"The Story of an Hour," a short story written by Kate Chopin explores the experiences of a woman 's reaction to the death of her husband. This narrative brings upon Louise Mallard a woman residing in 1894, who is thought to briefly believe she has lost her husband to a train accident. A close friend of the family’s brings the news of the death to her. Distraught and overwhelmed by a wave of grief, Mrs. Mallard poured from her eyes. A gloomy darkness swept her away from sanity for a few moments. When her tears settled and she fled to the solitude of her room; strange and inexplicable feelings begin to creep upon her, "she was striving to beat it back with her will [.]" Excitement arouses her mind with an almost crazed sensation of freedom. Mrs. Mallard is now free, free of all …show more content…
Nearing the end of the story, Mrs. Mallard has fully embraced her future with, "prayer[s] that life might be long." She wants to live a full life now, she is happy. When all seems well on its way her sister franticly begins knocking on her door to get her to open up because she is worried that Louise is making herself ill with despair. Far from the truth, after leaving the room the two make their way down the stairs and the front door opens with the husband walking in, Brently Mallard. This moment Mrs. Mallard 's heart stops and she falls dead. Though her heart was weak, if she was in true love and happiness with her husband she would have fell at the beginning of the story, but she does not. Chopin wishes for her to descend after she has been given the world and promises of freedom to be all she could be. Mrs. Mallard dies because of shock that her husband is still alive, she in that brief second, loses everything. Reality comes crashing upon her, life would not be free and would remain in servitude to a man she is not in love
The Story of an Hour is a short story of Ms. Mallard, a woman with a heart condition who receives short term good news. Chopin uses contrast between independence, marriage, and gender to show how hidden emotions can effect a woman’s actions in the time period where women did not have much power or right to speak what came to their mind.
Though Kate Chopin recounts to Mrs. Mallard's story, she does not do so in first person. Chopin reveals the short story through a narrator's voice. The narrator is not simply an observer, however. Louise Mallard, in ‘'The Story of an Hour’', is an average lady and protagonist of the 1890s who enjoys little in her quest for individual flexibility. When she learns of her significant other Brently's passing in a railroad disaster, in any case, she rapidly starts to understand the new potential for her own self assertions.With him gone, Louise senses feelings that change her, and with her quiet repetitive chant of the word 'free,' the reader soon learns just what that thing is. She finds herself feeling independent, but feeling guilty for having such reverence for herself, after her husbands passing. She then exposes the idea of feeling guilty. She is
“Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin was set in the Victorian Era and told the story of a woman who, in one hour, faced the lows and highs and lows of life. In the beginning, Mrs. Mallard was gently informed by her sister and a friend, that her husband was killed in a train accident, and she was devastated. The author wrote, “She wept at once, with sudden, wild abandonment, in her sister’s arms.” So we can clearly see that the news of his death truly upset her. After Mrs. Mallard went alone to her room and sat staring out the window, a feeling of freedom started to come over her, and she realized that it was not completely bad that her husband was dead.
In her short story, “The Story of an Hour” this story was first written on April 19, 1894 published in vogue December 6th. It original title was “The Dream of an Hour”. Kate Chopin informs her readers of the struggles concerning women during the late 19th century, did Chopin so through her character Mrs. Mallard. She is an older lady with a heart condition whose needs and wants do not matter in her husband’s home. After receiving the news of her husband’s death, Mrs. Mallard proceeds to her room where she grieves in an odd manner. Glancing out the window, she gathers her thoughts of sorrow and joy. When she later walked out of the room, she feels
Story of an Hour – A Big Story in a Small Space. Kate Chopin's "Story of an Hour" tells the story of a woman trapped in a repressive marriage, who desperately wants to escape. She is given that chance, quite by accident, and the story tells of the hour in which this freedom is given to her. The story is very short (only two pages), so is interesting to look at as a minimalist piece of literature, and the surprise ending offers an opportunity to look at Chopin's use of foreshadowing.
Mrs. Mallard is the example of a typical housewife of the mid 1800’s. At the time, most women were not allowed to go to school and were usually anticipated to marry and do housework. During that time, the only way women could get out of a marriage was if they were to die or their husbands was to die. In that time period, the husband had control of all of the money, so it would not be wise if the wife were to leave the financial freedom that was provided by the husband. This is most likely why Mrs. Mallard never leaves her husband’s death, she is sad at first but then experiences an overwhelming sense of joy. This shows that she is not in a fulfilling marriage as his death means she will finally have own individual freedom, as well as financial freedom being the grieving widow who will inherit her husband’s wealth. In the words of Lawrence I. Berkove he states, “On the other hand, Chopin did not regard marriage as a state of pure and unbroken bliss, but on the other, she could not intelligently believe that it was desirable, healthy, or even possible for anyone to live as Louise, in the grip of her feverish delusion, wishes: to be absolutely free and to live totally and solely for oneself.” (3) Mrs. Mallard’s reaction to her husband’s death is Chopin’s way of expressin...
