Assignment 4 10/20

A shift in the point of view in the story “A Rose of Emily” would change many things, like the tone, view of Emily, and the reader’s participation. The tone, if the story was narrated by Tobe, Homer, or Emily, would be more dark and sinister. It could even take on the tone of a horror story. The reader of the story as it is written is conflicted about Emily, sometimes we feel pity for her, and others we feel as if she’s cold and unscrupulous. In the first person plural, the reader is sucked into the story be feeling as if he or she is telling the story along with the other narrators. Without that, the story seems slightly walled off from the reader, that intimacy would be gone. The narrative mode allows the story to become sort of mystery story, where the reader is compelled to go back through and look for evidence to support whatever theories he or she may have. This make the story sort of fun and takes away from the gloom of death and a possible murder. Changing from a first person plural to a first person singular point of view would show us who Emily really is, but it would take away from what made the story interesting. It is much more fun to make our own hypotheses about a mysterious character than have the author tell us who this person is.