“The Storm” by Kate Chopin is a short story that touches on the controversial subject of adultery. The two characters Calixta and Alcee were both happily married. They reunited spontaneously during the midst of a severe storm, when old feelings resurfaced. Their actions out of lust were feelings they had long forgotten. Soon enough the storm had calmed, and the two parted ways; smiling back at each other they said their goodbyes. Their actions were without the intention of being deceitful, but rather uncontrollable. In the end it is ironic that the infidelity strengthened one marriage’s relationship and made the other character realize the importance of marriage through his wrong doings.
Calixta is the wife of Bobinot, also the mother of their four year old son Bibi. The day the storm brewed in she was preoccupied sewing, unaware of the rolling clouds. Calixta obliviously did not worry for the boys’ safety in the storm, as Bobinot and Bibi were away in town. She was a caring wife and mother though. As soon as she realized the situation she rushed outside to grab her husband’s trousers and such hanging on a linen line to save from the rainfall. There outside was where she saw Alcee Laballiere. With good intentions she let Alcee wait out the storm on her porch. Though the severity of the rain led Alcee to proceed inside, Calixta could not help but fear for the well being of her husband and son. As the hard sheets of rain pounded the shingles, she became more afraid and concerned for young Bibi and hoped they were safe. Looking out at the storm, Calixta began to cry and staggered backwards into Alcee’s surrounding arms. ‘“Bonte!” she cried, releasing herself from his encircling arm and retreating from the window,’ (533). She ...
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...much and so loud that anyone might have heard them as far away as Laballiere’s” (534). On the other hand, Alcee Laballiere can also be considered as a dynamic character. After his acts of infidelity, he wrote a very loving letter to his wife. Alcee had a change of heart and unselfishly requested her stay away for a little longer, if that would make her happy. He continued and wrote, “though he missed them, he was willing to bear the separation a while longer-realizing that their health and pleasure were the first thing to be considered” (534). Alcee realized that his care and love for his wife was greater than his selfish needs that would detract her from something that made her happy.
Works Cited
Reesman, Jeanne. "The Storm." The Norton Anthology of American Literature. By Nina Baym and Arnold Krupat. 7th ed. Vol. C. New York: W. W. Norton &, 2007. 531-34. Print.
During this time a storm develops leaving them stranded seeking shelter. Alce, the character who appears to be Calixta first love suddenly appears at her house as she is alone seeking shelter from the storm himself. They had not laid eyes on each other since Calixtra was married which from a passage in the text indicated it had been five years at this points “She was a little fuller of figure than five years before” (The Storm, by Kate Chopin). Surprised to see him she invited him in which resulted in the room being filled with feelings and the sensation of flesh they craved for each other. Like the scene in Titanic they drift away making love to each other passionately. At the beginning Calixtra fights to resist the temptation “Bont! She cried, releasing herself from his encircling arms and retreating from the window” (The Storm, by Kate Chopin) but is ultimately overpower by temptation. Calixtra’s moment of awakening comes when Bobint and Bibi returns and she affectionately attends to her husband and effusively kissing her son. In this moment she see what she has, an amazing family. This is a women how just cheated on her husband with a man she has held feelings for but the love for her husband a family unit holds more values, weirdly it took her committing a wrong deed to realize this. Her moment of awakening in the case was positive though
The subject of adultery was first introduced soon after Alcee asked Calixta if he may take refuge from the approaching storm within her house. That was also the first point when the author lets us know that Calixta “may” still have feelings for Alcee. This was shown clearly in the story when it says, “ His voice and her own startled her as if from a trance…” Immediately after this the description of the setting changed from a outdoor relax feel to an indoor tense feel. This also lead to the feelings of both characters towards each other, which was shown when the room was described, “ The door stood open, and the room with its white, monumental bed, its closed shutters, looked dim and mysterious.”
