Kate Chopin — The Awakening and "The Story of an Hour"

The purpose of Kate Chopin's writing in this novel was to inform women just like this all over the country that there is in fact more to being a wife and a mother. She wanted other women to believe that they could be free. Her purpose was to empower women to believe that they could do more than be a housewife like society has always told them. Kate Chopin almost began to start a revolution. Through this novel and others that surfaced around that time period, the motion for women's rights and feminism began to slowly rise up. Kate Chopin's works were very controversial at the time, and many of her works often went unpublished. No one wanted to looking at anything that radical (Chopin). After she passed, when women were fighting for their rights to vote, someone found all of Chopin's works and published them, helping the women's cause (Chopin).

This work fits with the time period of Realism. She appealed directly to the heart of a common housewife by portraying her character in this excerpt as just that- a common person. The character is simply a married woman who is sitting alone in her house crying to herself. It is not the cry of a woman who has just lost something dear to her heart or been given bad news, but it is simply the cry of a woman who feels as though there is something more to life that she has just not achieved yet (Chopin). This makes the character more relatable and normal, which is a large part of Realism. By discussing an important issue of the time period, Kate Chopin did a wonderful job of depicting Realism. Realism is all about what is real and what is happening at the time that it is written (Werlock). It is about appealing to the readers in order to hopefully spark a change. Also, Realism is about creating an everyday hero (Werlock). Where before the heroes had all been more optimistic, well educated white men, the hero has now become an average, ordinary, everyday woman (Chopin). This was an important step for women that Kate Chopin was leading.

These works were not Naturalistic because they were not a calculated study of women and their feelings, it was just about letting the emotions run freely (Chopin). These works did not have any Regionalistic characteristics because there was no reference to a specific important area (Chopin). These works show quite a lot about society at the time. They show that women of the time were often very unhappy with their lives, and they had no other choice but to accept their pessimistic lives (Chopin). When Chopin wrote these works, no one took her seriously, and that shows that the men either did not care what the women were thinking, or they did not think that Chopin was right (Chopin). There was nothing about religion, for a woman's feelings about her personal life do not necessarily always involve God (Chopin). There is nothing about government, because this problem did not stem from the government, it stemmed from the stereotypes of the time (Chopin). There was nothing about nature, but human nature played a large role in these works (Chopin). Chopin's works showed that human nature is to let one's feelings out, but women of the time could only do so in private (Chopin). They show that when one is in a tough position, they will continue to try and make everyone happy until they reach breaking point (Chopin). This shows the American Dream of women: freedom from a life of boredom and pain (Chopin). There is no figurative language, and there is nothing about a Hero (Chopin). Kate Chopin wrote radically for her time, but she was eventually recognized for her great talents. Many people look up to her, and she was an amazing and strong woman that deserves all of the credit that she receives.

Chopin, Kate. "The Awakening." Glencoe American Literature. comp. Wilhelm, Jeffery. McGraw Hill. Columbus, OH. 2009. pg. 491.

Werlock, Abby H. P. "realism." The Facts On File Companion to the American Short Story, Second Edition. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2009. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= Gamshrtsty0575&SingleRecord=True (accessed February 15, 2011).