Wait a second!
More handpicked essays just for you.
More handpicked essays just for you.
Descriptive detail in the story of an hourby kate chopin
Character analysis of the story of an hour by kate chopin
The story of an hour symbolism
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Identity Crisis within Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour” Sometimes during our lifetime, we come across confusion with who we think we really are. Identity crisis can be a very serious thing. We often think that we know who we really are but we also often question it. When you begin to experience identity crisis, it becomes a serious matter to many. You become oblivious, so to speak, to the stuff around you. They say that identity crisis is “a period in your life where you experience distress when trying to find one’s self”. In Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour”, we realize that may be true when Chopin is talking about Mrs. Mallard. In “The Story of an Hour”, we are introduced to Mrs. Mallard and we are finding out that her husband had been associated in a train accident and that he was on the list of people that had died according to their friend Richards. Mrs. …show more content…
We find out that she was never really comfortable in her own skin when she was with her husband even though she was with him for many years. Louise felt like she was never really living until she heard the news about her husband being involved in a train accident and he was gone. She was rather sad but also very joyful because she would finally be able to go on with her life without her husband holding her back. I believe that she was more than ready to finally find herself and be able to want to actually keep continuing her life but this time without her husband being right there. I realized that Chopin wanted you to feel sympathy towards Mrs. Mallard because it’s very unfair for someone to go through life and not be able to live it how they once imagined living it. It’s actually very sad to me that Louise does end up dying of heart failure but she only died because she was happy to find out that she was finally going to be free. I understand that she will be free now because she did die and now she can live life how she
Ego is the fall of many. In critical analysis, “Fatal Self-Assertion in Kate Chopin’s ‘Story of an Hour’”, Lawrence L. Berkove displays his view of Louise. It is evident in his article that he pays close attention to Chopin’s details of emotion. The article describes how the story forecasts the fatal ending with suspension and clues. He believes that the key to the story is “recognizing this deeper ironic level” (Berkove). Kate Chopin leaves the story up for interpretation concerning theme and the true reason for her death. Berkove, in his article, states that the theme of the story is extreme self-assertion and that feminism shines through the story.
Like in many tragically true stories, it would seem Mrs. Mallard 's freedom came too late. Kate Chopin’s, “The Story of an Hour” begins by introducing Mrs. Mallard as a person afflicted with heart trouble. The story builds on this by having Mrs. Mallard’s sister Josephine and her husband Richard explain the situation in a very sensitive manner. Their efforts would prove to be in vain however as Mrs. Mallard then proceeds to emotionally break down. The news shocks Mrs. Mallard to her very core and has her at odds with how she should feel now that all was said and done. After coming to terms with her situation, fate delivers its final blow in a cruel and deceitful ploy towards Mrs. Mallards. And with that, Mrs. Mallard 's dies. In her hour of change Mrs. Mallard 's was delicate, thoughtful and excitable.
As Mrs. Mallard lets her realization take root she begins to chant, “free, free, free” (Chopin, 75). This shows that she accepts her new fate and knows that she will be okay without her husband. Louise becomes aware that she has been dictated by social expectation and requirement, but now can live for herself once again with no one to answer to. Louise admits, “she would weep again when she saw the kind, tender hands folded in death” (Chopin, 75), but sees her future beyond that now. Social expectations no longer obligate her to be the woman she was. Louise is now able to do what she feels is most beneficial for her as an individual, and not what would be expected in her monogamous
Many people interpret that Louise passes away from shock and disappointment from discovering her husband is actually alive. They feel that when Louise finally accepts that her husband is deceased and she discovers freedom, that seeing her husband alive causes her to get depressed, go into shock, and die. On the other hand, a more unique interpretation of Mallard’s death would be that she passed away from excitement and anxiousness from being completely independent, and having various opportunities in store for herself. Mallard may have not been able to handle the new exhilaration directly after experiencing deep depression and grief from the news of her husband’s accident. Some supporting evidence that Louise did not collapse from seeing her husband alive, is that the passage never directly states that she actua...
However, even though Louise is thought to be passionate, it is also suggested that she is somewhat repressed. Chopin tells the reader that Louise's face "Bespeaks repression." The question is why? Louise seems to be a paradox of sorts; she is passionate, but repressed. This leads the reader to wonder if maybe Louise has been controlled or repressed by her husband. A little further in the story, this is confirmed even further by the Louise's later response to her husbands death. Louise begins to become joyful at the thought of being alone. When she begins to feel this joyful free feeling, the word "abandonment" is used suggesting that Louise has felt trapped in some way.
Cunningham, Mark. "The Autonomous Female Self and the Death of Louise Mallard in Kate Chopin's "Story of an Hour.” English Language Notes 42.1 (2004): 48-55. Academic Search Complete. Web. 3 Feb. 2014.
