The feeling, however, shifts because she begins to be happy about her husband’s death. She thinks she will be able to enjoy the freedom that she had lost in the marriage. Her hope is then ruined by the subsequent news of Mr. Mallard’s survival. The story describes the change of Mrs. Mallard’s reaction and emotion within a single hour. In the short fiction, Chopin explores her belief that marriage and freedom cannot exist together by using two powerful ironies: situational irony and dramatic irony.
Analysis of "The Story Of An Hour" by Kate Chopin I wrote my paper on “The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin. On the following pages, you will read about a character by the name of Louise. She was married at a time when marriage was not about mutual love. When she hears of her husbands’ death, she feels sorrow but is overcome with feelings of joy. Louise has found a freedom that she had forgotten she had.
Interpretive Analysis of Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour” “The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin shows the author’s completely negative view of marriage as nothing more than a constraint and a misery. Chopin goes on to say that a woman is better off dead than married when the character, Louise Mallard, dies of heart disease upon seeing her husband is not dead at all. Heart disease, being the disease of marriage. Louise Mallard not only accepted Brently Mallard’s death, but burst into sudden, almost unexplainable weeping. This was possibly due to the fact that she was so overjoyed with the fact that she was her own person again, she could not control her emotions.
Richards tried to shield Mrs. Mallard from seeing her husband except it was too late. Once Mrs. Mallard laid eyes on whom she believed to be her late husband she collapsed and died. (Chopin 1894) When the doctor had seen Mrs. Mallard he said “she died of heart disease-of joy that kills." (139) it was assumed that she was so happy her husband was alive and she died from the shock. When in fact were the opposite it was her husband being alive and the thought of giving up her new found freedom and becoming repressed again?
Mallard” is told by her sister, that her husband has been killed in a train accident. Initially, she is filled with sorrow and disbelief. However, after her tears dry and the days events begin to settle, Mallard begins to imagine what her life will be like without her husband. A calming relief begins to fill her thoughts. She would no longer have to live for him nor anyone else, only herself.
The Story of an Hour is about a woman with a fragile heart, who is carefully informed of her husband Brently Mallard's death due to a railroad accident. As one reads the story, it is simple to believe that Mrs. Mallard weeps at the news of her husband’s death, for now she is a young widow who may have been deeply in love. However, there is much more depth and there are layers to the story that spark the question of how well one can truly know what another feels if one only knows a short part of the story. Mrs. Mallard maintains a façade of loving her husband, which is also perpetuated by the world view that a married couple loves each other. She is oppressed by her husband, whose “face…had never looked save with love upon her, fixed and gray and dead”.
The grief she was feeling overcame her and she went to her room to be alone. In her room was an armchair that she proceeded to sink down in a feeling of exhaustion. Her exhaustion totally consumed her that it reached her inner soul. While looking out the window she noticed the top of the trees blowing in the wind, the breath of rain she took in, and the twittering of the sparrows gave her sense of a new beginning instead of death. She continued to sit in the chair; head thrown back and motionless.
he Story of an Hour” and “The Yellow Wallpaper” were written in the end of nineteenth century when women had no equal rights with man. Women’s role in the society’s life was stereotyped as being housewives. Both authors, Kate Chopin and Charlotte Perkins Gilman, were women with feminist persuasions. Their stories shocked “conservative Victorian society” (Chopin 1) but are now considered some of the greatest. 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.
Upon the delivery of the news, she starts sobbing and grieving then goes to her room to be by herself. This was a time to reflect upon her life. The reality of a life without her husband slowly started setting in. During this time the author helps us to realize that the death of her husband meant that there will be no more “women and men oppressing one another” (Chopin 5). As she is in her room, there is an overwhelming feeling that slowly builds up.
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.