Theme Of Selfhood In The Story Of An Hour

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The definition of selfhood is the state of being an individual person. In the story, The Story of an Hour by Kate Chopin Louise Mallard a wife in the 19th century was searching for selfhood and freedom. This short story was written at a time where it was common sense and tradition that women “were inferior to men in status and opportunities” (Berkove p152-158). The Story of an Hour has probably inspired a great deal of women to oppose their husbands if they feel like their marriage isn’t quite as equals as it ought to be. The story illustrates the authority a man has over a woman. Women are properties of men in a conservative society, so it is hard for women to have their own lives. Chopin clearly implies that any woman’s search for ideal feminine …show more content…

We know this because Chopin tells us that Brently Mallard, Mrs. Mallard husband works on the railroad. Throughout this short story there are examples showing how Mrs. Mallard's actions and ideas are focused on her selfhood and freedom. The author also describes the realization of freedom as if it were a evident thing, "there was something coming to her and she was waiting for it" (Chopin para. 9). There are also thoughts and ideas that show Mrs. Mallard realizing that love is by no means a substitute for independence. "The Story of an Hour" also deals with societal conflicts through their impact on the protagonist. Mrs. Mallard is seen to be unaware of the conflict and resulting oppression, until events occur that force her to see it. She is ultimately defeated by the social …show more content…

Mallard first name is only told in the story after she hears of her husband’s death and when she feels free. Before this she was acknowledge as Mrs. Mallard. Chopin is pointing to something very interesting here which leads me back to the title of woman as “wife.” When Louise marries Brently she becomes Mrs. Mallard, she lost her identity and assumes a new one. While it seems very normal and average for a wife to assume her husband’s name in marriage and in that time become the property of him, it cannot be ignored that a certain part of the self is lost. This woman is very in tune with this loss and even though her love for her husband keeps her from it, the freedom she feels when she thinks he is dead becomes unavoidable and enjoyable. According to Steven Doloff “Commentators have suggested that since only her married name, ‘Mrs. Mallard’, is given in the story’s first line, this delay in personalizing her identity apart from her husband’s is meant to underscore the narrative’s generally perceived theme: the unhealthy repression of a woman’s natural sense of individual self-worth by conventional sexist expectations of late nineteenth-century matrimony” (Doloff pg.

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