The Awakening Symbolism

Term Paper

Dr. Bollinger

April 8, 2010

The Use of Symbols in The Awakening

Throughout The Awakening, by Kate Chopin, much of the deeper meaning behind the story can be seen though the use of symbols. These symbolic elements help create a deeper connection to Edna’s world and her eventual awakenings. Some symbols used again and again throughout the story are birds, houses, art, clothing and the ocean. Each of theses things is connected to Edna in a way that helps her become the women she never thought she could be. Ultimately Edna awakens into someone completely different from the women she once was. Her Awakening creates in her a realization that her life is not being fulfilled and eventually she takes…show more content…
Edna is standing on the same beach where her awakening began. She is staring at a bird: “A bird with a broken wing was beating the air above, reeling, fluttering, circling disabled down, down to the water” (p. 188). She realizes that her life can never be fulfilled because Robert is too frightened to love her back. Edna looking at the helpless bird, as is falls into the water, decides to become like the bird. She swims into the water knowing she will never come back. Ultimately Edna decides that her life is not worth living if she cannot live fully. She knows that without love and happiness she will never have a complete life.

Another symbol used repeatedly throughout The Awakening is the house. There are many houses in the book. There is the house on Grand Isle, the house in New Orleans, the pigeon house and the house where Edna falls asleep. Each of

the houses have there own meaning and collectively they represent the soul of the person living in the house. Homes are very intimate; therefore, they stand for the very core of a person. In this case they reflect Edna’s feelings at different stages throughout the…show more content…
There are many ways to explore each symbol and then compare them to Edna’s life. Edna is a deeply wounded person in the sense that her life could never have been fulfilled. The realization of this caused her to end her own life.

Works’ Cited

Dyer, Joyce. The Awakening: A Novel of Beginnings. Twayne's Masterwork Series 130. New York: Twayne, 1993. 


MacCurdy, Carol A. "The Awakening: Chopin's Metaphorical Use of Clothes." Publications of the Mississippi Philological Association. [no volume given] (1985): 58-66

Malzahn, Manfred. "The Strange Demise of Edna Pontellier." Southern Literary Journal. 23.2 (Spring 1991): 31-39. Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism. Ed. Janet Witalec. Vol. 127. Detroit: Gale, 2002. 31-39. Literature Resources from Gale. Gale.

Walter and Jo Ann B. Fineman. "Kate Chopin: Pre-Freudian Freudian." Southern Literary 29.1 (Fall 1996): 35-45. Rpt. in Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism. Ed. Janet Witalec. Vol. 127. Detroit: Gale, 2002. 35-45. Literature Resources from Gale. Gale. Alabama Virtual Library