Read the Passage From the Story of an Hour Considering the News Mrs Mallard Has Just

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"The Story of an Hour": Educatee Responses, 1996

Students of Ann Woodlief, Virginia Commonwealth University

When I first began reading "The Story of an Hr," Mrs. Mallard seemed to me an erstwhile woman and as we are told in the very showtime line, �afflicted with a heart trouble.� I was surprised in the eighth paragraph when Chopin tells us that "She was young," only even more than interesting to me that she is described as having �a fair, calm face, whose lines bespoke repression� which depicts her as being onetime for her age. The description of this repression is backed up when Chopin gives us the reason for Mrs. Mallard�s �monstrous joy� which reads thus �At that place would be no powerful will bending hers in that blind persistence with which men and women believe they have a correct to impose a private will upon a fellow-animal.�

After reading through this story the starting time time, I had many questions and many conclusions. For instance, it seems as if Chopin is showing us a social situation of the times with the woman equally prisoner of her husband. It is common noesis that marriages are not always nigh mutual love between ii people and during the fourth dimension that Chopin was writing, this was more often the case. Marriage was every bit much almost monetary condolement, social status and acceptance equally it was about possible love. At that place are no children mentioned in this story which makes me wonder if in that location was a sexual relationship betwixt the Mallards. It seems from the description that Mrs. Mallard has been trapped in this wedlock for a long time even though we know she is young. How young is she? Fifty-fifty though I say she is trapped, do not misunderstand me: I do not think this union is arranged, instead that she has been coerced past her club to ally despite what she may want to practise in her heart and soul. I believe she does love her husband, but information technology is possible to honey a human and not be married to him. This was not her instance; if she were able (pregnant a human being would hold with her determination) and she did engage in a loving relationship with a man who was not her hubby, she would accept certainly been looked down upon. Is her heart condition purely physical or is it also psychological and emotional? We know the stereotypes, every bit Chopin did, that women are hysterical, timid, weak, irrational. Could it be that her center condition is created by those tip-toeing effectually her in conjunction with her ain emotional weaknesses?

I detect it interesting that her first proper name is merely told to united states after she hears of her husband�south death and when she feels the most gratis. Before this point she is referred to as Mrs. Mallard or �she,� and afterwards this point when her married man returns home, she is referred to as �wife.� Chopin is pointing to something very interesting hither which leads me back to the title of adult female as �wife.� When Louise marries Bently she becomes Mrs. Mallard; she loses her identity and assumes a new and strange one. While it seems very normal and average for a wife to presume her husband�s name in marriage and in that time, to put it harshly, become the property of him, information technology cannot be ignored that a certain part of the self is lost. This woman is very in melody with this loss and fifty-fifty though her honey for her husband keeps her from it, the freedom she feels when she thinks he is dead becomes unavoidable and enjoyable.

Chopin wrote the story and has given us a narrator who, if information technology is not Chopin personally, I believe to still be female. The descriptions and insight nosotros are given into the character of Louise come from someone who understands her situation and is forgiving. Nosotros come across Louise equally she finds happiness out of her married man�s expiry and all the same, by the narration, we come across her struggle with guilt and overcome information technology. From the female perspective, it could exist argued that her expiry was actually an ultimate freedom from her unhappy matrimony. If we assume that the narrator is male, could information technology exist that her death was a punishment for her happiness at the death of her married man? It is not as farfetched as it seems and raises many more questions as to the goal this story sets out to achieve.

Kristene B.

�The Story of an Hour� at first reminded me of �A Very Brusk Story� in the way that it leaves out details that that the reader needs to make full in the gaps and easily understand the plot of the story. It�s this �Swiss cheese� effect that makes the story and then interesting; by allowing the reader to �plug in� his/her own details the story takes on varied connotations. An example of this is the beginning paragraph where the reader gets the impression that this woman is going to be extremely upset that her husband has died in a train accident. The people closest to her have gone to great lengths to absorber the blow of her husband�south decease; withal, we are not given any details as to the human relationship they had in the past or any relevant information. By doing this the author allows the reader to form his/her own false interpretation of how this woman is going to react. Nosotros run across this technique used early into the story and nosotros, as readers, are strung along until we hear the woman utter the words �free, free, costless� which really throws the reader off the rail he/she expected to follow. The balance of the narrative begins to twist the story to the exact opposite of what the reader was waiting to take happen. We find a woman who instead of existence upset and heart-broken over her husband's death is experiencing complete joy over the death of another human being. Which, of class, now gives us the impression that she has been mistreated in this relationship and that, perhaps, this death is for the best. All this makes the reader justify the mode the adult female reacted, just in the end information technology'south Mrs. Mallard who dies upon seeing her husband alive and well. This ending definitely conjures up some questions that are difficult to respond.

