Kate Chopin's The Story of an Hour

903 Words2 Pages

Women should be powerful, beautiful and intelligence. Nevertheless, women in the eighteenth century were portrayed as servants did not have any say in anything just like the story of an hour by Kate Chopin, where even in a good marriage you could not do the things you wanted to do. What if their husbands died what would come of them? How would they feel? And the irony of gaining freedom but losing everything? In the eighteenth century, Women were portrayed as powerless beneath the men because, men were powerful everything was given to them once they became men and wife. According to Hicks, Jennifer “Divorce was quite rare in the 1800s and if one was to occur, men were automatically given legal control of all property and children”, In the story of an hour Mrs. Mallard who was portrayed as weak because of her heart problems was told that her husband had died from a railroad disaster. Literature: A World of Writing “It was her sister Josephine who told her, in broken sentences; veiled hints that revealed in half concealing. Her husband's friend Richards was there, too, near her. It was he who had been in the newspaper office when intelligence of the railroad disaster was received, with Brently Mallard's name leading the list of "killed." He had only taken the time to assure himself of its truth by a second telegram, and had hastened to forestall any less careful, less tender friend in bearing the sad message.” Mrs. Mallard would have lost who she was at that moment in time with her husband gone who was there to take care of her? or to help with the bills? Many questions should have been running through Mrs. Mallard’s head in that time period the men was the head of the household Mrs. Mallard went upstairs to be alone and to t... ... middle of paper ... ...LE|H1420056308&v=2.1&u=lincclin_bwcc&it=r&p=LitRG&sw=w&asid=7015772a71967b366e5bf190da89319e>. Hicks, Jennifer. "An Overview of “The Story of an Hour”." Short Stories for Students. Detroit: Gale, 2002. N. pag. Literature Resources from Gale. Web. 28 Mar. 2014. . "Overview: "The Story of an Hour"" Short Stories for Students. Ed. Kathleen Wilson. Vol. 2. Detroit: Gale, 1997. N. pag.Literature Resources from Gale. Web. 28 Mar. 2014. . Pike, David L., and Ana Acosta. "Chapter 10 "The Story Of An Hour"" Literature: A World of Writing. New York: Longman, 2009. 442-44. Print.

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