Faulkner and Olsen Analysis Characters in Faulkner

Faulkner and Olsen Analysis

Characters in Faulkner and Olsen

Complex characters tend to be challenging to write, especially in the case of those whose circumstances and actions make them slightly unappealing. William Faulkner and Tillie Olsen, however, show that with brief stories about their characters' pasts, endearment is not so difficult to elicit after all. In Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily," Emily Grierson's character is shown through the eyes of a collective narrator. In Olsen's "I Stand Here Ironing," the narrator looks back on the rearing of a troubled child (also the name of Emily). Both authors retell the stories that bring a sort of reader empathy toward the characters, especially after looking back on the past lifestyles both characters faced.

Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily"

"A Rose for Emily" is a short story told in five different sections, each reverting to a particular time period as narrated by a collective voice of the neighborhood. At the opening, Emily Grierson is newly dead, and men and women clamor to attend the funeral -- men because they seemed obligated to, and the women because they had not seen Emily in many years. While born an aristocrat and an upstanding citizen of the town of Jefferson, the death of her father leaves Emily destitute. At thirty years old, Emily's one promising husbandly prospect is found later to be "interested in men." Rather than relinquish him, Emily buys arsenic and poisons him; the act is only discovered after Emily's quick burial at 74 years old.

It is clear from the descriptions that Emily is an unappealing, frenzied character; in fact, the first descriptions of Miss Emily is that of a "small, fat woman in black," who "looked bloated, like a body long submerged in motionless water, and of that pallid hue." According to those who had gone to visit her about taxes, her eyes "looked like two small pieces of coal pressed into a lump of dough as they moved from one face to another." When Emily throws the tax collectors out, she gives them nothing. Later on, she continues to act in a manner that indicates some mental illness. At some point, people only whisper about her hermit-like behavior.

Yet throughout this story, the reader cannot help but feel empathy for the deranged and perverse Miss Emily. Even the townsfolk could not help but pity the girl, especially when she is "left alone, and a pauper," which in turn gives her a more "humanized" form. Of course, after her father dies, it becomes clear that Emily is a person to be pitied. At a certain instance, Faulkner writes Emily's denial over her father's death, and that she continues this charade for three days. At the end of the third day, Emily "[breaks] down, and they buried her father quickly," showing once more the humanization of Emily's character. Throughout Section IV of the narration, the townsfolk is uttering "Poor Emily" more frequently; the act itself allows the reader to realize just how pitiable the character truly is.

2. Olsen's "I Stand Here Ironing"

"I Stand Here Ironing" illustrates the justifications of an unnamed mother and her rearing of her eldest daughter. The story begins with the narrator speaking to a sort of counselor or psychologist, with which the counselor or psychologist tries to understand the inner workings of a troubled 19-year-old Emily. The mother recounts the story of how she herself had been 19 when she gave birth to Emily, and that it was during the time of depression, where a single mother had to work various jobs to make ends meet. Even after the narrator remarries, the neglect on Emily as compared to her other four children is evident, and Emily's character appears to suffer through this neglect.

The beginning seems to pinpoint Emily as a problem child, one whose life is riddled with conflict upon conflict. She is often absent from school, with her mother letting "her be absent, though sometimes the illness was imaginary." She is a slow learner, she rarely smiles, and she is thin, stiff, and has no appetite. With relation to her social life, she is a loner, with no best friend and no prospect of attracting guys. She is often ill, and at points, she is ill so much that the onslaught leaves her frailer than before. She is "a child of her age, of depression, of war, of fear."