Chopin gives off the impression that she is in favor of Calixta’s decision to actively engage in an affair. Chopin tackles the theme of female sexuality present at the time by allowing Calixta to crave sexual enjoyment with Alceé. In the 1800’s, like all women of her period Calixta grew unaware of her desires as a direct result of society. During that time women never acted upon their desires but rather played a submissive role in a sexual encounter omitting their needs to succumb to their male counterparts. Chopin identifies Calixtas’s ardent personality when she says: “she felt very warm and on her face perspiration gathered in beads” and “she unfastened her white sacque at the throat”(122). In this scene Calixta shows her devotion for sewing. Chopin parades Calixta as a very fervent woman who is eager to love and be loved when she says: “The generous abundance of her passion, without guile or trickery, was like a white flame which penetrated and found response in depths of his own sensuous nature that had never been reached” (123). In this excerpt Chopin alludes to the nature of their passion and the vigorous interaction that came with
The storm is the major factor of getting Alcee and Calixta back together. If the storm would not have hit, Calixta’s husband and son would have been able to return home, and Alcee would have not had a reason to come by the gallery where Calixta was. Also, while Alcee was waiting on the storm to pass at the gallery, he gave readers reason to believe that the two of them had been lovers before. A line in the story that was said by the narrator was “She had not seen him since her marriage and never alone.”, this symbolizes that Alcee and Calixta have had some type of relationship before the two of them married other people, and she does not trust herself alone with him. When things started to get intimate between the two, Alcee said “Do you remember in Assumption, Calixta?”.
'The Storm' and 'The Story of an Hour' expresses the attitudes of two women's rebirth and liberation. These two stories are alike in several ways. Natures plays a major role in both of these women's lives. Calixta and Mrs. Louise Mallard struggle to find their independence and in doing so the endings are triumphant and tragic.
This story focuses on the extra-marital affair a housewife named Calixta has while her husband and son are away due to a storm. Although we learn that Calixta has an affair we also know that she doesn’t completely defy the Cult of Domesticity. From the story we get the idea that she remained pure until she married her husband and as Chopin tells us in page 689 “She had not seen him very often since her marriage, and never alone,” this line suggest that even if she saw her past lover around she would not speak to him because neither of them were ever alone and they both didn’t want to disrespect their marriages. In addition Calixta seems to be a very good housewife and mother. She appears to be always tending her home. In page 689 we learn that “[sitting} at a side window sewing furiously on a sewing machine. [Calixta] was greatly occupied and did not notice the approaching storm.” She is so focused on her chores that she didn’t even notice a storm. For Calixta sewing and doing chores around the house is what is normal. She has assumed a role as a married woman and mother and she is fulfilling it. Before the affair you can say that by societies expectations she was a true woman, she kept her virginity until marriage, she makes sure her house chores are done, and she takes care of her family. Even after the affair she acts as if nothing has
During the turbulent storm in the story, Kate Chopin depicts that the marriage of Calixta and Bobinôt is going downhill. Both Bobinôt and Calixta are trapped in different locations during the storm. Bobinôt is in a general store and Calixta is at home. Not only are they in different places during the physical storm but they are also in different places on where their marriage stands. Calixta exposes the reader to see that her husband, Bobinôt, does not understand her because during the storm she is buried in the arms of another man. Calixta makes it apparent that she needs more from her husband and if he is not going to give her what she needs, she will find it in another man. The story depicts that Bobinôt did not give his wife the attention she needs when Bibi asked, “Mama’ll be ’fraid, yes” and Bobinôt responds by saying, “She’ll shut the house. Maybe she got Sylvie helpin’ her this evenin’” but Bibi corrects him by saying, “No; she ent got Sylvie. Sylvie was helpin’ her yistiday” (Chopin 96). Bobinôt shows that he is not attentive to what is happening around the home with his wife during this part of the story. Bobinôt’s inattentiveness must cause him to not unders...
