Why Emily Killed Homer Barron

Why Emily Killed Homer Barron

In William Faulkner's short story entitled "A Rose For Emily", Emily Grierson kills her lover Homer Barron after being in love with him for about a year. She then sleeps next to the body in the upstairs bedroom of her home, loving it as if Homer were still alive. She then closes up the upstairs, never seeing the body again. There are three different motives that can be looked at as to why Emily killed Homer. She wanted to exercise power, she couldn't accept that Homer was a homosexual, and she didn't want another man to be taken away from her.

Emily's father controlled her life up until his death. Emily's father believed that, "None of the young men were quite good enough for Miss Emily and such." This shows that her father never let her make a decision on her own. The townspeople were not pleased that Emily was thirty and still single. They thought, "...even with insanity in the family she wouldn't have turned down all of her chances if they had really materialized." Emily kills Homer when he returns to the home after being gone for a certain time while her cousins were at the house. Emily wanted to make sure that Homer was to never leave her again, after her father had obliterated any chances of her finding a man. She wanted to exercise power on somebody else after having the power being exercised on her for her whole life. Emily finally had what she wanted and she did not want to let it slip away. Killing Homer and keeping him in the house also gave Emily a sense of security, as her father had been the one who protected her her whole life. Living alone made her feel unsafe, but Homer brought that feeling of security to Emily.

The second reason as to why I believe Emily killed Homer is that she could not accept the fact that Homer was a homosexual. It had been said about Homer that, "--he liked men, and it was known that he drank with the younger men in the Elk's Club--that he was not a marrying man." Emily couldn't accept that he preferred men, and the remark about Homer and how he is not a marrying man let Emily know that she wouldn't be able to spend the rest of her life with him in love. They had grown so close to each other, and when Emily finds out he is a homosexual, she feels betrayed and she kills him.

The final reason as to why I believe Emily killed Homer is that she does not want to lose the most important person in her life a second time. When Emily's