Ron B.

This was a great story. I like Chopin even though she is an ardent feminist. Through the first read several things stood out. Beginning you will notice how the woman of the story is simply referred to as Mrs. Mallard--an appendage of Brently Mallard---so when she is free she is referred to as Louise, her starting time name. Chopin is trying to say that marriage represses women and "bends the will." Even if marriage does bend the will Brently Mallard was still a skillful man, and his face never looked upon her with annihilation merely love. She knows that this man loved her, but that is not enough for her to feel any honey for him. Chopin does non seem to think that a man�southward plans and intentions are bent for a relationship. Personally, I have never seen a working human relationship that was totally one-sided. It is cracking that such a brusque picayune story could enhance so many questions about the nature of relationships and what they mean to a woman like Chopin. She considers any intention that bends the will a criminal offence, even if it is kind. There could be a thou years of philosophical debate on that i bespeak.

In the way of characters I retrieve Richards was an interesting grapheme. His role seems so pocket-size, perchance intentionally and so. Chopin is trying to show that women can get along just fine without having men interfere. The major theme of the story represents a disdain for the way that women are treated in some relationships, and to a certain extent in order equally well. It is hard for a male to requite concrete examples of a female person'southward place in guild having never dealt with that stereotype. The late xviii hundreds were a rough time for women and there weren�t the options, like divorce, that are now available to women. However in this story at that place is so much repression. You would call back that this woman had been locked in a basement and fed bugs by Brently.

Travis C.

This is the story of a woman who finds out her husband has died in a train wreck. She reacts with sadness at first, merely then realizes in a rush of emotion & relief that she is �Free! Trunk and soul free!� She views the world with a fresh outlook--one where she volition exist her own person, answering only to herself. She is fix to begin this new life when her hubby--who evidently wasn�t on the train afterward all--comes home. The woman (Louise) dies from heart failure on the spot.

I loved this picayune story--it takes a couple of twists and turns that makes the catastrophe ironic and unobvious. The year the story was written (1894) is included, and this adds involvement to the content of the story. The fact that Louise recognizes her oppression from the male-dominated society of the fourth dimension is interesting to me. For some reason (I don�t know why) I haven�t read much piece of work in which a woman of the time period speaks of feeling that a long life with her husband is undesirable. But when she realizes her husband is dead, Louise�s view of a long life changes from dread to hope.

Louise is evidently the character of involvement--through her we see the social repression that women felt at the fourth dimension. Louise represents all women of the fourth dimension. They were locked into marriages that were probably loving--at least Louise says her hubby �never looked at her save with love�--but were oppressive in their treatment of women.

The linguistic communication of the story does a good task at carrying the emotions and feelings of the characters. Although Louise represents all women, she is dissimilar. Beingness told of Brently�southward (her hubby) death, she �did not have the news as many women take.� The pick of many is interesting. It shows that many women accustomed (perhaps blindly) the situation of being controlled in their lives by their husbands.

After being told the news of his death, Louise goes to her room and looks out the window. The language here foreshadows the ironic happiness that she feels at being set up costless. Instead of being gloomy and night (the style weather is usually symbolized at the mention of expiry) the heaven shows patches of blueish (from between white, non blackness) clouds; birds are singing and at that place is a �delicious breath of rain� in the air.

I can�t assist but think that when Louise�south sis is calling to her through the door--�open the door--you will make yourself ill�--that she would believe Louise had made herself sick with all the talk of liberty. When she finally opens the door and walks out �like a goddess of Victory� I would think that her sister would find and wonder why.

When Brently returns, Louise drops dead. We know that she had a weak heart--it was explained that the train accident was explained advisedly in lodge to prevent an adverse reaction--and the doctors assume that she died at his sight from the �joy� of seeing him. �The joy that kills� they called information technology. Those doctors, undoubtedly men, were unwittingly describing Louise�south marriage as well.

Mark D.

