【正文】 catalog. Gothic characters typify many of her work, including the insane Misfit and evil Manley. So do horrible climax and bloody setting. While to Faulkner, his utilization of Gothicism may only be perceived between lines, such as the mysteriously figure—Emily, like a sculpture, that appeared for a very short time and then disappeared, and more importantly, the final part of the story, when the towns people found Emily had been sleeping beside Barron?s skeleton for several years. If readers felt astonished after finishing O?Connor?s works, they may find it quite tranquil when reading Faulkner?s. As for the religious concerns, Faulkner didn?t depict directly. Instead, he melted it into the whole work, for it is one part of the southern central values. For Emily, we may not know that whether she believes in God or not, but as a conservative aristocrat in the southern states, she must be a Christian. For other works of Faulkner, there exist the clear traces of religious concerns, though not obvious in A Rose for Emily. Reasons That Make Females Tragic A Rose for Emily— faith in tradition Her tragedy is in her position—under Patriarchy, maintenance of the traditional values against her will—from which she can never escape. Mr. Grierson controlled Emily, and after his death, Emily temporarily controls him by refusing to give up his dead body. Totally under the rule of her father, she is weak and submissive, even being physically sick because the only person in her life has left her. She ultimately transfers this control to Homer, the object of her affection. To physically get better, 13 Emily has to be under another man?s dominance, and, when he would leave Emily as her father did, Emily keeps him by poisoning him. Even after Homer?s death, she sleeps next to his dead bod。s most anthologized stories. “Drawing on the tradition of Gothic Literature in America, particularly Southern Gothic, the story uses grotesque imagery and firstpersonplural narration to explore a culture unable to cope with its own death and decay” (Schoenberg). Miss Emily Grierson, an alienated spinster living in the South in the late nieenth or early twentieth century, is the representation of the old southern traditions and values, and yet felt conflicted when she 2 fell in love with Homer Barron, the very man who has brought to the town the northern innovation. Finally, after she was abandoned by Homer, she got him killed and slept just beside his skeleton for more than thirty years, which was only revealed to the public after Emily?s death. To the town?s people, Emily is a monument of the old values, living under the influence of her father for eternity. Brief Introduction of Protagonists in O’Connor’s Works A Good Man Is Hard to Find is one of the most famous examples of Southern Gothic Literature. The grandmother is introduced trying to change a planned family trip to Florida with her son, Bailey and his family. It is the night before the trip, and grandmother is“seizing at every chance to change Bailey?s mind” (537). The grandmother is the central character of the story, and the family is rather a bland, generic family. At last, she was killed by Misfit. The family is a typical nuclear family of the fifties, whose members appear to be disconnected not only to each other, but also to any form of family values. One of Flannery O?Connor?s most successful and frequently anthologized stories, Good Country People was published in her first collection of short stories, A Good Man Is Hard to Find, in 1955. Similar as many of her works, Good Country People addresses motifs of good versus evil, redemption achieved through an encounter with violence, and the foolishness of intellectual pretensions. The protagonist, Joy, has changed her name to Hulga only because it is the ugliest name in her mind. As a child in a hunting accident, Hulga has a wooden leg—her most valuable possession because it is a mark of her difference. She embraced this because she considers herself more intellectual than all of the “good country people” around her—especially her mother, their neighbors, and finally Manley Pointer, a Bible salesman. Manley steals her leg after seducing her, although it is Joy who intends to seduce Manley. Importance of Women Images Novels and stories are posed of characters and settings. The images of figures carry out the great significance of themes and intentions of authors. Due to such reasons, 3 in literary works, the studies on protagonists have been a usual way to trace the even slightest evidence, probe into the intentions of the authors, either due to their own favors, or under the influence of age and great events. Women, the special group of characters in literature, are sentimental, delicate, sometimes evil and hysteria, which can date back to the image of Eve in Bible—the image of a fool, and who needs redemption for the original sin. However, through centuries, the woman image has undergone an obvious change. 4 Chapter Two SIMILARITIES OF WOMEN IMAGES IN SHORT STORIES OF FAULKNER AND O’CONNOR Frequent Usage of Indirect Depiction In Faulkner?s novels and stories, multiple perspectives and psychological analysis are the familiar methods, together with the time and temporal shifts. In A Rose for Emily, the subtle arrangement of time and space, the Gothic atmosphere and the psychological analysis are the very features that put the masterpiece subtle to understand. Faulkner doesn?t set Emily?s disposition through direct words. Instead, he uses her antagonist?s promises in taxes, poison, mail service, her houses and appearance, and every detail—an indirect way—to indicate Emily?s disposition. Readers have to interpret the work through every slight sign and hint Faulkner has put in the nove