A Rose for Emily

Everyone talks how the world has changed since they were young, how everything is now faster, and more complicated, and less friendly. In William Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily," Miss Emily sees these changes occur around her yet she resists them. The Civil War came and went, and Miss Emily still lived in that same house "set on what had once been the most select street," "lifting its stubborn and coquettish decay above the cotton …

…woman, and if she cannot have this one last chance at happiness, then she will keep it by force. Throughout her life the town she lived in has been her "enabler," allowing her to continue in her unhealthy habits; Emily has no reason to think that what she has done is wrong. She is simply preserving what is rightfully hers; she is holding on to some semblance of happiness that has always been denied her.