Edna's Suicide in Kate Chopin's The Awakening
At the end of Kate Chopin's novel The Awakening" the protagonist Edna commits suicide.
The remaining question for the reader is: Does Edna's suicide show that she succeeded or failed in her struggle for independence?
Edna's new life in independency seems to be going well especially after Robert had returned from Mexico. The lover, who she met during her vacation at Grand Isle, told her that he loves her and he wants to marry her.
But her mood changes when her friend Adéle tells her that she should care more about her family as she does not spend enough time with her family because of her affairs.
Robert leaves Edna behind because Edna does not give a clear answer to his marriage proposal.
Afterwards she starts thinking about her life, her psychological and physical "awakening "and her children.
She invites her friends for dinner and returns to Grand Isle, where she pretends to go for swimming but never came back from the water.
In my essay, I would like to reflect upon Edna's options and decisions which she could have taken in order to avoid the suicide.
One way could have been to marry another man or remain married with Leonce and stay with her children. This option is not possible for her because she would be a man's trophy again and could not keep up her ideas of independence. Besides that, this would imply that she loses all that she has fought for or gained throughout the liberation process.
Man at that time would have wanted her to live as a " mother woman", "wom(a)n who idolized their children, worshiped their husbands, and esteemed it a holy privilege to efface themselves as individuals and grow wings as ministering angels" (Chapter IV).
Edna is no mother wo...
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...her anyone.
The novel ends very abruptly. That is why it is difficult to say whether the suicide is an act of desperation or to show the society that she is ready to die for her beliefs.
To my mind, it only shows that she couldn't see any way out of the misery and she chose the suicide to protect her kids from social problems.
There is no objective answer to the question: Edna's suicide, failure or success?
Both of the answers make sense and for both answers you will find reasons.
I think that her suicide shows that she failed. The society was simply not ready for her revolutionary ideas. She failed because she could not find people to support her ideas. In today's world, where the society is more liberal, she would have probably succeeded but not in the society of the 1890'ies century. And it was not a coincidence that the novel became famous 50 years later!
...manic depressive state which leads her to her suicide. She no longer has a will to repress any untold secrets from the past or perhaps the past. Since she has strayed far from her Christian beliefs, she has given in to the evil that has worked to overcome her. She believes she is finally achieving her freedom when she is only confining herself to one single choice, death. In taking her own life, she for the last time falls into an extremely low mood, disregards anyone but herself, and disobeys the church.
At last, she thinks so much about escaping Gilead by burning the house with the match, or hanging herself. (Atwood 292) She can do anything to escape the society, but all she did was sitting and waiting for the van to come. She only think about herself, she didn’t even try to escape, rebel. That’s the symbol of non heroine, she doesn’t think of others. Above all, she made no changes for this society. She was trying to stay alive through her time in Gilead, not to rebel or make changes for women. There wasn’t any performance from her that recognizes the signs
Robert is a fun, caring man to women and he especially desires Edna. He sees her unhappiness and of course tries to comfort her.
Throughout The Awakening, Edna faces oppression from her husband, children, and society. It is her duty, as a women, to get married and have children with her husband. Edna’s
...en as a realization that she cannot survive in a society that puts such restrictions on women, thus committing suicide, or so we are led to believe. Or it could be viewed as an act of tremendous courage, removing herself from a world that cannot hold her to societal expectations or rules.
