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Kate Chopin's Women

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In The Awakening and Story of An Hour, Author Kate Chopin shows how forcing social obligations on a woman will ultimately lead to her destruction. Throughout both stories we examine two women tied down by their obligations as women in the late 1800’s. The women we see portrayed in these two stories were not necessarily held down by their husbands, as many other of their time were, but instead they we held back by the life society chose for them. As each of the stories progress both Edna and Mrs. Mallard become fixated by a life without the obligations of a husband. Their obsession with the independence that they cannot have is what ultimately leads to the death of both Edna and Mrs. Mallard.

Throughout the Awakening by Kate Chopin we see the …show more content…

In Story of an Hour author Kate Chopin paints a different picture of a woman in the late 1800’s with the same outcome as Edna, death. We don 't know much about the main character, Mrs.Mallard other than that she suffers from a severe heart problem. Through Mrs.Mallard’s heart problem, Chopin tells the story of a woman held back by her obligations as a wife. When the news of her husband 's death was first brought to Mrs. Mallard that her husband died, her sister chose to be cautious so that she did not cause her to have a heart attack. “It was her sister Josephine who told her, in broken sentences; veiled hints that revealed in half concealing.” (pg.1 paragraph. 2). According to Chopin, Josephine is very cautious of the way she reveals the death of her husband to her sister. Like most other women in this time Josephine felt that she needed to hide the news when telling Mrs. Mallard, because Josephine believed that she would take the news poorly. When Mrs. Mallard was informed of the news she was initially saddened, but Mrs. Mallard did not respond as expected as illustrated by the author; “She did not hear the story as many women have heard the same, with a paralyzed inability to accept its significance.” (pg.1 paragraph.3). This shows that Mrs.Mallard is different from most women during the 1800’s, after hearing the news she doesn 't react dramatically instead she accepts her husband 's death and begins the think of her newly found freedom. Since Mrs. Mallard wasn 't

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