"A Rose for Emily"

"A Rose for Emily"

By: William Faulkner

"A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner was confusing for me. It took me a couple of times of reading it to understand the story.  I think my problem was the way the story jumped back and forth with the time.  Once I read it a few times i think that Miss Emily's father didn't think that any man was good enough for her.  I also think that he was selfish in the fact that he didn't want her to leave the house.  He seemed to be a very controlling man. When he died she wasn't sure how to be without him, so she didn't want the town people to bury him.  At this time keeping him in the house was the only way she could cope with the situation.  All Miss Emily wanted was to find a man to love her and start a family, but her whole life her father had kept her from that. I think that being locked up in the house was what drove her crazy.  When Homer came along she seen her chance to fulfill her dream.  When she discovered he was going to leave her it triggered something in her mind and she wasn't going to let him take her dream away like her father did.  Although she knew that murder was wrong, because being a southern woman she was raised in church, she couldn't let another man control her life.  This is when she decide to kill him. Keeping him in the house was a punishment for her because she knew she had done wrong, but also a fulfillment because she couldn't be alone. One thing I couldn't understand was why did Tobe stay with her all those years? He could have told someone about Homer being dead in the house. Did he think she would kill him too? Did she treat him that good for him to keep her secret that long?