In Kate Chopin's "Story of an Hour" the author portrays patriarchal oppression in the institution of marriage by telling the story of one fateful hour in the life of a married woman. Analyzing the work through feminist criticism, one can see the implications of masculine discourse.
The story is very short, but every word has import in the story and each line has great depth of meaning. It is possible to infer a great deal about the woman's life, even though we are given very little on the surface. A telegraph and a railroad are mentioned in the first paragraph, so there is some idea of the time the story takes place. We are also given her married name and the full name of her husband. The fact that she is referred to only as "Mrs. Mallard", while her husband's full name is given, coupled with what we learn on the second page, gives some indication of the repression she's had to suffer through and the indignity society placed on woman in those times. We also learn in the first paragraph that she lives in a man's world, for, though it is her sister that tells her the news, it is her husband's friend who rushes over with the story. Even after his death, she is confined to the structures she adopted with married life, including the close friend's of her husband.
Setting exists in every form of fiction, representing elements of time, place, and social context throughout the work. These elements can create particular moods, character qualities, or features of theme. Throughout Kate Chopin's short story "The Story of an Hour," differing amounts and types of the setting are revealed as the plot develops. This story deals with a young woman's emotional state as she discovers her own independence in her husband's death, then her "tragic" discovery that he is actually alive. The constituents of setting reveal certain characteristics about the main character, Louise Mallard, and are functionally important to the story structure. The entire action takes place in the springtime of a year in the 1890s, in the timeframe of about an hour, in a house belonging to the Mallards. All of these aspects of setting become extremely relevant and significant as the meaning of the story unfolds.
Kate Chopin’s story “The Story of an Hour” focuses on a married woman who does not find happiness in her marriage. When she hears of her husband’s death, the woman does not grieve for long before relishing the idea of freedom. Chopin’s story is an example of realism because it describes a life that is not controlled by extreme forces. Her story is about a married nineteenth-century woman with no “startling accomplishments or immense abilities” (1271). Chopin stays true to reality and depicts a life that seems as though it could happen to any person.
In Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour”, the struggle for freedom is dominant. The main character, Mrs. Mallard, stands for a woman who is struggling internally and externally for freedom. After the sudden loss of her husband, Mrs. Mallard gets a taste of the freedom she was lacking in her marriage. Like Mrs. Mallard, women throughout history have struggled to find freedom and success away from their husbands. Chopin herself only became successful after the loss of her husband. In “The Story of an Hour”, Chopin shows women’s struggle for freedom during the Victorian period through Mrs. Mallard’s struggle for her own freedom.
In "The Story of an Hour" Kate Chopin tells the story of a woman, Mrs. Mallard whose husband is thought to be dead. Throughout the story Chopin describes the emotions Mrs. Mallard felt about the news of her husband's death. However, the strong emotions she felt were not despair or sadness, they were something else. In a way she was relieved more than she was upset, and almost rejoiced in the thought of her husband no longer living. In using different literary elements throughout the story, Chopin conveys this to us on more than one occasion.
Kate Chopin provides her reader with an enormous amount of information in just a few short pages through her short story, “The Story of an Hour.” The protagonist, Louise Mallard, realizes the many faults in romantic relationships and marriages in her epiphany. “Great care [is] taken to break to her as gently as possible the news of her husband’s death” (Chopin 168). Little do Josephine and Richards know, the news will have a profoundly positive effect on Louise, rather than a negative one. “When she abandoned herself,” Mrs. Mallard opened her mind to a new way of life.
Freedom is one of the most powerful words in the world because of the feeling it gives people. This idea is evident in Kate Chopin’s, “The Story of an Hour.” In the story, readers witness the effect freedom can have when the main character, Louise, finds out her husband had passed away. The story begins when Louise’s sister informs her that her husband had been in a terrible accident and he was dead. Once she gets over the immediate shock, she finds herself overwhelmed with joy because she was free to live her life for herself and not her husband. At the end of the story, her husband walks through the front door, and Louise has a heart attack and dies. In the story "The Story of an Hour," Kate Chopin reveals the power of freedom through the use of diction, point of view, and setting.
The descriptions in the story foreshadow the tragedy that ends the story. The author believed unexpected things happen often. In the case of this story, Louise Mallard believed her husband to be dead, having been told this by her sister, Josephine. However, when it is revealed that her husband had been alive the whole time, she is unhappy to see him and suffers a fatal heart attack. While she did have heart trouble, Richards and Josephine thought that the news of her husband’s death, not her seeing him again would be detrimental to her health, possibly even fatal. Chopin succeeded in getting this message across.