Chopin describes for us here a story of great irony. She introduces to us Mrs. Mallard; we know she is a adult female with a heart condition and that she is unaware of her married man�south death. We and then meet her sister, Josephine, who is reluctant to be the bearer of bad news. And also her husband�s friend Richards, whose significance in the story seems very ambiguous to me. Nosotros learn that there has been an accident, a railroad disaster, and that Mrs. Mallard�southward husband, Brently, was deemed �killed.� There had been two telegrams affirming this, thus eliminating the possibility of an error. She immediately begins to grieve with �wild abandonment,� shortly subsequently she seeks confinement. In her solitude, we find her to be acutely aware of her surroundings and her senses, almost as if a dark cloud has been lifted from her soul and she tin now live life to its fullest potential. For moments, we can see through her eyes, feel her chest heaving and hear the birds chirping. She feels something that she has forgotten she could feel. She is feeling the clouds existence lifted from her soul, she is illuminated, she is free. She is overwhelmed with freedom, opening up her artillery to welcome it, letting it envelope her body and her soul. She remembers her husband with kind memories, memories of time, memories that are at present of the past. She is in the nowadays and she is free! Her sister is concerned with her solitude and inquires of her well beingness. We learn that her proper name is Louise; she is no longer Mrs. Mallard, she is Louise, she has her ain identity because she is free. She is reveling in her freedom, thinking of her freedom today and tomorrow, longing to have a lengthy life of her own. She opens the door to her sister with a sparkle in her eye and a new sense of herself. They descend the staircase together, meeting Richards at the bottom. Someone is opening the door. It�due south Brently Mallard, unharmed and completely composed, unaware of the transformation that has occured with his absenteeism. Nosotros hear a scream from Josephine and see Richards endeavor to muffle the living dead from the view of the center patient. But it is also late. She is dead. Mrs. Mallard�south heart stopped. Her life stopped. She had everything and nothing all in the same moment.

This is a wonderful story, then well written and descriptive that nosotros can be Mrs. Mallard. The omniscience of the narrator allows usa this. We can see through her optics, exhale through her lungs. Nosotros desire what she desires. This makes the story. The setting is perfect. She ascends the staircase to liberty, everything changes at the pinnacle of the stairs. We descend the staircase with her and everything is taken away. She dies of the joy that kills, irony to the end. Magnificent!

This brusk story grabbed my attention from the moment I finished the beginning sentence to the end of the story. During the first few paragraphs I thought that she was very depressed and saddened from hearing about her husbands expiry. Of course equally shortly every bit she whispers the words �free, gratis, costless!� I knew that she felt happy most her hubby�s death. I observe that no i else knew of these feelings of contempt for husband but herself, or she would not have kept these feelings inside of herself.

In the fifth paragraph, afterward just beingness told of her husband's decease, she is very descriptive of everything that she sees at that moment, as if she wants to remember every detail of this moment. Merely why would ane point out �delicious breath of rain,� �notes of a distant song,� and �sparrows were twittering in the eaves� at the time of their spouse's decease? When I remember of these things that she is describing they are happy scenes, scenes of serenity. This was my start inkling that in that location was more going on in this story than but someone who lost her married man.

Throughout the story you get the feeling from the wife that she was probably controlled by her husband and that their spousal relationship was not a happy one at all. �The kind, tender hands folded in death�; this statement shocked me at starting time when I read it. Because I didn�t go the impression from her other comments that he was a kind and tender man, as a matter of fact I thought the exact opposite of him. Only her next statement--�... the face that had never looked salve with dear upon her, fixed and gray and expressionless�--this was more of how I pictured this man to be. The words that she uses to describe him are very stiff-- �stock-still,� �gray,� �dead�--these words are very harsh. Information technology was in the next couple paragraphs of her describing her liberty that I began to feel very happy for her that he was out of her life.

I retrieve that it was very ironic for them to utilise the word �joy� in the last judgement of this story, because it was actual joy that she felt when she realized her husband was dead, and hurting so great that killed her when she saw him walk through the door.

Shajuana I.

The first fourth dimension I encountered this story, it was read aloud to me in a grade that I took this fall. I thought it was well-nigh unusual, and I am glad I accept the opportunity to read it now. The story has many surprises, twists and turns, and in the end I had nearly forgotten the poor dead husband, equally I was happy for Mrs. Mallard�s release from such an unhappy existence.

