Mademoiselle Reisz’s observation pertains to Edna in The Awakening because Edna attempts to “soar above the level plain of tradition and prejudice,” but in the end, she fails and collapses into a “sad spectacle” by struggling to find her moral self, which was to fight back against her bruised and exhausted bird she has become, but ultimately lost strength of hope in a better life.
Many women in the early 20th century never did "soar"; they would never go above and beyond what was expected by society. Edna Pontellier, attempts to soar above the level plain of tradition and prejudice by making a statement about the person she wants to become. Edna states “one of these days, I’m going to pull myself together for a while and think-try to determine what character of a woman I am. By all the codes which I am acquainted with,
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In other words, Edna Pontellier clearly does not resolve her issues and keeps being indecisive and foolish, with her self-conscience throughout the novel. Edna is portrayed as a weak bird, who struggles to overcome the obstacles of being a woman in the early 20th century, ultimately collapsing into a sad spectacle. When Edna attempts to find her moral self by fighting against the social norms of society, she is left “bruised” and “exhausted”. She continues to drag out a life that she is not satisfied with, which is being a wife and a woman. Edna states that “despondency had come up her and had never lifted.” Rather than finding a way out of the problems that she had encountered. She chooses to give in to her bruised self, ultimately giving up and ending her life. This reveals Edna’s weak individuality, self, because she lets go and did not have enough strength and determination to find a solution. The statement of a “bruised, exhausted, and sad spectacle” pertains to Edna because she chose the easy and cowardly way out, rather than being a