Sexual Awakening In Kate Chopin's The Awakening

1542 Words4 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Essays about kate chopin

Kate Chopin is quite witty when choosing titles for her short stories and a novel, just like The Storm indicated some natural, unavoidable passion, in her novel The Awakening we have sexual awakening of the main protagonist Mrs. Edna Pontellier. Chopin kept it simple and classy yet deep tones given to titles are more than present. Chopin portrayed Edna in most honest way and not fearing that by giving her character sexual, emotional and intellectual freedom, Chopin was damaging a social picture of herself, since people were not very forgiving for daring Chopin, they try to harm her career and reputation. Edna Pontellier is a young woman in her late twenties who didn’t let her role of a wife and a mother rule over her personality.
The novel …show more content…

So right from Edna’s indifference toward the situation we get the sense that she’s not that much into her motherhood, after all, just because she is a mother that doesn’t give as right to think of her as of a perfect woman. Maybe she was annoyed with her husband’s nagging, however that doesn’t give her an excuse for not jumping out of bed when hearing that her son may be sick. The moment her husband falls asleep she bursts into tears, one of the most beautiful and touching moments in The Awakening, and since the reason for her tears is unknown there is something painfully beautiful about it. Every ‘awakening’ starts with tears, whether those are happy or sad tears, it is our body reflecting the storm happening …show more content…

In chapter 27, Edna comes close with Alcee Arobin, a heartbreaker of New Orleans, he comes in her life while Robert in Mexico and he becomes the men who sexually satisfies her even though she never gave him the feeling that he could possess her sexuality in any way. It was the first kiss of her life to which her nature had really responded. It was a flaming torch that kindled desire. (Chopin 112) Later on in chaper 31, Alcee and Edna meet again after the party, and if we don’t read closely we might miss the fact that they let themselves go passionately once more

Show More
Related

  • Kate Chopin's The Awakening

    1023 Words  | 3 Pages

    Kate Chopin's novella The Awakening tells the story of Edna Pontellier, a woman who throughout the novella tries to find herself. Edna begins the story in the role of the typical mother-woman distinctive of Creole society but as the novelette furthers so does the distance she puts between herself and society. Edna's search for independence and a way to stray from society's rules and ways of life is depicted through symbolism with birds, clothing, and Edna's process of learning to swim.

    Read More

  • How Does Kate Chopin Use Characterization In The Awakening

    970 Words  | 2 Pages

    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.

    Read More

  • Ambiguity in Kate Chopin's The Awakening

    3587 Words  | 8 Pages

    Leonce Pontellier, the husband of Edna Pontellier in Kate Chopin's The Awakening, becomes very perturbed when his wife, in the period of a few months, suddenly drops all of her responsibilities. After she admits that she has "let things go," he angrily asks, "on account of what?" Edna is unable to provide a definite answer, and says, "Oh! I don't know. Let me along; you bother me" (108). The uncertainty she expresses springs out of the ambiguous nature of the transformation she has undergone. It is easy to read Edna's transformation in strictly negative terms‹as a move away from the repressive expectations of her husband and society‹or in strictly positive terms‹as a move toward the love and sensuality she finds at the summer beach resort of Grand Isle. While both of these moves exist in Edna's story, to focus on one aspect closes the reader off to the ambiguity that seems at the very center of Edna's awakening. Edna cannot define the nature of her awakening to her husband because it is not a single edged discovery; she comes to understand both what is not in her current situation and what is another situation. Furthermore, the sensuality that she has been awakened to is itself not merely the male or female sexuality she has been accustomed to before, but rather the sensuality that comes in the fusion of male and female. The most prominent symbol of the book‹the ocean that she finally gives herself up to‹embodies not one aspect of her awakening, but rather the multitude of contradictory meanings that she discovers. Only once the ambiguity of this central symbol is understood can we read the ending of the novel as a culmination and extension of the themes in the novel, and the novel regains a...

    Read More

  • Theme Of Birth In Kate Chopin's The Awakening

    2916 Words  | 6 Pages

    ...oroform, a sensation-deadening stupor, the ecstasy of pain, and an awakening—mark Edna’s self-discovery throughout The Awakening. Still, in the end, Edna follows through with what she told Madame Ratignolle she would and would not be willing to do: “I would give up my life for my children; but I wouldn’t give myself” (69). She gives up her life because she is unwilling to give up her self—her desires, her cravings, and her passions to do what she wants selfishly and without regard for any other being’s wishes. She cannot escape motherhood, nor can she ever hope to find her idealized lover. Thus, she leaves these dissatisfactions behind her as she enjoys her final moments of empowerment and solitude wrapped in the folds of the sea, the hum of bees, and the smell of pinks’ musk.