The kickoff words that struck me as wonderful in this story were in lines 3 and 4: �veiled hints that revealed in half concealing.� What a beautiful way to describe breaking bad news. The words �veiled� and �concealing� are used in a wonderful fashion in the aforementioned sentence. I also like the clarification of the �tempest of grief� Mrs. Mallard experiences. Weeping with �sudden, wild abandonment� is such an apt description of this emotion. And then far I have not suspected that there is annihilation amiss with Mrs. Mallard�southward reaction to the news of her married man�south death. After all, each and every human being has an intense range of emotions that are neither right or wrong--they just belong to that particular private. I also found nothing doubtable in Mrs. Mallard retreating to her room--as well perfectly understandable. Here, nevertheless, solitary in the privacy of her room, is where the story started to turn for me.The clarification of what she saw when looking out her bedroom window hitting me every bit odd--I think times in my own life when overwhelming grief or stupor has seized me. Nothing in the globe looks correct--certainly non happy or pleasant. Yet, there were �trees that were all oscillating with the new spring life. The delicious breath of pelting . . . sparrows . . . patches of bue sky . . . � These things tell me that she is seeing her life every bit now having a new look, and it seems to parallel the fresh, new, earthy and upbeat sights out of her bedroom window. I similar the description of her emotional release when she saturday �with her head thrown back upon the cushion of the chair . . . � The sob described here actually indicated emotional intensity--was she crying for joy, albeit guilty joy? �There was something coming to her....� this passage nigh says �fasten your seatbelts, readers.� Mrs. Mallard has succeeded in gaining my sympathy hither, equally she is definitely resisting her feelings--feelings that are coming upon her similar a tidal moving ridge. I experience that she is really a decent, moral woman and wants to do the right thing-- she wants to accept THE CORRECT GRIEF REACTION. Finally she accepts this reaction every bit beingness true--after all it has come up upon her and then powerfully, how could it be anything only an honest feeling? Information technology was refreshing to come across that her reasons for feeling this way were non because she was an abused and mistreated wife--not even considering she hated her husband (I retrieve she had tender feelings for him): she simply wanted time to herself! Go MRS. MALLARD! I take the feeling that Mr. and Mrs. Mallard had been married a while, and that she had felt �bound� past the restrictions of being in a relationship and this was an �out� that was dropped into her lap, so she�s gonna run with it. Later on all, she didn�t kill the homo--it was Divine Intervention! The terminal line of paragraph 14 is �A kind intention or a cruel intention made the act seem no less a criminal offence equally she looked upon it in that cursory moment of illumination.� This says that it doesn�t matter that her husband probably didn�t intend to be so controlling and needy--but the effect upon her was the same.

I relate to this story not in that I am a widow, only I have been divorced for five years after x years of marriage. I too reacted with grief when my marriage ended, and I went through an incredible range of emotions. Now, nevertheless, I revel in my liberty and independence. Not that I had a horrible wedlock, but I did have to be part of a �couple� and there are responsibilities that go along with that which exercise infringe upon 1�south freedom to constitute her own identity. I was really lamentable that Mrs. Mallard did not get the run a risk to do this. She was swimming in it--she was in overdrive imagining the possibilities nigh being �free, free, free!� I don�t think she felt guilty most information technology, nor should she have. She had loved him, all the same what could love take do practice with the feeling she was having at present? And then what if she loved him--he was dead just she was alive as she�d never been earlier . . . mayhap even on the route and then wrapped upwardly in this fantasy, planning the rest of her life without her �ball and chain,� that when she saw this �ghost� walk through the front end door, it hitting her x times harder than information technology might accept had she non been adrift in her joy of being �suddenly single.� This likewise tells me that both Mr. and Mrs. Mallard must accept been older people--in that location was a lot of history betwixt them, a lot of years, and I imagine that her heart might have withstood the daze had she been a chip younger.

[Later response, same person (the adjacent semester in a women writers course)]: I understand and at times tend to concur with the argument that the writer�south biographical information should stand up apart from the work itself. In the case of Chopin, however, I do find it necessary, mayhap imperative, to incorporate her life experience into the meaning I gather from her piece of work. I believe the events in her life greatly influenced her writing--from her father�southward death in a railroad accident, when she was v years quondam, to the time subsequently the death of her own husband. Chopin died immature (44), yet she had twelve years of married life and twelve years of widowhood packed into those 40-four years. I find that interesting, and I feel it gave her a fair perspective of life as the �other half� in a union, and life as a woman solitary. Chopin was some other of the �pioneer feminists,� daring to write that women could really exist, thrive, sans a human being. She is credited with having the nerve to explore the sexual, emotional, and intellectual needs, or the very existence of these needs of women. That she had the fortitude to write near these �taboo� problems with great integrity in a time when women could but fantasize most equality, etc. is inspiring.

