Much of Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily" is predicated on
situational irony, or the contrast between what we (the
reader) or the characters expect to happen and what actually happens. Examples are as
follow:
- We don't expect a citizen like Emily to
refuse to pay taxes:
"I have no taxes in Jefferson. Colonel Sartoris
explained it to me. Perhaps one of you can gain access to the city records and satisfy
yourselves."
- We
don't expect the sheriff to acquiesce to her demands of not paying
taxes. - We (and the townspeople) don't expect the awful
smell coming form Emily's house to be a dead body. - We
don't expect a daughter like Emily to refuse to give up the dead body of her late father
Southern clout, like Emily, to marry a Northerner like Homer
Baron - We don't expect a homosexual, like Homer, to marry
a woman:
"Homer himself had remarked--he liked
men..."
- We don't
expect the townspeople not to investigate the very obvious murder of Homer Baron by Miss
Emily, especially after she bought the means
publicly:
"I want some poison..." and "I want
arsenic."
- We don't
expect Emily to be sleeping with Homer's dead body for all these
years.
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