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A symbol is a person, character or a object in a story used to represent an idea. In the short story, A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner, the symbols reinforce the themes of tradition vs. progress, decay and the passage of time, and love that is not returned. Emily Grierson, her father, Colonel Grierson and Colonel Sartoris, now deceased, represent the Old South. They contrast with the new middle class that is represented by …

…the dust they noticed that in the second pillow there was a long strand of iron-gray hair-Emily's lock of hair. A necrophilic Emily, one who is attracted to corpses, had in his death what she could not keep in his life-a lover's embrace. Like a rose pressed between two pages of a book, he becomes Emily's "rose" forever. William Faulkner skillfully uses symbolism to help describe the setting, theme and character development in the story.