Comparison: "A Rose For Emily" And "The Death
Comparison: "A Rose For Emily" And "The Death Of Ivan Illych”
William Faulkner was born in the American South, dropped out of high school in tenth grade and published his more popular works between 1954 and 1962. Interestingly enough, Leo Tolstoy was born into a noble Russian family, his official title being Count, entered the University of Kazan at age sixteen and wrote his most popular works between 1865 and 1876. Indeed, on the surface there seems to be very little in common between these two men and yet there exits such overwhelming similarity between the short stories A Rose For Emily and The Death of Ivan Illych in terms of narration, character and theme that it is almost as if the stories were written to complement each other.
Perhaps the most glaring similarity between A Rose For Emily and The Death of Ivan Illych makes its appearance in the first few paragraphs of both stories, namely, the deaths of the title characters. This in itself may hardly be spectacular, but the fact is that in each story the protagonist's death was the climax yet both authors chose to reveal this from the very beginning, effectively giving their stories predetermined ends. It may even have been easier to relate the stories in chronological order of the events, or more artistically appealing to open with the character's early lives, switch to their deaths, and then relate the intermediate events that might have contributed to their tragic ends. However, both stories follow the almost identical format of beginning with the events immediately following the characters' deaths, then giving almost episodic preludes to the deaths (though Faulkner splices his tale a bit more in order to produce his final effect).
A more interesting similarity lies in the protagonists themselves. Firstly, although neither work goes into great detail to relate the character's childhoods, Faulkner and Tolstoy make it abundantly clear that while Emily and Ivan may not have experienced perhaps ideal childhoods, they were certainly not unhappy children. Ivan had been "la phenix de la famille" (Section II) and Faulkner states implicitly that Emily was given everything she needed, had been a fine-looking woman and attracted many suitors.
Furthermore, both stories explore the theme of a character trying to conform to the norm. Tolstoy goes to great pains to elaborate just how "most ordinary (...and therefore most terrible)" [Section II] Ivan's life had been....