Essay --

​William Faulkner began what would be an extensive exploration of his southern world of what he named Yoknapatawpha County (really the area of New Albany, Mississippi) with the short story â€Å"A Rose for Emily† in 1930.   At this point, Faulkner was 33 years old, having grown up in the smothering and genteel small town atmosphere he uses as the setting for this work.    On one level, this is the tragedy of one person who was stifled and pushed to a monstrous crime, while on a larger scale, the story is a metaphor for the way in which the Old South refused to come to terms with the 20th century and the new demands of American society.    ​The Civil War looms large over Jefferson, from the pride that the community takes in the battle that raged nearby to the graveyard full of honored dead and the very elderly men who still wear Confederate uniforms to funerals.   The town’s mayor uses the title â€Å"Colonel† Sartoris all his life, and it seems as if the war was a breaking point past which families like those of the Griersons just couldn’t get past, as if they were frozen in time.   The experience ...