This essay is about the similarities and differences between William Faulkner’s, A Rose For Emily, and Katherine Anne Porter’s, The Jilting of Granny Weatherall. These are stories about two very different women, but women who also share some similar aspects in their lives and personalities. Emily Grierson and Granny Weatherall actually have more things in common in ways then were originally seen when the stories are first read. After reading them again more and more similarities are seen.
Emily Grierson is described as coming from a wealthy family and lived in the upper class area of town while she was grown up, which as she grew older started to become the bad part of town. Her house became run down and she no longer had wealth and prestige like she and her family had at one time. In the beginning of Granny Weatherall’s story she describes herself as a beautiful, young woman with fancy clothes when she was younger and talking about her John, the father of her children who died many years before.
By the end she is a old, dying woman who’s life became very different in that she became a woman who could take care of herself and had to do everything for herself because things needed to get done and that was how they were going to get done. It almost seems like after her husband dies she no longer had the wealth that she once had. Another thing that these two women have in common is that they are both very stubborn and are set in what they say and will not be persuaded otherwise.
Emily in that after her father died Colonel Satoris told her some story that her father had lent money to the town and because of this she no longer had to pay taxes. It almost makes someone think that she really didn”t have the money anymore to pay for the taxes each year and that her father left much debt behind when he died. Later on in the story, years later, the new town council kept sending her notices and she kept sending them back. Then when they came to her door she turned them away. Granny Weatherall is also very stubborn.
In her mind she knew that she was very sick and dying but kept pushing the doctor away because she didn”t want to give into that truth. One similarity that stood out between the both of them is that men they loved jilted them both. A man named Homer Baron was courting Emily and then he leaves and comes back. To the townspeople it looks like he went away while she got her affairs in order but to the reader it seems more like he left her and then somehow she lures in back because in the end he is found dead and lying in a bed upstairs with an indentation of a head, which turned out to be her because she slept in that bed also.
She had killed him so that he would always love her. Granny Weatherall was jilted in that she was left at the alter by the man she was to marry before she married John, the father of her children. However, one difference is that she didn”t kill him but you can kind of see at the end of the story that she never fully stopped loving him or got over the situation because as she is dying she wants to see George and tell him that she ended up having the life that she thought she would never have after he left her.
Even though these two women have many similarities they also have many differences as all people do. One of the main ones is that when Emily died, she died alone except for the manservant who took care of her all those years and even then it was only out of duty because as soon as the first people arrived for the funeral he left and was never seen again. When Granny Weatherall died he whole family, the town doctor and priest were there at her beside. This shows that Emily was rich but poor in family and Granny Weatherall was poor but rich in family and love.
With this said one can say that Emily Grierson had a somewhat unhappy life in that even though she had someone to do everything for her, she however had nobody to love her while Granny Weatherall had a happy life even though she had to work hard for everything she had but was surrounded by love. As can be seen these two women led to very different lives with some similarities and some differences. One can conclude that family brings happiness not money. Most people would choose to have Granny Weatherall’s life for the happiness then Emily Grierson’s for the money and no happiness.
