The novel, The Awakening, and the short story, “The Revolt of ‘Mother,’” both stories have women that are not respected by their husbands. Both of the women, Edna Pontellier and Sarah Penn, have husbands who do not respect them, but they fight back in different ways. Their battles shows the differences between these two women from an earlier and less accepting time.
They are both strong willed characters. They both believe strongly enough in themselves that they will go to the extremes. Sarah moves out of her house. As does Edna, and they both do so against their husband’s wills. Neither of their husbands wants to have their wives move out of their houses, but they both do so and even go as far as to move their stuff with them. Edna only brings some of her things with while Sarah moves everything. She empties her and her families home and moves into the barn. The barn shows the wildness of her action because she did not just move her stuff out into another house she moved it to the barn, the barn where animals are supposed to be held. As it is in Sarah’s point of view, “ We’ve got jest as good a tight here as new horses an’ cows.”(Wilkins) This is quite the staement, still Edna’s move could be considered more devastating because when she moved out she moved out into another house with no intention of living with her husband. Whereas Sarah was going to continue living with her husband. Living with him in the barn, but never the less living with him.
Maybe it was their class differences that lead them to their final doings. Edna was of a high class. She had many workers who did her chores for her. The reader would think that she is lazy and thus lacking willpower because she does very little work for herself. She does not even ca...
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...y none the less because Edna was trying to get separation from Leonce. Unlike Sarah moving out was just the start for Edna. Once she had that she wanted more, and she ended up with the most she could possibly obtain.
In the end there were very many similarities between Sarah Penn and Edna Pontellier which lead them both to their goals. However their differences lead them to different goals. Goals that they fight their disrespecting husbands for. But was it the end was it each person’s character that lead them to their actions or was it there husbands?
Works Cited
Chopin, Kate. The Awakening and Selected Stories. 1899. Ed. Sandra M. Gilbert. New York: Penguin Books, 1984.
Wilkins, Mary. “The Revolt of Mother.” Harper’s New Monthly Magazine. Sept. 1890: 553-561. Electronic Text Center, University of Virginia Library. 10 Oct. 2008. http://etext.lib.virginia.edu
When Edna felt dissatisfied with the life she is given, she pursues other ways in which to live more fully. She attempts painting and enters into an affair with another man. As her desire for freedom grows, she moves out of her husband’s house and tries to live life as she sees fit. She lives a life reflecting her new philosophies towards life, philosophies that are in conflict with that of society. The oppression by man caused Edna to have a social awakening, illuminating the meaning of the novel.
In the third chapter she really expresses her true unhappiness with her husband and her children. She really has no interest in her children and caring for them as a mother. I can blame Edna, because she knew what she was in for when she married Leonce. But, I also feel sorry for her because reality hit her too late, and she’s miserable. I felt like she thought maybe giving it a chance with this man and bearing children, that she may learn to enjoy this life. WRONG!!
Edna had wanted to be a free woman, her own woman, and in a way she had become an independent woman but you have to consider what would have happened when Leonce came back in March and the children returned home. Robert understood Mr. Pontellier saw his wife as his possession, and he would never let her go and stake his own image on a wife who loved another. Robert would not take her from the children. He would not ruin the life she leads for a fight he would ultimately lose to Mr. Pontellier no matter that she loved him back. So one way or another Robert would eventually have left, and Mrs. Pontellier would have been left heartbroken. On top of this one must consider Mr. Pontellier's conversation with the doctor, if Mrs. Pontellier's actions only escalated what would he have done? Would she even still find reason to search for herself after Robert left, him being the one that sparked it all back on Grand Isle over summer? It is sad to say that there is not a way you can logically imagine that Mrs. Pontellier would have ended up
She desperately wanted a voice and independence. Edna’s realization of her situation occurred progressively. It was a journey in which she slowly discovered what she was lacking emotionally. Edna’s first major disappointment in the novel was after her husband, Leonce Pontellier, lashed out at her and criticized her as a mother after she insisted her child was not sick. This sparked a realization in Edna that made here realize she was unhappy with her marriage. This was a triggering event in her self discovery. This event sparked a change in her behavior. She began disobeying her husband and she began interacting inappropriately with for a married woman. Edna increasingly flirted with Robert LeBrun and almost instantly became attracted to him. These feelings only grew with each interaction. Moreover, when it was revealed to Edna that Robert would be leaving for Mexico she was deeply hurt not only because he didn’t tell her, but she was also losing his company. Although Edna’s and Robert’s relationship may have only appeared as friendship to others, they both secretly desired a romantic relationship. Edna was not sure why she was feeling the way she was “She could only realize that she herself-her present self-was in some way different from the other self. That she was seeing with different eyes and making the acquaintance of new conditions in herself that colored
Because of the time she lived in, Edna felt oppressed just because she was a woman. Being a married woman and a mother made her feel even more tied down. By looking at the relationship between Edna and her husband, Leonce, we see that men treated women as if they were nothing more than possessions or property. They had no respect for their wives, mothers, or even their daughters as they constantly treated them like housemaids who were there to answer to their every call. Even Edna's father thinks that his daughter is her husband's property. We see this when he says "You are far too lenient, too lenient by far, Leonce. Authority, coercion are what is needed. Put your foot down good and hard; the only way to manage a wife" (Chopin 663). This is her own father telling her husband that he needs to be tougher on her. Chopin is clearly showing the inequality of women here. Nowadays, you would never find a father telling his son-in-law to be harder on his daughter. This was something that Edna would not accept. Chopin cleverly adds that it was this same treatment from her father that killed her mother. "The colonel was perhaps unaware he had coerced his own wife into her grave" (Chopin 663).