    Read More

  • Edna's Struggle for Power in Chopin's The Awakening

    1390 Words  | 3 Pages

    Kate Chopin's The Awakening tells the story of Edna Pontellier, a young wife and mother living in the upper crust of New Orleans in the 1890s. It depicts her journey as her standing shifts from one of entrapment to one of empowerment. As the story begins, Edna is blessed with wealth and the pleasure of an affluent lifestyle. She is a woman of leisure, excepting only in social obligations. This endowment, however, is hindered greatly by her gender.

    Read More

  • Edna Pontellier's Regression In The Awakening

    1583 Words  | 4 Pages

    Essentially, Edna is not able to fulfill any of the roles that are presented by Chopin in the novel: mother, sister, daughter, wife, friend, artist, lover to either man, and finally the traditional role of a woman in society. She does not quite fit into any niche, and thus her suicide at the end of the novel is the only way for Edna’s story to end. Chopin must have Edna die, as she cannot survive in this restrained society in which she does not belong to. The idea of giving yourself completely to serve another, Edna declares “that she would never sacrifice herself for her children, or for any one” (47). However, her awakening is also a realization of her underprivileged position in a male dominated society. The first sign that Edna is becoming comfortable with herself, and beginning to loosen the constrictions of not being an individual is when she asks Robert, her husband, to retrieve her shawl: "When he returned with the shawl she took it and kept it in her hand. She did not put it around her" (30). Edna is trying to establish herself as an artist in a society where there is no tradition of women as creative beings. For any woman to suggest a desire for a role outside the domestic sphere, as more than a mother or housewife, was perceived as

    Read More

  • The Role Of Reinvention In The Awakening

    1206 Words  | 3 Pages

    Throughout Kate Chopin’s novel The Awakening, the main protagonist Edna Pontellier, ventures through a journey of self-discovery and reinvention. Mrs.Pontellier is a mother and wife who begins to crave more from life, than her assigned societal roles. She encounters two opposite versions of herself, that leads her to question who she is and who she aims to be. Mrs. Pontellier’s journey depicts the struggle of overcoming the scrutiny women face, when denying the ideals set for them to abide. Most importantly the end of the novel depicts Mrs.Pontellier as committing suicide, as a result of her ongoing internal

    Read More

  • The True Identity In Kate Chopin's The Awakening

    1882 Words  | 4 Pages

    Throughout Kate Chopin’s The Awakening, Edna Pontellier, the main protagonist, experiences multiple awakenings—the process in which Edna becomes aware of her life and the constraints place on it—through her struggles with interior emotional issues regarding her true identity: the confines of marriage vs. her yearning for intense passion and true love. As Edna begins to experience these awakenings she becomes enlightened of who she truly and of what she wants. As a result, Edna breaks away from what society deems acceptable and becomes awakened to the flaws of the many rules and expected behavior that are considered norms of the time. One could argue that Kate Chopin’s purpose in writing about Edna’s inner struggles and enlightenment was to

    Read More

  • Kate Chopin's The Awakening

    1261 Words  | 3 Pages

    In the Creole culture, outward affection and expression were a common thing. Edna, being brought up in Kentucky, "was at first a little confused. . .by the Creole's gentle caress. She was not accustomed to an outward and spoken expression of affection, either in herself or in others," (Chopin 22). Robert knew that Edna was not of Creole background and that she might not take his flirting as simply that. Yet, he still continued to playfully pursue Edna like the women which he had been devoting himself to each summer for the past eleven years. He did not understand that what he was doing was wrong in the culture that Edna had been brought up with. Once, when Robert laid his head against Edna's arm, she brushed him off. He then did it again and Edna "could not but believe it to be thoughtlessness on his part; yet that was no reason she submit to it," (15). Edna was at first disturbed by Robert's actions. Because she did not know about the Creole culture, she allowed Robert to flirt with her and she actually took him seriously. The flirting resulted in her starting to have feelings for him and to wonder about her place in life.

