Examine how William Faulkner uses the motifs of death and decay to foreshadow the events in "A Rose for Emily"

The descriptions of the decaying house, a decaying society
of the  South, the decaying father within the house, and the decaying Emily thread
throughout William Faulkner's masterful Gothic tale, "A Rose for Emily."  With this
atmosphere of decay and foreboding and an overriding tone of mystery, the reader is
prepared for Emily's unnatural act at the story's end.

In
the second paragraph of his narrative, Faulkner describes the house that is left after
Emily's death:

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lifting its stubborn and coquettish decay about
the cotton wagons and the gasoline pumps--an eyesore among
eyesores.  

Then, he mentions
Emily as having gone to join those of august names from the South.  As representative of
the South, Emily "had been a tradition."  Part II's flashback, the "vanquishing" of the
city officials by Emily when they come for her father's body foreshadows the grotesque
ending in which Emily also retains another body, that of her lover.  In another scene
which foreshadows Emily's bizarre behavior at the story's end, the narrator's comment on
her behavior regarding her father's death,

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We did not say she was crazy then.  We believed
she had to do that.  We remembered all the young men her father had driven away, and we
knew that with nothing left, she would have to cling to that which had robbed her, as
people will.

Coquettish
decay, vanquishing others, clinging to that which had robbed her--all of these actions
along with the decay of the house and her father, Emily's crumbling old society, and the
departure of her Negro servant set the tone and create the atmosphere that foreshadows
and prepares the reader for what is to come.