The late nineteenth century was changing time in American history. The United States of America was the number one industrial nation and a new wave of imperialism had begun. In this time, women are still not equal to men and are expected to live a certain way. Upper class women at this time were expected to be domestic. More than half a century later, the 1950’s, American culture was rapidly transforming. Pop culture was drastically changing, as rock music becomes popular, television shows becoming widespread, and the best actors ever known in this time. The fifties were a time of happiness and fun, especially for the average American teenager. The name teenagers was formed in this time because of young people trying to distinct themselves. Teenagers had much freedom and trouble. The new automobiles and leisure time lead young people to do wild things. The Awakening, by Kate Chopin, reveals a woman, Edna Pontellier who unleashes her true self. Edna Pontellier is a women living in the late 19th century in the Creole society of southern Louisiana. Being from Kentucky, she is unlike most women in the culture. In the film, Dead Poets Society, boys at a Vermont private school in 1959 become interested in the English subject, especially Neil Perry, taught in an unorthodox way. Edna Pontellier, the main character of The Awakening, and Neil Perry, the main character of the Dead Poets Society, share similar characteristics. Both protagonists go through a realization of what they want and should be doing in life. They both have two important people in their lives that help them with their realizations of life. Even though Edna and Neil have similar characteristics, they also have differences. Edna Pontellier, in Kate Chopins The Awakening, ...
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...elf. The difference between their deaths is that Edna died in the water and Neil died by gun force. Edna’s death could also be seen as an accident and not a suicide while Neil’s death was an intentional suicide.
Edna Pontellier and Neil Perry both went through a realization in their lives. The two characters were helped by someone in their lives. Even though they went through the same conflicts, they had different passions and fatalities. The role of women has from1890’s to present day. Women are independent, possess freedom, and have equal opportunities as men. The American teenager however is becoming even more distinct. The 1950’s started the evolution of the teenager and the authenticity lives on.
Works Cited
Chopin, Kate. The Awakening. New York. Avon Books, 1972. Print.
Dead Poets Society. Dir. Peter Weir. Perf. Robin Williams. Touchstone. 1989. DVD.
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
Social expectations of women affected Edna and other individuals in Kate Chopin’s novel The Awakening. The protagonist, Edna Pontellier, struggles throughout the novel in order to become independent and avoid her roles as mother and housewife in American Victorian society in 1899. This was because women during the 19th century were limited by what society demanded of them, to be the ideal housewives who would take care of their families. However, Edna tries to overcome these obstacles by exploring other options, such as having secret relationships with Robert and Arobin. Although Edna seeks to be independent throughout the novel, in the end she has been awakened but has not achieved independence.
Often in novels, a character faces conflicting directions of ambitions, desires, and influences. In such a novel, like “The Awakening,'; the main character, Edna Pontellier, faces these types of conflicting ideas. In a controversial era for women, Edna faces the conflict of living in oppression but desiring freedom. The patriarchal time period has influenced women to live only under the husband’s thumb but at the same time, break away from such repression. These opposing conflicts illuminated the meaning of “social awakening'; in the novel.
Today’s women are an accumulation of the characteristics of their predecessors. In the film Dance, Girl, Dance, the two supporting characters, Bubbles and Judy, exemplify some of the most relevant characteristics of contemporary women. The character of Bubbles not only demonstrates manipulative and superficial behavior, she also demonstrates ambition and resourcefulness. The character of Judy exhibits independence and tenacity, but also naivety and innocence. Today’s women have molded themselves with the most relevant characteristics of each of these women, drawing form both positive and negative attributes.