    Read More

  • Free Essays - Importance of the Houses in The Awakening

    914 Words  | 2 Pages

    As the novel starts out Edna is a housewife to her husband, Mr. Pontellier, and is not necessarily unhappy or depressed but knows something is missing. Her husband does not treat her well. "...looking at his wife as one looks at a valuable piece of personal property which has suffered some damage." She is nothing but a piece of property to him; he has no true feelings for her and wants her for the sole purpose of withholding his reputation. "He reproached his wife with her inattention, her habitual neglect of the children. If it was not a mother's place to look after children, whose on earth was it?" Mr. Pontellier constantly brings her down for his own satisfaction not caring at all how if affects Edna.

    Read More

  • Gender Roles In 'The Awakening' By Kate Chopin

    1474 Words  | 3 Pages

    For example, he treats some women with little respect. The novel states, “ And [Robert] related the story of Alcee Arobin and the consul’s wife; and another about the tenor of the French Opera, who received letters which should never have been written…” (20). This shows that Alcee has been with multiple women, and he has, from what can be inferred, written bad letters to them. He seems to have casted these women aside now and moved on showing little respect for them which was not what a man should have. Moreover, he moves in on married women. The novel states, “When he leaned forward and kissed [Edna], she clasped his head, holding his lips to hers” (84). Although Edna returned the kiss, it still does not excuse the fact that Alcee initiated the kiss on a known married women. Men during the time did not try to take what other men already had as the reader is shown when Robert says goodbye to Edna for the reason of her marriage to Leonce. Additionally, Alcee does what he wants to women. The novel states, “‘ I am, after I have said good night[,]’ [said Alcee.] ‘Good night,’ [Edna] murmured. He did not answer, except to continue to caress her. He did not say good night until she had become supple to his gentle, seductive entreaties” (94). Edna tries to tell Alcee to leave, although not in a very commanding way, but he refuses until he gets what he wants from her. Men at the time had more respect from

    Read More

  • Controversial Views in Kate Chopin's The Awakening

    1210 Words  | 3 Pages

    One of the main themes explored in The Awakening is that of a woman's place in society. In that time period, a woman was considered in some ways to be property of a man (Mahin 2). This is shown repeatedly in The Awakening, through the many relationships between the characters. As with many ideas throughout the book, this is depicted well through the contrast between Edna's marriage and Madame Ratignolle's (Klein 4). While Madame Ratignolle is happy to do whatever her husband wishes, Edna will not indulge her husband at all, at one point even telling him "Don't speak to me like that again; I shall not answer you" (Chopin 80). Edna also had extremely rebellious views on her family life, thinking of her children as passing pleasures rather than the sole purpose of her existence (Klein 4). She even states to Madame Ratignolle "I would give up the unessential [for her children];... but I wouldn't give myself" (Chopin 97). These were definitely not the usual thoughts of a woman in that era, which is reflected through her husband's opinion. "It seems to me the utmost folly for a woman at the head of a household, and the mother of children, to spend in an atelier days which would be better employed contriving for the comfort of her family" (Chopin 108). Although women were supposed to automatically be good mothers ...

    Read More

  • Kate Chopin's The Awakening

    1882 Words  | 4 Pages

    During the late nineteenth century, the time of protagonist Edna Pontellier, a woman's place in society was confined to worshipping her children and submitting to her husband. Kate Chopin's novel, The Awakening, encompasses the frustrations and the triumphs in a woman's life as she attempts to cope with these strict cultural demands. Defying the stereotype of a "mother-woman," Edna battles the pressures of 1899 that command her to be a subdued and devoted housewife. Although Edna's ultimate suicide is a waste of her struggles against an oppressive society, The Awakening supports and encourages feminism as a way for women to obtain sexual freedom, financial independence, and individual identity.

    Read More

  • Awakening

    2436 Words  | 5 Pages

    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.

    Read More

  • The significance of the title The Awakening

    542 Words  | 2 Pages

    The sexual aspect of Edna’s awakening is formed through her relationship with a supporting character, Robert LeBrun. In the beginning of the novel, Robert assigns himself to become the helper of Mrs. Pontellier and his advances help to crack the barrier in which Edna is placed in due to her role as a woman of the Victorian era. Her feelings begin to manifest themselves as she intends to liberate herself from her husband and run away with Robert. He on the other hand has no intention of having a sexual affair because of the role placed upon him as a man of the Victorian era which is not to destroy families. Her quest for complete independence ultimately brings her to committing suicide at the end of the story. Her suicide does not represent a disappointment in how she cannot conform to the society around her but a final awakening and symbol for her liberation.

    Read More

More about Sexual Awakening In Kate Chopin's The Awakening

Open Document