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Theme Of Freedom In Kate Chopin's Story Of An Hour

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In Kate Chopin's "The Story of an Hour" we go through an hour of Mrs. Mallard's life as she learns of her husband's death and embraces the freedom this brings forth. This new-found freedom is short lived as the sight of her allegedly dead husband walks through the front door, Mrs. Mallard succumbs to her death immediately. This story, although it is short, it is deeply symbolic, filled with irony that is used to achieve major themes of freedom and societal views.
Mrs. Mallard's heart condition is used as a symbol of the way society views women. Women tend to be viewed as delicate, emotionally and physically. This is seen here in the first paragraph "Knowing that Mrs. Mallard was afflicted with a heart trouble, great care was taken to break to her as gently as possible the news of her husband's death" and in the end here "He stood amazed at Josephine's piercing cry; at Richards' quick motion to screen him from the view of his wife." It also represents the way marriage affects her independence as her heart keeps her from leading the life she wants to live, just as marriage hinders her from exercising free will. "There would be …show more content…

It is spring time which stand for renewed life. "She could see in the open square before her house the tops of trees that were all aquiver with the new spring life." She was facing west which represents the end of a chapter. "There were patches of blue sky showing here and there through the clouds that had met and piled one above the other in the west facing her window." The open window represents her view of her unobstructed future. "she was drinking in a very elixir of life through that open window." Death is the last symbol of the story. It tends to hover around the Mallard house. It is the open and close of the story. Death seems determined to take someone that day. Maybe Mrs. Mallard was always the intended

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