Is marriage a prison? According to Kate Chopin, the answer is – yes; marriage is a prison in which freedom does not exist. In 1894, Kate Chopin wrote and published “Story of an Hour.” The story takes place in the late nineteenth century in an American home, where Mrs. Mallard, the protagonist, heard about the news of her husband’s death from her sister. In the beginning, Mrs. Mallards felt sad about her husband’s death. The feeling, however, shifts because she begins to be happy about her husband’s death.
In the story, “The Story of an Hour”, Mrs. Mallard learns of her husband’s death from her sister Josephine. She is so distraught with the news, that she retreats to her bedroom to be alone. While in her room, she goes through several emotions: first, she is exhausted and allows herself to relax, then, she gets depressed by the news of her husband’s death, and finally, she is relieved
Her use of imagery and personification throughout the writing draws the reader into the sick mind of a young mother struggling to find herself again and broaches the issue of feminism. According to the Online Literature website, Charlotte Perkins Gilman was born in Hartford, Connecticut in 1860. Her father, a librarian, abandoned the family early on and Charlotte was often looked after by her Great aunt and uncle, Harriet and Henry Beecher. Henry was a social reformer and Harriet was the author of Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Due to the strong social and literary influences, Charlotte was drawn to literature and began writing at a young age.
The protagonist of “The Story of an Hour” Mrs. Mallard dies of a heart attack when she saw her husband alive just an hour later hearing of his death in the railroad disaster. The main character of “The Yellow Wallpaper” Jane is a woman who was diagnosed by her husband and physician John as having “a temporary nervous depression” (Gilman 55). He rented a big colonial mansion with gorgeous garden to help to treat her sickness by doing nothing. It was forbidden for his wife to write, to spend a lot of time with her baby, to have visitors and traveled somewhere. He controlled each Jane’s step by himself or with his sister supervision.
Ironically Reality of “The Story of an Hour” In Kate Chopin’s story “The Story of an Hour”, describe after Mrs. Marllard hear her sister told her that her husband’s death, her psychological changes in an hour. Instead of becomes extreme sadness, she experiences the joyful of the life. This character is struggling with herself, whether or not accept the new life. The detail where “her bosom rose and fell tumultuously” (par.9), is more than just a feeling, this establish the outcome, which is the death of Mrs. Mallard. This story use ironic writing technique to describe Mrs. Mallard’s mental change.
This becomes controversial because when an individual read her novels it removed the optimism of that happiness and comfort in love that people look forward to. Women are supposed to enjoy marriage and look forward to being submissive to their husbands who are “breadwinners.” In the early nineteenth century, women relied on their husbands and required permission to engage in numerous activities. The act of marriage caused
In the beginning of the story we learn Mrs. Mallard’s husband, Brently Mallard, was killed in a train accident. Brently’s friend Richards rushed over to her house to break the news gently to Mrs. Mallard because she suffered from a fragile heart. Throughout her story, Chopin gave us the first names of the characters except for Mrs. Mallard. We didn’t learn her first name until after she received the news of her husband’s death. This signified that Mrs. Mallard was known only as Brently’s wife and didn’t have a true identity of her own until she was freed from her marriage.
Chopin describes Louise as not perceiving her husband's death as society expected her to, "She did not hear the story as many women have heard the same, with a paralyzed inability to accept its significance" (Chopin, 1894). Chopin showed Louise's short-lived grief of her husband's death as, "[s]he wept with sudden wild abandonment, and when the storm of grief had spent itself, she went away to her room alone"( Chopin, 1894, para.3). Louise openly showed grief, but retreated to her room to be alone to hide her true feelings. Kate Chopin used imagery and the senses of sight, sound, and smell to describe how Louise started to come alive; she could see "[t]he tops of trees that were all aquiver with the new spring life and the clouds with patches of blue sky." She heard "[t]he sounds of a peddler calling out his wares from the streets below, a distant song of someone singing faintly, and sparrows twittering in the eaves."
The Story of an Hour As the title puts it, “The Story of an Hour” is a story that happens in one hour. This story mostly revolves around one woman, Louise Mallard. The story begins on a very sad note especially in the eyes of a reader. Mrs. Mallard is said to have a “heart trouble” (Chopin 1), so her sister Josephine felt that great care had to be taken when delivering the sad news of her husband Brently Mallard’s death. Upon the delivery of the news, she starts sobbing and grieving then goes to her room to be by herself.
In addition, we know she is fragile when we are told, “great care was taken to break to her as gently as possible the news of her husband’s death”(Chopin 573). In my opinion, Louise’s marriage was bringing her down and making her character feel old. Again, I feel sympathy for Louise due to the struggles she had with herself and her marriage. Chopin portrays Louise as a prisoner of her husband. This was not strange at the time Chopin was writing the story.