“When the doctors came they said she had died from heart disease –of the joy that kills.” Mrs. Mallard’s death was a peculiar death indeed. It is not common that a women is told her husband is dead, only to find out that he is alive. The shock and joy that came from this revelation was the apparent cause of death for Mrs. Mallard. However, in the story *story title here* it wasn’t the joy of her husband being alive that killed Mrs. Mallard, it was sadness. It is mentioned in the beginning of this short story that Mrs. Mallard suffers from a heart disease. This means that if she experiences a strong and powerful mixture of emotions suddenly she has the potential to die on the spot. Also, the women is known to be a young women and we can infer …show more content…
In Mrs. Mallard’s case, this is an obvious and easy assumption. The shock combined with her happiness must have been the thing that triggered her heart disease. However, the reader knows that the women was actually happy that her husband died. Originally, the news made her grief-struck, but as she thought about it more, she realized that she suddenly had new freedom. “There would be no one to live for in those coming years,” Mrs. Mallard could now live for herself. Women in the early 1900s were meant to serve their husbands. They did housework, had children, and were not allowed to vote. Now that Mr. Mallard had died, it was no longer his wife’s obligation to serve him. With this realization, the women felt repurposed in life. “Spring days, and summer days, and all sorts of days that would be her own. She breathed a quick prayer that life might be long. It was only yesterday she had thought with a shudder that life might be long,” he life was now her own to live and she was overjoyed to experience it. Sadly, the moment Mr. Mallard walked into the house, a mix of powerful emotions hit the supposed widow. All at once, a part of her is happy that her husband is alive, but part of her is distraught that her newfound freedom has been revoked. The combined effort of so many different emotions results in the triggering of Mrs. Mallard’s heart disease and the
They hear the key turning in the front door and Mr. Mallard walks in the door. He was not on the train that he was always on, so he did not die, and it was only speculation from Richards that he had died. Mrs. Mallard was in shock when she saw her ‘dead’ husband walk through the door, and she died right then and there. The doctors said that she died from the “joy that kills”(Pg. 280). But it seems that is not true because she became glad that her husband had passed
Upon coming to the realization that her husband did not die in a tragic railroad incident as she was told by her sister Josephine and her husband’s friend Richards, in the most delicate manner due to her heart troubles, Mrs. Mallard dies suffering from a heart attack. The doctors claim that the cause of her heart attack was from a “joy that kills”(Chopin, Page 3). Throughout this short story, the author Kate Chopin, focuses on visualizing the emotions and the role that the women of the 19th century had as wives. And so, Kate Chopin shows the role of women and what is expected of them by telling a story of a woman who experiences an emotional transformation as soon as she finds out she is a widow. The emotional transformation that Mrs. Mallard
The story begins on a very sad note especially in the eyes of a reader. Mrs. Mallard is said to have a “heart
The story notes that, “Yet she had loved him –sometimes” (477). Mrs. Mallard seemed to be taking her husbands death to well. When it turns out her husband was not dead and he comes through the door she dies of “Heart Disease” (477). It can be assumed several things. She was really excited he was back or she had already looked so far beyond him when he came back she could not make herself live with him.
The story begins when a woman must be informed of her husband’s sudden death from a railroad accident. The author states that Mrs. Mallard is “afflicted with a heart trouble” and must be informed of her husband’s death carefully, to prevent her from
Mrs. Mallard was at first overjoyed with freedom because her husband was supposedly “dead,” yet at the end of the story, Mrs. Mallard comes face to face with Mr. Mallard. A whole new wave of emotions overcame Mrs. Mallard as she laid eyes on her husband instantly killing her from “a heart disease-of joy that kills.” It is ironic how Mrs. Mallard is overjoyed about her husband’s death, and she ended up dying because she found out he was alive instead. Her joy literally was killed, killing her on the inside as
Most women in Mrs Mallard’s situation were expected to be upset at the news of her husbands death, and they would worry more about her heart trouble, since the news could worsen her condition. However, her reaction is very different. At first she gets emotional and cries in front of her sister and her husbands friend, Richard. A little after, Mrs. Mallard finally sees an opportunity of freedom from her husbands death. She is crying in her bedroom, but then she starts to think of the freedom that she now has in her hands. “When she abandoned herse...
But shortly after, she begins to feel that the problem has a good side to it. Mr. Mallard not being around anymore could mean that she can start a new life for herself. But when Mr. Mallard walks in, she drops dead. “When the doctors came in they said she had died of a heart disease--of the joy that kills” (2).