With a husband and two children at the age of twenty eight, Edna Pontillier realized that the mother-wife life was not for her. With her new found independence Edna’s husband was unsure of how to handle his new untraditional wife. “I came to consult—no, not precisely to consult—to talk to you about Edna. I don't know what ails her.”(pg. 109) Mr. Pontillier is a loving and good husband but, his slight narcissistic personality causes him to lose touch with his wife. Mr. Pontillier buys Edna bonbons and compliments her in front of their friends but it would seem that he enjoys spending time with his friends and working more than he values his time with his wife. “Coming back to dinner?" his wife called after him. He halted a moment and shrugged his shoulders.”(pg. 8) The only reason Mrs. Pontillier stays with her husband for so long is because of her children. Although the Pontillier children are not major characters they help demonstrate her true commitment. Edna would rather die than let her children think their mother left them to be with another man. “She thought of Leonce and the children. They were a part of her life. But they need not have thought that they could possess her, body...
When we meet our narrator, the mother of Maggie and Dee, she is waiting in the yard with Maggie for Dee to visit. The mother takes simple pleasure in such a pleasant place where, "anyone can come back and look up at the elm tree and wait for the breezes that never come inside the house." (Walker 383) This is her basic attitude, the simple everyday pleasures that have nothing to do with great ideas, cultural heritage or family or racial histories. She later reveals to us that she is even more the rough rural woman since she, "can kill and clean a hog as mercilessly as a man." (Walker 383) Hardly a woman one would expect to have much patience with hanging historical quilts on a wall. Daughter Maggie is very much the opposite of her older sister, Dee. Maggie is portrayed as knowing "she is not bright." (Walker 384)
In the 1950’s, a woman’s life path was pretty clear cut, graduate from high school and find a good man while your ultimate goal is to start a family and maintain an orderly house. This is shown when Kingston says to the little girl “Some one has to marry you before you can become a housewife.” She says this as if becoming a housewife is a top priority for a woman. However presently, most women in America hold very respectable jobs and the role as housewife is slowly disappearing from American culture. Another example of modern day women showing strength is portrayed when the narrator’s mother goes on a cultural rampage and forces the narrator to go to the drug store and demand a piece of candy simply because the druggist missed the address of the house. This scene is shown in pages three, four, and five. By doing so the narrator comes off as poor and illogical.
Although the next morning, after Edna had cried the night before had to go and say good-bye to her husband because he was leaving on a business trip. Edna acted immaturely around him again when he gave her half the money he won the night before. ¡§¡¥It will buy a handsome wedding present for Sister Janet!¡¦ she exclaimed, smoothing out the bills as she counted them one by one,¡¨(15). Edna is spoiled by all of her husbands money.
...tionship she had until she was left with literally no reason to live. Throughout the novella, she breaks social conventions, which damages her reputation and her relationships with her friends, husband, and children. Through Edna’s thoughts and actions, numerous gender issues and expectations are displayed within The Awakening because she serves as a direct representation of feminist ideals, social changes, and a revolution to come.
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.
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Edna is a woman that has overcome many obstacles in her lifetime, but when she decides that she needs more than just her husband in her life, Edna’s life will
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