The Awakening sheds light on the desire among many women to be independent. Throughout the novel Edna conducts herself in a way that was disavowed by many and comes to the realization that her gender prevented her from pursuing what she believed would be an enjoyable life. As the story progresses Edna continues to trade her family obligations for her own personal pleasures. This behavior would not have been accepted and many even criticize the novel for even speaking about such activities. Kate Chopin essentially wrote about everything a women couldn’t do. Moreover, it also highlights the point that a man is able to do everything Edna did, but without the same
At the beginning of The Awakening Edna Pontillier is seen as a bad mother-wife but by the end of the novel she is seen as an independent, self-sufficient woman. Although she is not a traditional Creole woman her innovative outlook creates a new meaning to how a Creole woman is defined. Edna may not have been willing to give herself up for her children but she was willing to die for them and their happiness. This new branch of Creole woman is created by the characters in Edna’s life. While some make her character look negative others boost her new world ideas and want to help her change tradition.
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.
The Awakening was a very exciting and motivating story. It contains some of the key motivational themes that launched the women’s movement. It was incredible to see how women were not only oppressed, but how they had become so accustomed to it, that they were nearly oblivious to the oppression. The one woman, Edna Pontellier, who dared to have her own feelings was looked upon as being mentally ill. The pressure was so great, that in the end, the only way that she felt she could be truly free was to take her own life. In this paper I am going to concentrate on the characters central in Edna’s life and her relationships with them.
In The Awakening, Kate Chopin tells a story during the upbringing of the feminist movement, the movement was masked by the social attitudes entering into the 1900’s. She tells this story in the form of a novel, in which is told in a third person view, that is very sympathetic for Edna Pontellier, the protagonist. This is a review of the journey Edna takes in her awakening and evaluate the effectiveness this novel takes in introducing, continuing, and ending Edna’s awakening.
In the late 1800s, a crusade began that campaigned for the rights of women across America: the Feminist Movement. Using this movement as inspiration, Kate Chopin bewitches her primarily female readers with a writing style that emphasizes the importance of emotion and encourages the independence of women in a world dominated by men. In her novel, The Awakening, Chopin flawlessly illustrates the radical yet alluring character transformation of her protagonist, Edna Pontellier, as she struggles to surmount marital and societal conflict in the hopes of being reborn.
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.
A main theme in this small town’s culture is the issue of gender and the division of roles between the two. Not uncommon for the 1950’s, many women were taught from a young age to find a good man, who could provide for them and a family, settle down and have children – the ideal “happy family.” As Harry states after singing the showstopper “Kids,” “I have the All-American family: A great wife, 2 wonderful kids and a good job.”
In The Awakening, Kate Chopin depicts the varying definitions of women and their role through her three major female characters, Edna Pontellier, Madamoiselle Reisz and Madame Ratignolle. In the late 1800s, the role of women was strictly being caretakers for both their children and husbands. Edna Pontellier attempts to fit into society’s expectations by marrying Léonce Pontellier and raising two children, yet she struggles with feelings of oppression as she suffers through her unwanted role. Mademoiselle Reisz, a talented musician, is unmarried and childless, rejecting all of society’s ideals. Edna’s friend, Madame Ratignolle, greatly contrasts the two as she represents the model Louisiana women. However, while Edna, Madamoiselle Reisz and Madame Ratignolle each depict a different idea of woman’s role in society, none of these three women reach their full individual potential.
In the novella The Awakening by Kate Chopin, the main character Edna Pontellier “becomes profoundly alienated from traditional roles required by family, country, church, or other social institutions and is unable to reconcile the desire for connection with others with the need for self-expression” (Bogard). The novella takes place in the South during the 1800’s when societal views and appearances meant everything. There were numerous rules and expectations that must be upheld by both men and women, and for independent, stubborn, and curious women such as Edna, this made life challenging. Edna expressed thoughts and goals far beyond her time that made her question her role in life and struggle to identify herself, which caused her to break societal conventions, damage her relationships, and ultimately lose everything.
Critics of Kate Chopin's The Awakening tend to read the novel as the dramatization of a woman's struggle to achieve selfhood--a struggle doomed failure either because the patriarchal conventions of her society restrict freedom, or because the ideal of selfhood that she pursue is a masculine defined one that allows for none of the physical and undeniable claims which maternity makes upon women. Ultimately. in both views, Edna Pontellier ends her life because she cannot have it both ways: given her time, place, and notion of self, she cannot be a mother and have a self. (Simons)