Mallards’ heart stopped working due to the overwhelming joy that she might have felt at the realization that her husband had not perished, it is not the case. Mrs. Mallard, in fact, collapsed and died to the shock and disappointment from learning that she was not free from her marriage, and that the exhilaration and hope that she’d been feeling was not a possibility for her future. In “Fatal Self-Assertion in Kate Chopin’s ‘The Story of an Hour’”, the author Lawrence I. Berkove surmises that it “has long been recognized that the story’s last line is ironic, but it is even more ironic than previously been surmised… She did die ‘of joy that
...els. When Mrs. Mallard sees her husband, the chains of bondage are thrown back onto her. The reviving and refreshing experience she has just had in her room is put out, and she dies. The doctors say that Mrs. Mallard dies "of joy that kills." Actually, her soul cannot handle the oppression after it has felt such freedom. Josephine's and Mrs. Mallard's differences are reflected in their reactions to Mr. Mallard's coming home.
Mallard’s emotions over the presumed death of her husband. The author used both dramatic and situational irony to mislead the reader and surprise them with a plot twist ending. By utilizing both external and internal conflict the author expresses the internal debate of Mrs. Mallard’s true feelings and those of the people around her. The author used symbolism to display Mrs. Mallard’s desire for freedom from her marriage. In the end it was not joy that killed Mrs. Mallard but the realization that she lost her
Mallard. Her self-assertion surpassed the years they were married and the love she had for him. She is beginning to realize she can now live for and focus on herself. The text insists “There would be no one to live for during those coming years; she would live for herself. There would be no powerful will bending hers in that blind persistence with which men and women believe they have a right to impose a private will upon a fellow-creature.” (Chopin 477.) Finally she can live freely and no longer worry about being confined in her marriage and inside her own home. She has come to realization that she is now independent and can think freely and achieves happiness and freedom. She is no longer held down or back by her marriage. She will no longer be someone’s possession she will be free and respected. Her husband Brently returns and he is alive the happiness and freedom she once possessed briefly with the mere image of her deceased husband were quickly torn away. “When the doctors came they said she died of heart disease of joy that kills” (Chopin 477). She was free but still confined without the knowledge of her husband who wasn’t dead. Chopin illustrates at the end that she was free because joy killed her. She was joyous because she was finally set free but she is now once again confined by the grief knowing her husband was not killed
Mrs. Mallard’s repressed married life is a secret that she keeps to herself. She is not open and honest with her sister Josephine who has shown nothing but concern. This is clearly evident in the great care that her sister and husband’s friend Richard show to break the news of her husband’s tragic death as gently as they can. They think that she is so much in love with him that hearing the news of his death would aggravate her poor heart condition and lead to death. Little do they know that she did not love him dearly at all and in fact took the news in a very positive way, opening her arms to welcome a new life without her husband. This can be seen in the fact that when she storms into her room and her focus shifts drastically from that of her husband’s death to nature that is symbolic of new life and possibilities awaiting her. Her senses came to life; they come alive to the beauty in the nature. Her eyes could reach the vastness of the sky; she could smell the delicious breath of rain in the air; and ears became attentive to a song f...
The story takes place in the late nineteenth century, a time when women had very limited rights. Mrs. Mallard, a young woman who has a bad heart, plays the main character in this story. She receives news that her husband has been killed in a railroad accident. Mrs. Mallard is shocked and bewildered by the death of her husband. However, the feeling of bewilderment is only a temporary feeling that quickly leads to an overwhelming sense of freedom. A freedom she has desperately longed for. Yet, shortly after receiving the news of her husbands death there is a knock at the door. Upon opening the door, she discovers that her husband is not dead, for he is standing in the doorway alive and well. Mr. Mallard’s appearance causes his wife to die. “[T]he doctors … said she [has] died of heart disease – of jo...
The first reader has a guided perspective of the text that one would expect from a person who has never studied the short story; however the reader makes some valid points which enhance what is thought to be a guided knowledge of the text. The author describes Mrs. Mallard as a woman who seems to be the "victim" of an overbearing but occasionally loving husband. Being told of her husband's death, "She did not hear the story as many women have heard the same, with a paralyzed inability to accept its significance." (This shows that she is not totally locked into marriage as most women in her time). Although "she had loved him--sometimes," she automatically does not want to accept, blindly, the situation of being controlled by her husband. The reader identified Mrs. Mallard as not being a "one-dimensional, clone-like woman having a predictable, adequate emotional response for every life condition." In fact the reader believed that Mrs. Mallard had the exact opposite response to the death her husband because finally, she recognizes the freedom she has desired for a long time and it overcomes her sorrow. "Free! Body and soul free! She kept whispering." We can see that the reader got this idea form this particular phrase in the story because it illuminates the idea of her sorrow tuning to happiness.