Edna's Awakening

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Recommended: Ambiguity in the awakening by kate chopin

Edna's Awakening

Kate Chopin's "The Awakening" is a work of

litature like none other I have read. It is not

hard to imagine why this major work of Chopin's was

banished for decades not long after its initial

publication in 1899. Most of society did not like

the fact that "The Awakenings" main character, Edna

Pontellier, went against the socially acceptable

role of women at that time. At that time in

history, women did just what they were expected to

do. They were expected to be good daughters, good

wives, and good mothers. Edna seemed to fit this

mold at first, but eventually as the story develops

Edna breaks free from that mold.

Edna chose to do what society expected of her,

she marries, and leaves her fantasies and dreams in

the depths of the shadows. "The acme of bliss, which

would have been a marriage with the tragedian, was

not for her in this world. As the devoted wife of a

man who worshiped her, she felt she would take her

place with a certain dignity in the world of

reality, closing the portals forever behind her

upon the realm of romance and dreams." After

marriage, Edna faced the expectations of motherhood

and being a devoted mother, after all "if it was

not a mother's place to look after children, whose

on earth was it?"

The outward appearance of Edna's life looked

perfect, she was the envy of many women. "And the

ladies, selecting with dainty and discriminating

fingers and a little greedily, all declared that

Mr. Pontellier was the best husband in the world.

Mrs. Pontellier was forced to admit she knew of

none better." The cover of her life was a

picture of a fairy tale, but inside, the pages were

filled with the emptiness and the loneliness she

was feeling. During that ...

... middle of paper ...

...obert, but he will not because it will disgrace

her to leave her husband. Now, the wings that once

held such possibilities for her new life were

shattered and "a bird with a broken wing was

beating the air above, reeling, fluttering,

circling, disabled down, down to the water."

In the end Edna takes a death walk down to the

beach. When she arrives at the shore, she "casts

the unpleasant pricking garments from her." This

symbolizing the shedding of her "unpleasant" and

"pricking" life. She could hear the waves inviting

her, and "She felt like a new-born creature,

opening its eyes in a familiar world that it had

never known." As Edna swims towards

eternity she thinks of many things. Now the shore

was far behind and her strength was gone, not only

to swim, but live. Edna underwent an "awakening"

and as a result chose the endless sleep of death.

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