Dry September Vs a Rose for Miss Emily

There are societies filled with meddling and insensitive people, the towns in “A rose for Miss Emily” and “Dry September” are two such towns. The towns’ duplicity is shown effectively as in both of the women's towns, the townspeople try to pry into their personal lives and also put on a facade of care and concern

Both Miss Emily and Miss Minnie are victims of the meddlesome townspeople. When a mysterious stench begins to surround Miss Emily’s house, a group of men decide to take the matter into their own hands. “[The men] slunk about the house like burglars” and attempted to put out the smell without notifying Miss Emily as well as entering her property without permission. The men breaking and entering shows the extent that the townspeople will go to change things. Another example of the meddlesome townspeople occurs when Miss Emily is seen with Homer Barron, a worker and a Northerner, someone whom they felt was inappropriate for a women like Miss Emily. “The ladies forced the Baptist Minister-to call upon her...and the following day the minister’s wife wrote to Miss Emily’s relations in Alabama.” The ladies of the town forcefully push the minister onto Miss Emily because they feel that she was a “disgrace” to the town and therefore try to change her opinions and life. The opinions and deeds of the townspeople show meddlesome the townspeople are as they take Miss Emily’s life into their hands without permission, forcing upon her visits from the minster and Miss Emily’s relations.

Similarly, the townspeople also are meddlesome and interfering in “Dry September.” When a group of men in the town find out about the supposed rape of Miss Minnie, they decide to go and confront the accused without going through the justice system or actually consulting with Miss Minnie. Also, the people pry into Miss Minnie’s life. For example, shortly after the rape of Miss Minnie becomes public, her supposed friends from the town demand that she “tell (them) what happened. What he said and did; everything.” This shows the peoples’ instinct to pry and to with depths they’d go to extract the information.

The townspeople showed in “A Rose for Miss Emily” and “Dry September” also are an uncaring people, putting up a facade of worry and concern. In A Rose for Miss Emily, “the woman most out of curiosity, (went to see) the inside of (Miss Emily’s) house” under the pretence of going out of respect for the deceased woman. Another instance in which the townspeople pretend to care about Miss Emily is when the people begin to comment “poor Emily” when it appears as if Homer Barron would not settle down with her and get married.