Women are put under the pressure of the unequal society, and the stereotype that they are always the supporters rather than the main financial provider for the family. The story of an hour explores one woman's desire to be free from the social norm and live for herself only. Beginning in the 1960s, Kate Chopin introduced to the reading public a new fictional theme, the theme of self-assertion. Chopin was recognized for her depiction of women who experience the power of passion that often brings them into conflict with society. In “The Story of an Hour”, Louise Mallard is in a sense awakened after hearing the death of her husband.
The Story of an Hour was written by Kate Chopin and published in a Vogue magazine in 1894. The short story is about a woman with heart disease, Louise Mallard, who is day dreaming about the death of her husband. Instead of falling into grief the way most new widows would, she is overcome with joy and new-found freedom. An hour later her husband comes home and she is over whelmed with the independence she created in her head that she dies. In this story Kate Chopin uses the literary devices of imagery, irony, and symbolism.
As the title puts it, “The Story of an Hour” takes place in the span of an hour. The title of the story also shows the possibility of occurrences within a single hour. This story is mostly centered around one woman, Louis Mallard. In conventional circumstances, death brings sorrow, grief, seclusion, guilt, regrets, along with other feeling depending on the cause of death. In “The Story of an Hour”, sorrow and grief are a product of the recent happenings, however, these feelings are coupled with joy and independence. Kate Chopin uses this story to convey death as a joyful circumstance whereas conventionally it is portrayed as sorrowful.
Kate Chopin wrote a short piece called “The Story of an Hour” about a woman’s dynamic emotional shift who believes she has just learned her husband has died. The theme of Chopin’s piece is essentially a longing for more freedom for women.
Kate Chopin’s short story "The Story of an Hour," utilizes superb symbolism and elucidating points of interest with a specific end goal to differentiation Mrs. Mallard 's everyday and dreary life. Chopin utilizes symbolism and expressive subtle elements to differentiate the rich conceivable outcomes for which Mrs. Mallard longs with the dull reality of her regular life. The main theme of this story is “the quest for identity” because Louise’s sudden self-discovery shows that she had been seeking her own identity in a male-dominated world at the time. Kate Chopin wrote this in the 19th century when males were “dominate” and females were “passive.” Mr. Brently’s "death" was what initiated her “quest for Identity” without him “dying” she would have never thought about how
Kate Chopin's story, "The Story of an Hour", focuses on an 1890's young woman, Louise Mallard. She experienced a profound emotional change after she hears her husband's "death" and her life ends with her tragic discovery that he is actually alive. In this story, the author uses various techniques-settings, symbolism and irony- to demonstrate and develop the theme: Freedom is more important than love. Chopin uses settings to convey particular moods, character qualities and features of theme. Firstly, the author uses time setting to reveal Louise' inner desire and her restrictions.
The descriptions in the story foreshadow the tragedy that ends the story. The author believed unexpected things happen often. In the case of this story, Louise Mallard believed her husband to be dead, having been told this by her sister, Josephine. However, when it is revealed that her husband had been alive the whole time, she is unhappy to see him and suffers a fatal heart attack. While she did have heart trouble, Richards and Josephine thought that the news of her husband’s death, not her seeing him again would be detrimental to her health, possibly even fatal. Chopin succeeded in getting this message across.
In the short story of "The Story of an Hour" by Kate Chopin, it opens on the news that Mrs. Mallard's husband, Brently Mallard, had died in a railroad accident: "Knowing that Mrs. Mallard was afflicted with a heart trouble, great care was taken to break to her as gently as possible the news of her husband's death" (Chopin 1). Not much about the protagonist is known except that she has heart trouble. The tone of hesitation and sadness in the story is set within the first sentence along with an uneasiness about Mrs. Mallard's condition.
Kate Chopin employs the tool of irony in "The Story of an Hour" to carefully convey the problem inherent in women's unequal role in marital relationships. Chopin develops a careful plot in order to demonstrate this idea, one not socially acceptable at the end of the 19th century, and unfortunately, a concept that still does not appreciate widespread acceptance today, 100 years later as we near the end of the 20th century. Louise Mallard's death, foreshadowed in the initial line "Knowing that Mrs. Mallard was afflicted with heart trouble" takes on quite a different meaning when the plot twists and the context of her sudden death is presented unexpectedly, not upon her shock at her husband's death, but instead in her inability to endure the fact that he lives.