The Storm Setting Analysis

By delving into Chopin’s The Storm, we have the opportunity to see setting used quite expansively. It becomes apparent that the setting can do much more than simply house the story, it can grow the climax, drive the plot, and even offer insight into the inner workings of characters. She utilizes it for all of these purposes, using specifically “somber clouds…rolling with sinister intention” (105). As the storm builds in its intensity the plot thunders on, almost as if catalyzed by nature itself. It elicits a tone of foreboding and anticipation, making each character a product of their environment. Chopin knew that to thoroughly execute the scenes to come, both we the readers and our protagonists needed to know with a great deal

The storms impending presence was the driving force that brought about this chance meeting, as seen when Alcee queries Calixta if he can linger until “the storm is over?” (106) Without the setting looming over our protagonists, the plot would’ve had little pushing it forward. Chopin took a lot of care with building the storms intensity, and for good cause. She needed to give life to a substantial squall to ensure the setting was almost electric with intense anticipation. She brewed it to be a storm of notability and not soon dwarfed through Calixta’s statement: “It’s a good two years sence it rain’ like that” (106), and in describing it as coming in “driving sheets” (106). Her verbiage paints a picture of a setting ripe for action, exactly what the plot seemed to call for. Terminology like “deluge” (106), and the “blinding glare” (106) of the lightning strike made us experience the same sentiments as our protagonist, excitement, anxiety, and even thrill. Feelings we’d need as the weather continued to segue our characters into