Mrs. Mallard�s centre trouble is surely two-fold--no dubiety a concrete defect exists, possibly exaggerated emotional strain--heart trouble, the intangible multifariousness, unhappiness, misery, the sad country of one�southward lot in life. Mrs. Mallard�due south heart trouble may have been psychological as well as biological--one can literally make oneself ill from worry, depression, etc. People do die of a broken centre.

Mrs. Mallard �did not hear� the story as other women might--this shows how one-dimensional, clone-like women of Mrs. Mallard�southward time were: there was an expected, acceptable emotional response for every life state of affairs. Chopin makes an interesting commentary hither near the necessity for women to express themselves as individuals--in times of joy, grief. I believe in that location was even a prescribed manner in which women were immune to �swoon�--not a drop-dead faint, but a slow, feminine form of collapse.

Lynda R.

The things that I marked in the story were the references to Mrs. Mallard�s heart condition. The very offset paragraph informs the reader of her heart trouble, and how her loved ones were and then careful and cautious while breaking the news to her of her married man�s death. In paragraph xi, where Mrs. Mallard cries out �free, gratis, gratuitous!� her middle condition is no longer an result (to herself) since her married man is dead. Her body is �warmed and relaxed.� At the finish of the story, I found it ironic how Mrs. Mallard�due south loved ones took spontaneous and startling means to protect her from the realization that her husband was indeed alive. They took little care and caution regarding her delicate heart condition. I thought these portions of the text were meaning because there was some reference to Mrs. Mallard�south eye condition throughout the text. Peradventure I missed the answers to these questions within the text, but I hope not. Why did Mrs. Mallard dislike her married man and so much, that she could rejoice and feel reborn in his death? I approximate that my reading experience could exist categorized as emotional. In the starting time few paragraphs, my feelings were those of sympathy and pity for the sickly wife who just lost her husband. Around the 8th paragraph I experienced a trivial confusion, �Is she happy that her hubby is expressionless?� At the eleventh paragraph I felt relief forth with Mrs. Mallard. I felt her liberty. At the beginning of the adjacent to the last paragraph, I felt nervous, anticipating the worst for Mrs. Mallard, that information technology would exist her husband opening the door. I could feel the thwarting when the person opening the door was Mr. Mallard. Afterward my first reading of the text, I idea of a character in a very pop novel, Celie of Alice Walker�due south The Color Purple. When Celie was young her father impregnated her and abused her. When he died, he left her his state and his house. Celie mourned for the benefit of those around her, but when they were gone and she was in the driveway of that house, she smiled and danced for joy. This is quite similar to the reactions of Mrs. Mallard.

Monique M.

My �first� response to this story is �I like it.� That is because it is not my first fourth dimension reading it. The first time I read this story I was shocked by the catastrophe and disappointed with her view of marriage. At the time of my showtime reading of this story, I was newly married and �high on love� and then to speak. Therefore, I couldn�t perchance believe that someone could wait at honey and marriage in such a negative light.

On reading the story this time around I see a much more positive side to the story. I probably too see it a niggling more objectively now. There are many signs of life in the story that stand for a re-nativity of this young woman. Prior to her husband's death she dreaded each mean solar day and was �pressed down by a physical exhaustion that haunted her body.� Now that he is expressionless she sees the potential for life (her life) with phrases similar �new bound life, breath of pelting, and endless sparrows were twittering in the eaves.� Near of the story deals with her quick accepance of her husband'due south death and her quick acceptance of the new possibilities for her own life and soul. The title of the story would seem to reinforce this thought of quick credence. It indicates that her important transition took place within one short 60 minutes. Unremarkably people take months to fully come up to terms with the death of a family member. Mrs. Mallard, however, is quick to put it all into perspective.

I recall the location she has called to deal with this transition is important. She is in her bedchamber in a comfy armchair, which would seem to indicate she felt safe here. She seems to accept found a remedy to life, which is her husband's death. The ending this time around is more ironic than shocking. She died because her potential for unhappiness was still alive (her husband).

