A Rose for Emily

A "Rose For Emily" was American author William Faulkner's first short story to be published in a national magazine (Forum, April 30, 1930). It was next published in a collection These 13 in 1931 and went on to become one of the most anthologized American short stories. By the way, if you run across a copy of These 13, you might be able to get big bucks for it on eBay.

Faulkner had mixed feeling about the short story as form for his fiction. On the one hand, Faulkner refers to his short story work as "whoring." But, he also said this:

Yes sir. You can be more careless, you can put more trash in [a novel] and be excused for it. In a short story that's next to the poem, almost every word has got to be almost exactly right. In the novel you can be careless but in the short story you can't. I mean by that the good short stories like Chekhov wrote. That's why I rate that second – it's because it demands a nearer absolute exactitude. You have less room to be slovenly and careless. There's less room in it for trash (source).

Well, there's no trash in "A Rose for Emily," with its intricate plot and crafty pacing. One thing we love about this little masterpiece of horror is its openness and flexibility. The possibilities for interpretation are endless, and it inspires very creative interpretations, in large part because of its unconventional style. This story has something for just about everyone.