ipl-logo

The Awakening, By Kate Chopin

757 Words4 Pages

Kate Chopin is known as one of the most influential female authors to hail from the United States. Much of her modern-day success came posthumously, but during her own time, Chopin was well-known and positively received for her short stories in particular, which were published in various prestigious magazines such as Vogue, the Atlantic Monthly, Harper’s Young People, Youth’s Companion, and the Century. Chopin made waves with her then-controversial themes regarding women, depicting her female characters as sexually powerful and independent, and was one of the first pioneers in feminist literature. Catherine “Kate” O’Flaherty was born in St. Louis to Thomas O’Flaherty and Eliza Faris in 1850. Her mother had French heritage, and as a result, …show more content…

Over this period of time, Kate published two novels named At Fault and The Awakening as well as hundreds of short stories, some of which are children’s stories. It was the latter in particular that attained the most attention at the time, as Kate’s short stories found themselves published in high-end magazines that were distributed nationally, such as Vogue, the Atlantic Monthly, and Harper’s Young People. Some of these famed short stories include titles such as Bayou Folk, A Night in Acadie, The Storm, The Story of an Hour, Désirée’s Baby, A Pair of Silk Stockings, A Respectable Woman, and Athénaïse. However, while her short stories were loved, Kate’s second novel, The Awakening, met with harsh criticism at the time of its publication due to Kate’s defiance of gender roles and expectations for women through the novel’s protagonist, Edna Pontellier, who ultimately denied her role as a mother and a wife in favor of being independent. Despite the controversy surrounding The Awakening, it is with this novel that Kate Chopin is noted have broken new ground with literature by being the first female writer in the country to undertake passion as a serious subject for literature This blatant separation from the normal public perception of women with themes involving women that were ahead of their time became a trademark of Kate Chopin’s works as she rejected tradition and age-old customs and pioneered into her society’s mistreatment of sexuality, divorce, and females’ need for existential

Show More
Related
713 Words | 3 Pages

“Women belong in all places where decisions are being made. It shouldn’t be that women are the exception.” — Ginsburg, 2009. Kate Chopin is an American author born on February 8, 1851 at St. Louis, Missouri, United States. Chopin is famous for her brave movement by writing novels, stories and critiques mainly about feminism.

Read More
1432 Words | 6 Pages

From these two women’s Edna awakens and feels and understands the women or motherhood image she just does not see the male figure. Both of these characters will represent the role of women’s in the nineteen century. The Awakening is a novel that brought Kate Chopin, although not during her life time, the fame of an advocate of women’s rights (Wolff 449). THESIS STATEMENT:

Read More
1794 Words | 8 Pages

Tabitha Schlatt Honors English II Mr.Williams March 6, 2023 Romanticism to Realism in American Literature “She was becoming herself and daily casting aside that fictitious self which we assume like a garment with which to appear before the world,” professes author Kate Chopin about her feminist protagonist, Edna Pontellier, in her groundbreaking novel The Awakening. This highly controversial literary piece shocked its audience since women during the early nineteen hundreds were restricted by sexist social expectations. Chopin’s unprecedented character wants to be more than a housewife and proclaims so with pride. The rise of the feminist movement sparked the American Literary Realism period noted for the new Naturalistic ideals such as heredity,

Read More
1096 Words | 5 Pages

Women were never thought of becoming lawyers or doctors because of the restrictions of the functions they had to do, based on their gender. They were just considered property belonging to their spouse. In Kate Chopin’s works such as The Awakening, she contradicted the roles and stereotypes of women and

Read More
634 Words | 3 Pages

Kate Chopin is an American writer known for her deception of impacts, the restricted view of the nineteenth-century society, had on women. At that time, people were very restrictive about the perspective of a women’s place in the society. Women did not have a voice of their own. They were trained to believe that the goal of their life is to serve their husband. In the stories “Desiree’s Baby” and “The Story of an Hour” Chopin has portrayed how this condition of the society affected women and their view about marriage and life.

Read More
949 Words | 4 Pages

The Awakening Review Kate Chopin was the start to women’s feminism. She daringly wrote a controversial and some-what erotic book well before it was acceptable for critics to approve. She lived what some would call a short life. Dying at the youthful age of 54, Chopin created a pathway for writers even well after her time.

