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Edna's conflicting desires in chopin the awakening
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Choosing between Family and Individuality in Kate Chopin's The Awakening
Kate Chopin's The Awakening focuses on a woman's struggle to become an individual while still being a mother and wife. In the process of this journey, the female heroine discovers that establishing her own identity means losing a mother's identity. Edna looks to be the "brave soul," a "soul that dares and defies" (Chopin 61). Edna's society looked down upon females who seek anything other than attending to their children and husband's needs. Therefore, she is seen as an outcast and must turn inward as well as outward towards nature for satisfaction and approval.
At the beginning of The Awakening, Mr. Pontellier poses the question, "If it was not a mother's place to look after children, whose on earth was it?" (Chopin 7). He reflects the general belief of his time that women should be mothers who give up themselves for the more important needs of their children. He believes that women should be self-sacrificing beings who never take and always give. He thinks, just as other men believed during this time period, that she should be the "angel of the house," catering to his every need. Mr. Pontellier wants her to be one of the "ministering angels" (Chopin 9) who "idolized their children" (Chopin 9) and "worshipped their husbands" (Chopin 9). Mrs. Pontellier shows little interest in taking care of her husband and children, hinting that she seeks more than a life lived for others. She begins to "recognize her relations as an individual to the world within and about her" (Chopin 14) which inevitably becomes a curse in disguise. It creates a complicated inner conflict. Mrs. Pontellier ponders whether she should be defined as a mother and ...
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...nature for acceptance and to her soothing childhood memories for forgotten innocence.
Works Cited and Consulted
Chopin, Kate. "The Awakening." 1899. The Complete Works of Kate Chopin. Ed. Per Seyersted. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State UP, 1989.
Culley, Margo, ed. A Norton Critical Edition: Kate Chopin: The Awakening. New York: W.W. Norton, 1994.
Edwards, Lee. "Sexuality, Maternity, and Selfhood." A Norton Critical Edition: Kate Chopin: The Awakening. Ed. Margo Culley. New York: W.W. Norton, 1994. 282-285.
Walker, Nancy. "Feminist or Naturalist." A Norton Critical Edition: Kate Chopin: The Awakening. Ed. Margo Culley. New York: W.W. Norton, 1994. 252-257.
Wolff, Cynthia. "Thanatos and Eros." A Norton Critical Edition: Kate Chopin: The Awakening. Ed. Margo Culley. New York: W.W. Norton, 1994. 231-241.
Chopin, Kate. "The Awakening." The Norton Anthology of American Literature.. Gen. ed. Nina Baym. 8th ed. Vol. C. New York: Norton, 2012. 561-652. Print.
Allen, Priscilla. "Old Critics and New: The Treatment of Chopin's The Awakening." In The Authority of Experience: Essays in Feminist Criticism, ed. Arlyn Diamond and Lee
Chopin, Kate. The Awakening and Selected Short Stories of Kate Chopin. New York: Penguin Books, 1996.
Kate Chopin’s The Awakening takes place in the late 19th century, in Grande Isle off the coast of Louisiana. The author writes about the main character, Edna Pontellier, to express her empowering quality of life. Edna is a working housewife,and yearns for social freedom. On a quest of self discovery, Edna meets Madame Ratignolle and Mademoiselle Reisz, falls in and out of love,and eventually ends up taking her own life. Kate Chopin’s The Awakening shows how the main character Edna Pontellier has been trapped for so many years and has no freedom, yet Edna finally “awakens” after so long to her own power and her ability to be free.
The Awakening sheds light on the desire among many women to be independent. Throughout the novel Edna conducts herself in a way that was disavowed by many and comes to the realization that her gender prevented her from pursuing what she believed would be an enjoyable life. As the story progresses Edna continues to trade her family obligations for her own personal pleasures. This behavior would not have been accepted and many even criticize the novel for even speaking about such activities. Kate Chopin essentially wrote about everything a women couldn’t do. Moreover, it also highlights the point that a man is able to do everything Edna did, but without the same
When Kate Chopin's "The Awakening" was published at the end of the 19th Century, many reviewers took issue with what they perceived to be the author's defiance of Victorian proprieties, but it is this very defiance with which has been responsible for the revival in the interest of the novel today. This factor is borne out by Chopin's own words throughout her Preface -- where she indicates that women were not recipients of equal treatment. (Chopin, Preface ) Edna takes her own life at the book's end, not because of remorse over having committed adultery but because she can no longer struggle against the social conventions which deny her fulfillment as a person and as a woman. Like Kate Chopin herself, Edna is an artist and a woman of sensitivity who believes that her identity as a woman involves more than being a wife and mother. It is this very type of independent thinking which was viewed as heretical in a society which sought to deny women any meaningful participation.
Leder, Priscilla. "An American Dilemma: Inner Conflicts in Kate Chopin's The Awakening." Southern Studies 22.1 (1983) : 97 104.
In the novel The Awakening, Kate Chopin tells of Edna Pontellier's struggle with fate. Edna Pontellier awakens from a slumber only to find that her life is displeasing, but these displeasing thoughts are not new to Edna. The actions taken by Edna Pontellier in the novel The Awakening clearly determine that she is not stable. The neglect of her duties as a wife and mother and as a woman of society are all affected by her mental state. Her choices to have affairs and disregard her vow of marriage represent her impaired judgment. The change in her attitude and interests becomes quite irresponsible, and that change along with her final decision to commit suicide tell the reader that Edna Pontellier is not capable of making valid judgments. Had Edna Pontellier been of sound mind and body, she would not have ended her young life by suicide. The fact that she can clearly and easily turn to such an alternative suggests that she is depressed and obviously in opposition to the church. The thoughts and actions of Edna Pontellier are solely determined by her manic depressive state, her apparent repressed abuse from her childhood, and her abandonment of Christianity.
Chopin, Kate. The Awakening. The Norton Anthology of American Literature. Ed. Nina Baym. New York: W.W. Norton, 2007. 535-625. Print.
According to Unsworth, the first record of using pesticides started around 4,500 years ago by the Sumerians. The Sumerians first used Sulphur compounds to control insects and other
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Bryfonski, Dedria, ed. Women's Issues in Kate Chopin's The Awakening. Farmington Hills, MI: Greenhaven, 2012. Print.
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Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia. “Kate Chopin.” Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th Edition, Sep2013. Academic Research Database. 1 Nov. 2013
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