The image of women in the Eightieth
Uploaded by darkmessenger on Aug 11, 2005
Thanh H. Mai
LIT 2010
Final Paper
Professor: Patricia A. Stefanovic
The image of women in the Eightieth
The environment is having a very big effect to people surrounded by it. The way parents treated their child will have a direct influent on whom and what they want to become in the future. The relations of people to a person might lead that person to their ruin. From “A Rose For Emily” and “The Yellow Wallpaper”, we can see very clearly the evident that lead these women to their tragic ending. In “A Rose For Emily” by William Faulkner, a noble woman being isolated from people in her town and because of loneliness she end up insane and have a tragic life. Also in “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the narrator is being restricted to all her favorite things and that leads her to insanity. These two women have one thing in common: they were forced to insanity by the people surrounded them.
In “A Rose For Emily”, the main factor that leads to the change of Emily’s mental and physical is: the isolation of the people of the town. Before Emily was considering one of the best looking people in town: “None of the young men were quite good enough for Miss Emily and such.” (page 486); now Emily looks more like a drowned body: “She looked bloated, like a body long submerged in motionless water” (page 485) Due to the fact that Emily lived in a big house and had a colored servant, it made the people in town think that Emily is not one of them and thus it’s easier for them to put her aside and ignore her. In addition because of her father’s ideas, she always thought she was someone special better than the rest of the rest of the people in town, and that is the reason why she never got married. Thus her father is the only one that can take care and protect her.
There are two people that have the most influenced to Emily’s life were her father and her lover. Her father raised her as a real “lady” and he thought noone will be good enough for her so he chased away all the people that came and asked for Emily. Her first appearance of insanity when her father died, since he was the only one that closed to her so she refused to accept...