She desperately wanted a voice and independence. Edna’s realization of her situation occurred progressively. It was a journey in which she slowly discovered what she was lacking emotionally. Edna’s first major disappointment in the novel was after her husband, Leonce Pontellier, lashed out at her and criticized her as a mother after she insisted her child was not sick. This sparked a realization in Edna that made here realize she was unhappy with her marriage. This was a triggering event in her self discovery. This event sparked a change in her behavior. She began disobeying her husband and she began interacting inappropriately with for a married woman. Edna increasingly flirted with Robert LeBrun and almost instantly became attracted to him. These feelings only grew with each interaction. Moreover, when it was revealed to Edna that Robert would be leaving for Mexico she was deeply hurt not only because he didn’t tell her, but she was also losing his company. Although Edna’s and Robert’s relationship may have only appeared as friendship to others, they both secretly desired a romantic relationship. Edna was not sure why she was feeling the way she was “She could only realize that she herself-her present self-was in some way different from the other self. That she was seeing with different eyes and making the acquaintance of new conditions in herself that colored
In the first place, Edna breaks free from society’s rigid mold in order to find herself, not conforming to the expectations of the men in her life and having the courage to fight for her independence. Throughout the course of the novel, Edna works to find her place in life. The first time Edna begins “to realize her position in the universe as a human being” rather than as her husband’s possession is during the exposition at Grand Isle, where she spent the summer (17). Although she does not fully comprehend what she is feeling, she realizes that she does not want to be another woman who submits to the power of
Freedom means to be able to do what one desires to do without being restricted from doing that action. In Kate Chopin’s book The Awakening, she displays how the protagonist, Edna, escapes from her relationship and society .She feels cornered by society and she is not satisfied with her relationship. Mr.Pontellier Edna’s husband does not treat her with respect, but as if she is a child. Edna is trying to get out of the relationship because she wants to be treated equally (Chopin). During the 1800s, oppression of women was beginning to happen more frequently with women not taking anymore of the unfair rights and actions toward women. Edna uses others distractions or hobbies to feel free away from everything else in her life. Throughout The Awakening, Edna’s obsession with water, playing music and just flat out leaving her family despite her children are her actions toward freedom. She finds these activities soothing and comfortable ,she is feel when she is around doing these things she can't be judged or told what to do. With her obsession with water it is a Her transcendalistic obsession with water and nature sooths her and releases the toxins from her life. With music being an interest of her, she plays it a lot throughout the book too, which is a symbol of something she does to escape from society. But all of these actions by Edna result in her suicide ,which is a way of freeing herself from everything that is constricting her in her life. Edna’s longing for freedom inspires many of her actions throughout The Awakening.
Because of Robert, Edna realized that she was not happy with who or where she was and decided to drastically change everything that she was accustomed to. If Edna Pontellier had never met Robert Lebrun, she may never have realized how unhappy she was, and, in turn, may never have chosen to end her life.
In Kate Chopin’s, The Awakening, the reader immediately notices the sexual undertones of Mrs. Mallard and Robert’s relationship and the strained relationship between Mr. and Mrs. Mallard. There are always going to be women who do not want the routine “married with children” lifestyle, unfortunately in Edna’s time period that was the primary role of women. Had she been living in today perhaps she would have been without a husband and children, possibly totally devoted to a career in the arts and totally single. Back to her reality though: I believe she is unsure if she wants that one true love (supposedly Robert) or if she just wants anyone who will pay her a little attention and is fun (supposedly Alcee Arobin). Edna wants to be Wild and Free, not saying that there is anything wrong with that, but she needs to recognize it for what it is because she is really fooling herself.
In Kate Chopin's The Awakening, the principal character, Edna decides to kill herself rather than to live a lie. It seemed to Kate that the time of her own death was the only thing remaining under her control since society had already decided the rest of her life for her. Edna was a woman of the wrong times; she wanted her independence and she wanted to be with her lover, Robert. This type of behavior would never be accepted by the society of her time. Edna's relationship with Robert, and her rejection of the role dictated to her by society, resulted in her perceiving suicide to be the only solution to her problems.
At first Edna only misses Robert greatly and wonders why he never writes her like he promised he would. She does get to read letters in which Robert has sent others instead of her.
	There are definite signs of Edna Pontellier's depression, from the beginning of the novel and all the way to the end when she commits suicide. If there had been someone who had seen this, Edna might not have been driven to death, but she felt that no one could understand her wanting to be on her own. She thought of Doctor Mandelet, that he might have understood, but it was already too late, she was too far from shore and her strength was gone. So in the end there was really no one that could have saved her from this fate.
The Awakening by Kate Chopin ends with the death of the main character, Edna Pontellier. Stripping off her clothes, she swims out to sea until her arms can no longer support her, and she drowns. It was not necessarily a suicide, neither was it necessarily the best option for escaping her problems.
There are many ways of looking at Edna's Suicide in The Awakening, and each offers a different perspective. It is not necessary for the reader to like the ending of the novel, but the reader should come to understand it in relation to the story it ends. The fact that readers do not like the ending, that they struggle to make sense of it, is reflected in the body of criticism on the novel: almost all scholars attempt to explain the suicide. Some of the explanations make more sense than others. By reading them the reader will come to a fuller understanding of the end of the novel (and in the process the entire novel) and hopefully make the ending less disappointing.