Title During the nineteenth-century, women faced great inequalities and hardships. These hardships included social, economic and legal issues and stemmed from roles and expectations society imposed onto them. Women were considered property owned by their husbands or fathers, and thus limited in careers, goals, and interest they hope to pursue. Kate Chopin’s “The Awakening”, depicts the lives of multiple nineteenth-century women; this depiction shows the social strains and expectations placed on women due to gender role. Expectations of women were the “four cardinal virtues, [were] piety, purity, submissiveness, and domesticity. Put them together and they spelled mother, daughter, sister, wife—woman” (Welter, Papke 11). Women were expected to play the role of both a mother and of a wife with absolutely no objection. With that in mind, Chopin uses …show more content…
By creating such a controversial character, which has failed to fulfill her role as a dutiful wife and devoted mother; Chopin aims to reject the nineteenth-century expectations of women and their supposed gender roles. The story begins with an symbolic representation of Edna’s life. “A green and yellow parrot, which hang in a cage outside the door, keep repeating over and over…” (Chopin 1) Chopin opens with this symbol to illustrate the feeling of being trapped in a marriage where one has to live a life of repetition. Throughout the story, Edna Pontellier our protagonist struggles to define herself and attempts to liberate herself from her caged marriage. The narrator describes Edna’s marriage with the following