background of the times, but to the conflict of background of the charaters.

In addition, this paper also puts forward the views of Professor Liu and Professor Xiao. They are quite different. Liu(1997:69-74) believes that this novel reflects the conflict between the old and new orders between the North and the South of the United States and the conservative mentality of the declining aristocracy in the South. Emily represents the declining aristocracy in the South and is the embodiment of the old tradition and values. What she did was a portrayal of the unyielding mentality of these declining nobles. However, Xiao(1999:56-78) believes that the real cause of Emily's love tragedy is the people in the town and their old traditions.

In all, The author fully agrees with Professor Xiao. the author views the indifference and bitterness of the people around them are the direct causes of Emily's tragedy, furthermore, the failure of Emily's family education also gives rise to her tragedy.

参考文献References

[1]Faulkner, W. A Rose for Emily [J].Perfection Leading Corp,1990.45(1):45-79

[2]Spiller, Robert E. The Literary History of the U.S. New York amp; London[J].The