A Rose for Emily and Jilting of Granny Weatherall, Essay Example

The main characters of “A Rose for Emily” and “Jilting of Granny Weatherall” have much in common due to their life circumstances, unhappy love and loss of their beloved people who abandon them shortly before the marriage. Surely, each of them experiences serious spiritual tortures because of this: Granny Weatherall remembers her love of youth just before death, and one of her last thoughts, desperate remembering is to ask Cornelia to find him and to tell him that she succeeded in life without him, that she managed to build her life again on the ruins of her life and shame (Porter). Emily Rose also shows how shocked she was because of the cancellation of her marriage – she stopped leaving the house and remained “different” for the whole community that she denied and from which she alienated herself (Faulkner).

The change both women dared to do on the ruins of their love that was doomed to shameful failure is also similar – Emily and Ellen found other men who helped them obtain the firm ground under their feet and continue living. However, here the sharp contrast between their fates is felt: Ellen found a man who was decent, loving and devoted. It is enough to analyze his wish to kill the betrayer of his beloved because of the pain he caused (Porter). As for Emily, her choice might have been even worse than the previous one; Homer was more fond of young boys with who he drank in a pub, and as the town’s community posed this, he was not the one who married women. He was dishonest and indecent, so his relationships with Emily threw a shameful shadow on her reputation (Faulkner).

Both women show their attitude to their life situations brought to the verge of life and death – Granny Weatherall calls her daughter asking to find George, her former lover, and tell him that she succeeded in life and had wonderful children and was happy throughout the life path, for sixty years after their break-up. However, the fact that it was George who she remembered before death speaks against her claims – it means that she lived with the pain of loss for all her life, and even mechanic labor she did every day, her children and successful marriage, happy life could not erase the reminiscences and pain she suffered in her youth (Porter). As for Emily Grierson, it was evident from early pages, from the situation of her father’s death and her unwillingness to bury him, that she was a dreamer, a very specific person who could not put up with the change and preferred to think that her father was alive than to part with his body. She retained the same maniac perseverance in the situation with Homer; it is possible to suppose that he refused to marry her, but Emily understood that she could not part with him, killed him and remained with him up to her death, making herself believe that it was her full life with a bridegroom (Faulkner).