Read More
1758 Words | 8 Pages

Searching for a feminist voice in Chopin’s work is much easier now because of all the groundwork that feminist activist have done over the years. Chopin’s stories often depict women as silent, passive and incapable of expressing themselves or their desires in her earlier work but as she grew as a person and author women changed into being more vocal and active (Cutter). Her work as a whole usually shows a pattern of women’s voices being repressed, such as in Desirée. Women today can take away from Chopin the relationship between men and women in her stories and how little women had any say in their lives. It also shows the reader how far the evolution of feminism as

Read More
905 Words | 4 Pages

She utilized her books, for example, The Awakening to demonstrate her strengthening and give a lady a voice, so they could feel free from the social standards of that time. Not at all like male journalists, her perspectives on political issues were not acknowledged by everybody. Kate Chopin was something other than an essayist, she was an enabled lady who needed to give ladies a voice as American writing. Kate Chopin was a women's activist author who composed fundamentally about battles ladies experienced in the contemporary society. A significant

Read More
1768 Words | 8 Pages

A woman’s job in life was to be a good mother and a good wife, period. Although feminist movements were now on the horizon, the subject of women standing up and speaking out for their rights was extremely controversial. As a feminist, Kate Chopin incorporated feminism in The Awakening through characters such as Edna Pontellier and Mademoiselle Reisz. Because the subject matter was so controversial and taboo, Chopin received a lot of negative feedback when she published the novel, with readers calling it “morbid, vulgar, and disagreeable.” The reactions Chopin received in response to her novel are very similar to how the people within Edna’s society react to her journey of a spiritual awakening.

Read More
1518 Words | 7 Pages

Kate Chopin, one of the most important and influential writers of her time, uses sensory language, symbolism, and themes to closely relate her short stories, A Respectable Woman, and The Story of an Hour, to her personal life. Chopin grew up in a house of all women, her mother, grandmother, and great grandmother who were very opinionated and down-to-earth people, and taught her to always think and act for herself. Kate quickly became curious about standards in society and the “norms” of women, all of which result in her success in the works of American feminist literature. As a young child, Chopin experienced two horrible deaths, one being her father, and the other her half brother.

Read More
1037 Words | 5 Pages

Despite Victorian society’s rejection of any sort of feminist progressive mindset, the decades preceding allowed for these ideas to take root in the women’s suffrage movement. Kate Chopin in her novel The Awakening, explores the concept of feminist individualism and fulfillment through the characterization of the protagonist Edna. Edna throughout the novel defies gender roles and develops into a strong independent woman. Yet at the conclusion of the novel, she commits suicide. Critics for decades have tried to comprehend Chopin 's intention of this conclusion.

Read More
360 Words | 2 Pages

The late 1800s contested traditional American ideals and with the ending of the Civil War came recognition of previous social injustices. Imagine growing up in a family where all of your female role models were widows. Kate Chopin was raised in a unique situation that opened her eyes to the unsatisfactory condition of women at the time, prompting her to examine and unintentionally create the Feminist movement. Although this is Chopin’s recognition point, it should be noted that while writing she only considered herself as a modern writer who never doubted the potential strength of women. The Awakening took heavy criticism at the time but later served as motivation for a new generation of women who aspired to create their own social condition

Read More
245 Words | 1 Pages

In Kate Chopin’s short story “The Story of an Hour,” we can understand her opinions about feminism in the 1920’s. Her outgoing opinions caused her literary works to get pushed aside by many publishers because they did not conform to societies standards of women. In “The Story of an Hour,” Chopin presents Mrs. Mallard having just lost her husband and finding that she doesn’t feel the need to grieve but have a sudden urge of freedom. Kate Chopin is seen as one of the earliest feminist writers of her time. She addresses the many discoveries of women central to feminism including self- discovery, gender conformity, and individuality.

Read More
1402 Words | 6 Pages

The Awakening and Selected Short Stories: The Awakening “The Awakening” by Kate Chopin may be a novel regarding feminism as she writes about women and their positions in society. Drawing on her own origins, Chopin utilizes familiar themes and surroundings as she grew up in New Orleans and like the Pontillier family, also vacationed in Grand Isle during the summer. The Awakening touches on the rawness and controversy women experience regarding patriarchy.  Edna, the protagonist, reaches a point in her life where she begins to contemplate her fate and tries achieving self-actualization.  

Read More
951 Words | 4 Pages

In an era when most of the people don’t even have the idea of gender equality. “The story of an hour” is one of her most famous feminist works. The author find some of the evidences of Kate Chopin’s feminism thoughts in “the story of an hour” by analyzing the inner spirits of this novel. Introduction During Kate Chopin’s 20 years of writing life she wrote many works to reflect the social reality that the women were dominated by the society, or more specifically, the man.

Read More

More about The Awakening, By Kate Chopin

Open Document