Jacqueline M.

This story is both humorous and is valuable in a historical perspective. Information technology is starting time a commentary on the feelings that a woman trapped into wedlock during this time period may accept experienced. Marriage may have seemed to exist an interminable �trap� and the simply �honorable� manner out for a woman may have been through death of her husband. This story is ironic in that the narrator's death is attributed to existence overcome with dandy joy, when in fact she died of a combination of shock and disapointment. I liked this story, and I think that despite the time that the story was written, it is very easy to relate to. It as well presents the mode death can encourage many unlike feelings at in one case. The narrator admits that she will probably miss her husband, only she can also see the years of freedom stretching into the time to come.

Sunita R.

I have read this story before so my kickoff reading is really a second or third reading. If I call back correctly my first response to it was amusement at the irony of the whole affair. I can understand how a adult female tin can feel gratuitous from the husband that she has been with for a long fourth dimension. He wasn�t bad to her, only all she was known as was Mrs. Mallard. I noticed that everyone had a first proper noun at the beginning of the story except for Mrs. Mallard. Information technology was not until her husband'south supposed death that we detect out her name is Louise. Information technology�s like a spiritual freeing of the woman that was caged behind the man. Obviously she felt gratis because she said it over and over. �And yet she had loved him--sometimes. Frequently she had not. What did it thing! What could dear, the unsolved mystery, count for in the face of this possession of self-assertion which she suddenly recognized equally the strongest impulse of her beingness! 'Gratis! Body and soul costless!' she kept whispering.� In that location were certain words that I saw that lent themselves to the mood of the story. �She did not hear the story as many women have heard the same, with a paralyzed inability to have its significance. She wept at once, with sudden, wild abandonment, in her sister's arms. When the storm of grief had spent itself she went away to her room solitary. She would accept no one follow her.� The tempest of grief that overcame her eventually led to �a concrete exhaustion that haunted her body and seemed to reach into her soul.� I think that everyone has experienced the feeling of beingness totally emotionally tuckered after dealing with something that was probably too much to handle in the first identify. After you lot relax for a bit, there is a peaceful calm that slowly takes over your body and y'all feel totally at ease. At least I do. I think the mere fact that the situation is over lends itself to the feeling of liberty and the feeling that a terrible burden has been lifted off your shoulders. For Louise, being Mrs. Brently Mallard was a burden. Many women feel oppressed and overshadowed by their husbands. It is not necessarily something that the husband has done, it is just the personality of the woman who cannot be caged. Her storm of grief turned calm and of a sudden �Her fancy was running riot along those days alee of her. Spring days, and summer days, and all sorts of days that would be her own. She breathed a quick prayer that life might be long. Information technology was only yesterday she had thought with a shudder that life might be long.� The blue sky peeked through the storm and turned into the longing for days filled with sunshine and light. She wanted to alive long and prosper on her ain when just the solar day before she didn�t really want to prolong her life. I can throw some Emerson in hither as well because she was totally content within herself. She was set for a long and happy life by herself. When her married man was live, these feelings of hers were dead.

Stephanie R.

I�ve read a few other things by Kate Chopin, and �The Story of an Hour� fits into the body of her work very neatly. She foreshadows the end of the story blatantly, and if you�re at all familiar with her piece of work, the catastrophe is no surprise. It would exist fitting that her supposedly expressionless husband�due south render (safely) to the house would trigger her decease, since she is, later on all, �affected with a center trouble.� Once she�s got her mind attack beingness �free� from her husband, she is completely unprepared to bargain with being imprisoned backside him over again. Some words that caught my attention were specially in the second paragraph, with �cleaved,� �veiled,� �revealed,� and �half concealing.� Another item that caught my eye was that her married man was �leading the list of �killed�,� when he was, in reality, �far from the scene of the accident, and did non even know that there had been one.� Things that surprised me: she�s �young� but �afflicted with a heart trouble.� If she�s young, would she have had fourth dimension to even experience imprisoned by her wedlock? �And yet she had loved him--sometimes. Often she had not. What did it affair! What could love, the unsolved mystery . . . � If she�s young, why did she ally him if not for dearest? I suppose there isn�t room to address all of these bug in one curt story. Perhaps Chopin is addressing the fact that not everyone at this time married for beloved--�The unsolved mystery�--is it unsolved because the woman doesn�t know what it is? She hasn�t felt it. She seems to never have loved this human that is her husband. She loves her new-found hour-long freedom, simply not her own husband? Finally, �eye affliction--of the joy that kills�--what�s that all about? Joy that kills? She�south happy to have him back? Is that what the doctor thinks? She�due south heartbroken because her freedom was all imaginary, but an hour long. Is that what killed her? That�south been bothering me e'er since I read it, which is, I suppose, the author�s intent.

