Story Of An Hour Style Analysis

The style in “The Story of an Hour”, such as foreshadowing, simile, symbolism, and irony, impacts the story. In paragraph 1, the reader is informed that Mrs. Mallard suffers from heart trouble; this information is foreshadowing that something unfortunate might occur later in the story. At the end of the story, the doctors claim Mrs. Mallard “had died of heart disease—of the joy that kills.” This is an example of irony; doctors believe that she was so happy to see her husband alive again that she dies, but it is the sorrow that overcomes her from seeing him alive that kills her. The author’s decision to put the word “killed” in quotations in the second paragraph of the story is another example of foreshadowing; Chopin is giving the reader the

The term “quadroon” is also used, which clues the reader into both the time period of the story and the theme because it is considered to be an offensive term. Similes within the story, such as “like an avalanche, or like a prairie fire, or like anything that drives headlong over all obstacles”, “like ice in her veins”, and “like a stone image: silent, white, motionless”, serve various purposes; in this instance they are being used to elaborate on how a person is feeling. Additional similes are used as a method of foreshadowing; for example, “like a cowl” and “like a pall” are both being used to describe the setting of the story, which is foreboding and foreshadows negative things to come. Other examples of foreshadowing include Armand’s mom being from France, the change in Armand’s behavior, the statement “Désirée was miserable enough to die”, Désirée’s skin color compared to Armand’s, and when Désirée states, “I shall die. I must die. I cannot be so unhappy, and live.” Each example foreshadows either that Désirée is going to die or the truth regarding Armand’s ethnicity. The story also contains irony; Armand drives his wife to suicide by making her believe that she is not white, but in the end, Armand