Analysis Of The Monkey's Paw, And A Rose For Emily

“The Monkey’s Paw” by W.W. Jacobs and “A Rose for Emily” by William Faulkner both detail the tragedy of loss and how one reacts to it. Tragedy is an ever- present occurrence in life, and death is often the cause of it, this is the main cause of conflict in both texts. However both stories go on to teach us that clinging to the dead is unhealthy for the living. Both living parties refuse to accept that their loved ones are dead and become unstable because of it. Their vitality also continues to decrease until they relinquish the dead. Additionally any actions they do take to fix their dead loved ones are never truly successful. Their actions bring them only pain and they only find closure in letting go. When presented with the news of their loved ones dying the characters from both stories react in their own unstable way. Mr. and Mrs. White from the story “The Monkey’s Paw” cannot bring themselves to believe that their son Herbert White has died. Likewise Miss Emily from “ A Rose for Emily” is also in denial. Mr. White loses his sense of health as he “smiled faintly, put out his hands like a sightless man, and dropped, a senseless heap, to the floor.” Miss Emily has a similar reaction as she refuses to come to grips with reality, “she told them that her father was not dead, she did that for days.” These …show more content…
Miss Emily concluded her journey with death and Mrs. White had to be restrained from her son. The situations at hand prevented a true healthy resolution for the both of them. Also in the case of the White family re-killing their son may not have necessarily set them on a better path. The increased trauma of having to kill their son a second time could have simply added on to their guilt. They were already traumatized by the earlier event and seeing their dead son could’ve have had its own resolution as well. If anything dying by the hands of their undead son could have given them