Caitlin S.

Equally I read this story, I noticed there was a definite juxtaposition of woman and man. I found the character of Richards unnecessary. Simple exposition through Josephine could take easily explained the accident. While I�one thousand on the subject of Richards--why was he �most� Mrs. Mallard? I don�t retrieve information technology was entirely innocent because he had waited to �assure� himself of the husband�s expiry. What odd diction. The passage with Mrs. Mallard staring off out of the window of her room was the most significant in my opinion. The reason why is because the natural world (i.e., the blue patches of sky peeking out through the clouds, the tops of trees all oscillating, the jiff of pelting, etc.) mirrors Mrs. Mallard�s feelings. The earth breaks open with new, spring life, just equally Mrs. Mallard�southward new life is about to brainstorm. The phrase �a picayune whispered word escaped her slightly parted lips� is wonderful. �Costless� is a very appropriate give-and-take to �escape� one�s lips. When Mrs. Mallard and Josephine descend from the top of the stairs to meet the two men, I couldn�t assist but laugh. It seems that the women had to come up down to the level of the men . . . kind of a descent into hell sort of matter . . . perchance I�1000 reading too much into it . . . did anyone else choice up on that? A major gap that I picked up on was the husband�s reaction to his wife�s death. I keep thinking that if Chopin had showed usa a footling more in that scene, that perhaps he, also, would feel �free.� I noticed, also, that Richards, who thinks himself the nearly tender, careful friend, doesn�t assistance out while Louise is upstairs. It�s her sister who helps her. Richards is downstairs twiddling his thumbs . . . yea, real tender, conscientious guy . . . so careful in fact that he fails in his concluding endeavor to shield the sight of the hubby from Mrs. Mallard. Also, the husband�s death was mentioned in i paragraph, but Louise�s journeying of freedom took up the majority of the story. Definitely a woman-power story (for lack of a ameliorate term).

Leigh W.

I have read this story before. It�south one of my favorites. I don�t view Louise�south reaction to her married man�s death as a wrong way to react. Of course dorsum in the 1800�s, the cultural �norm� was for a woman experience tremendously grievous, and distraught over the death of her hubby. Dorsum in those days a woman�s worth was primarily based on who she was married to.

I don�t think Louise was necessarily happy her hubby died. At the beginning of the story after she learned of his death information technology says, �She wept at once with sudden, and wild, abandonment in her sister�southward arms. When the storm of grief had spent itself, she went away to her room alone. She would have no one follow her.� That doesn�t spell out joy to me. I think she went into her room non knowing what to feel. While she was in there �soaking in� her environment she began to realize certain things. One monumental thing was that life was moving on despite her husband�due south expiry. When I say that, I�k referring to the mentioning of �the new spring life, the delicious breath of rain, the street caller, the open window, the open square.� Ultimately she decided to view her husband�southward death equally an opportunity to become a part of that life in ways that she never had earlier.

Well, every bit we all know, Louise�southward husband did not die. I recall the irony of the catastrophe is what ties the story upward so well. She didn�t have a heart attack when she heard of his death, she had ane when she saw him alive. The narrator wants the reader to believe that she died of disappointment at seeing her hubby live. I�k going along with that. I likewise don�t think she died of joy either. It�due south obvious that the narrator believes that the other characters thought she died of the �joy that kills.� Chopin does an first-class job at convincing the reader that the other characters were clueless. She died of shock. Can you imagine finding out that your spouse is dead, and accepting it ane way or the other, and and then seeing that they are actually live? Regardless of your feelings for them, it'south going to affect you lot tremendously. Unfortunately, Louise�s heart could not handle the shock.

Merely out of marvel. . . does anyone have whatever ideas about what the title of the story suggests? What nigh the thought that Louise may have died of guilt? Maybe she thought her husband was actually a ghost. She did scream when she saw him.

Megan Thousand.