A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner

A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner is, like The Lottery, also another twisted story with an even more sickening ending. The main character of this story is about a woman named Emily, and yet it is taken from an interesting point of few. The reader views this story from the first person point of view, but not from Emily's point of view or any of her close companions that she spends most of her time with. The people in Emily's town observe, "When we saw her again, her hair was cut short, making her look like a girl..." (Faulkner, 285). By the use of "we" and the speaker saying that they had seen her for the first time in a while, the reader can conclude that the towns people are observing her. The story is also jumbled in a non chronological order, leading to believe different individuals are sharing their story. Being written in the first person point of view, Faulkner is able to create a sense of mystery and questioning about Emily. The towns people telling the story are unsure of the true answers behind Emily so the reader must piece puzzles of the story to make their own conclusions. By having the towns people at the end explain the details of the room with the corpse, the reader is able to realise how sick and twisted Emily acts. The first person point of view helps to establish how distant Emily was from reality, and how her distance was perceived by normal people.