A Rose for Emily

The physical setting impacts "A Rose for Emily," made evident by the disregard for proper punishment of a tax evader. Like today, Emily is spared the consequences largely in part because of her background, but unlike today, years and years pass without the county seat taking rightful action, such as forcefully removing this miserable lady from her even more miserable home. They don't even make it through the front door according to our unidentifiable first-person narrator. In the event that they did take action, they would have discovered the remains of Homer Barron, and reveal the real reason why Miss Emily Grierson purchased arsenic from the druggist... For murder!

The setting also plays a large part in her eventual break-down, sort of her self-realization that she cannot live without Homer Barron who isn't "the marrying type" and therefore poisons him as to easily confine him. She was kept from dating men for so long because of her father, proving that parental control was much more powerful in yesterday's times and indeed it was. Her deprivation of suitors led her to love a man beyond what is healthy love. Reading the last few statements leads us to believe that she had a pretty gross relationship going on with a dead person.