Most good stories start with a fundamental list of ingredients: the initial situation, conflict, complication, climax, suspense, denouement, and conclusion. Great writers sometimes shake up the recipe and add some spice.
Initial Situation
Death and Taxes
As we discuss in "Symbols, Imagery, Allegory," Faulkner might be playing on the Benjamin Franklin quote, "In this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes," in this initial scene. We move from a huge funeral attended by everybody in town, to this strange little story about taxes.
Conflict
Taxes aren't the only thing that stinks.
The taxes seem tame compared to what comes next.
In Section II, we learn lots of bizarre stuff about Miss Emily:
- When her father died she refused to believe it for four days
- The summer after her father died, she finally gets a boyfriend (she's in her thirties)
- When worried that her boyfriend might leave her, she bought some poison
- Her boyfriend disappeared, and there was a bad smell around her house.
We technically have enough information to figure everything out right here, but we're thrown off by the issue of the taxes, and by the way in which facts are jumbled together.
Complication
The Town's Conscience
For this stage it might be helpful to think of this story as the town's confession. This section is what complicates things for the town's conscience. The town was horrible to Miss Emily when she started dating Homer Barron. They wanted to hold her to the southern lady ideals her forbearers had mapped out for her. She was finally able to break free when her father died, but the town won't let her do it. When they can't stop her from dating Homer themselves, they send her cousins after her.
Climax
"For Rats"
Even though this story seems all jumbled up chronologically, the climax comes roughly in the middle of the story, lending the story a smooth, symmetrical feel. Emily wanted to hold tight to the dream that she might have a normal life, with love and a family. When she sees that everybody – the townspeople, the minister, her cousins, and even Homer himself – is bent on messing up her plans, she has an extreme reaction. That's why, for us, the climax is encapsulated in the image of the skull and crossbones on the arsenic package and the warning, "for rats."
Suspense
Deadly Gossip
As with the climax, Faulkner follows a traditional plot structure, at least in terms of the story of Emily and Homer. Emily buys the arsenic, and we learn that Homer Barron was last seen entering the residence of Miss Emily Grierson on the night in question.
Denouement
The Next Forty Years
At this point, we've already been given a rough outline of Emily's life, beginning with her funeral, going back ten years to when the "newer generation" came to collect the taxes, and then back another thirty some odd years to the death of Emily's father, the subsequent affair with Homer, and the disappearance of Homer.
The story winds down by filling us in on Miss Emily's goings on in the forty years between Homer's disappearance and Emily's funeral. Other than the painting lessons, her life during that time is a mystery.
Conclusion
The Bed, the Rotting Corpse, and the Hair
The townspeople enter the bedroom that's been locked for forty years, only to find the rotting corpse of Homer Barron.