Kate Chopin’s “The Storm”, is a story filled with metaphorical references between a thunderstorm of rain and a thunderstorm of passion. Calixta, Bobinot, and Bibi led, what one would assume to be, a rather normal life. While Bobinot and Bibi are in town shopping they notice a storm approaching, and “Bobinot, who was accustomed to converse on terms of perfect equality with his little son, called the child’s attention to certain sombre clouds that were rolling with sinister intention from the west, accompanied by a sullen, threatening roar.” However, a moment a Mother Nature’s fury unleashed a wealth of passion between Calixta and her former beau Alcee Laballiere.
“Like a river flows so surely to the sea darling, so it goes some things are meant to be.” In literature there have been a copious amount of works that can be attributed to the theme of love and marriage. These works convey the thoughts and actions in which we as people handle every day, and are meant to depict how both love and marriage can effect one’s life. This theme is evident in both “The Storm” by Kate Chopin and “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Gilman; both stories have the underlying theme of love and marriage, but are interpreted in different ways. Both in “The Storm” and in “The Yellow Wallpaper,” the women are the main focus of the story. In “The Storm” you have Calixta, a seemingly happy married woman who cheats on her husband with an “old-time infatuation” during a storm, and then proceeds to go about the rest of her day as if nothing has happened when her husband and son return. Then you have “The Yellow Wallpaper” where the narrator—who remains nameless—is basically kept prisoner in her own house by her husband and eventually is driven to the point of insanity.
Chopin, Kate. “The Storm.” Literature: Reading Fiction, Poetry, and Drama. Ed. DiYanni Robert. 6th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1986. 477-481. Print.
... The affair brews, it happens, and then it is over. But as we know another storm will happen and so will the affair between these two characters. When Alcée sends a letter to his wife saying that she must not rush home, this is an indication that Alcée may expect to see Calxita again soon. “Mrs. Chopin may refuse to sit judgment on morals, but she covers only one day and one storm and does not exclude the possibility of later misery” (Koloski 145). Kate Chopin ends the story with the idea that this may have been first time but is certainly not the last time will this happen.
Storytelling has been a common pastime for centuries. Over the years it has evolved into different styles containing different themes. Kate Chopin, a well-known author of the 20th century, wrote stories about the secrets in women’s lives that no one dared to speak of. Her work was not always appreciated and even considered scandalous, but it opened up a world that others were too afraid to touch. In Chopin’s story “The Storm,” a woman has an affair that causes an unlikely effect. The story’s two themes are portrayed greatly through an abundance of imagery and symbolism, along with the two main characters themselves.
As the story begins we find Bibi and Bobinot on their way home. They were at Friedheimer’s store; they notice the dark clouds flowing with evil intentions to the west. As its howl pierced the sky they decided to stay until the storm had passed. As Bibi worries for his mother, Bobinot reassures him that she will be fine. Bobinot buys a can of shrimps, which Calixta loves very much. As the storm unleashes bashing the wooden store, Bibi and Bobinot waits till the storm to pass.
...n Biloxi so he can pursue his affair with Calixta—though there is no evidence in the story that the two continue their affair—but his letter is nevertheless filled with love and regard for his wife and children. Similar to Calixta, Alce is satisfied. He can now be emotionally generous.
For instance in the story The Storm illustrated the marriage life of two couples that are passing throughout a difficult phase of their marriage and infidelity is performed by men/women. The women characters represented a devoted wife and mother responsible of her duties. They display the kindness and affection that women should demonstrate to their family. Regarding their values, women can be driven by their emotions and commit infidelity. One of the couples, the wife cheat on her husband, but then she realizes that what she has done is unappropriated. However, she confirms her loved to her husband and she could not image her life without him and want to keep her family united. In society preconception about women cheating on their husband is inconsiderable and unacceptable. On the past is was a sin or even worst the life of women were the punishment of infidelity. On the other hand, the husband cheats on his wife who is in a trip with his sons, after the infidelity he communicates to his wife to stay longer if she wants. His wife Clarisse found appropriate to stay away longer from her husband, because