Story Of An Hour Literary Analysis

In Kate Chopin’s story “The Story of an Hour” Chopin shows a very unbelievable take on marriage. Mrs. Mallard feels happy and free rather than sad when she found out her husband died. Eventually, Mrs. Mallard got the news that her husband, Brently, is, in fact, alive. She now believes she is not free anymore. This devastating disappointment kills Mrs. Mallard. This story was published in the late eighteen hundreds and it may perhaps be a reflection of the marriage in that era.

Even though Chopin relates to Mrs. Mallard’s story, she does not write the story in first person. The story is being told through a narrator. The narrator is aware that she doesn’t love her husband. “And yet she had loved him - sometimes. Often she had not” (paragraph 14). Clearly the narrator knows more than what can be watched. We never actually knew how Mrs. Mallard felt because the narrator never came out and said. Instead, the reader must use context clues about Mrs. Mallard's activities and words to be able to comprehend how Mrs. Mallard feels. Mrs. Mallard is kept down in her marriage. “She was young, with a fair, calm face, whose lines bespoke repression and even a certain strength" (paragraph 7). When Mrs. Mallard finds out that her husband

Mallard went downstairs with her sister “there was feverish triumph in her eyes” (paragraph 19). The front entryway opens and Brently walks in. This instance has a very big impact on Mrs. Mallard. It ends her. She gained freedom and independence to anticipate in life. When Brently walks in she now knows that she will never be free again. This is a lot for Mrs. Mallard to deal with. Life has been terrible some time recently, with her anticipating the years ahead “with a shudder” (paragraph 18). Since Mrs. Mallard knows what life would be like with her husband dead, she knows that her previous life was boring. When Mrs. Mallard saw that her husband was still alive, she died, murdered by the loss of everything she thought she