Ending In Kate Chopin's 'The Story Of An Hour'

The short story The Story of an Hour, by Kate Chopin, describes a woman conflicted with the death of her husband and her outlook on life after his assumed passing. Through the story, Chopin shows the transformation of Mrs. Mallard from that of an ordinary wife to that of a woman cherishing her newfound freedom. Although Mrs. Mallard is deeply saddened at the news of her husband’s passing, she finally begins to feel a sense of relief and witnesses what it means for her as a woman. Just as she begins to fully cherish her life, she is horrified at the sight of her “dead” husband’s return and proceeds to perish. Through the use of imagery and syntax, Chopin illustrates the interchanging psychoanalytic perspective of an individual following a personal loss.

The short story “The Story of an Hour” by Kate O’Flaherty Chopin is about a young woman who is told of her husband’s death and how, in one hour, her life was changed forever. Kate’s life was in some ways similar to that of Mrs. Mallard’s, I believe her true feelings were reflected in her many writings.

Anyone who receives notice of a loved ones death is never expected to take it lightly. In Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour,” Mrs. Mallard is informed of her husbands “death” as gently as possible, and immediately she understands the enormous significance this loss will have on her life. Unlike many widow’s, her feelings of utter devastation do not last. Mrs. Mallard’s sobs of loss turn to cries of joy after she reflects upon her own character and discovers truths about her marriage.

The Story of an Hour," by Kate Chopin is the tragic story of a woman whose newfound position as a widow gives her strength. She develops a sense of freedom as she embraces her husband's death as an opportunity to establish her own identity. The tragedy is when her newfound identity gets stripped away as the appearance of her husband reveals that he is still alive. The disappointment from this tragedy kills her with a heart attack symbolizing the many conflicts that she faced throughout the story. The conflicts the character faces within herself and society show that the social norms for women were suppressing to their strength and individuality as human beings.

The story of an hour by Kate Chopin introduces us to Mrs. Mallard as she reacts to her husband’s death. In this short story, Chopin portrays the complexity of Mrs. Mallard’s emotions as she is saddened yet joyful of her loss. Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour” argues that an individual discover their self-identity only after being freed from confinement. The story also argues that freedom is a very powerful force that affects mental or emotional state of a person. The story finally argues that only through death can one be finally freed.

Richard was too late. “…She had died of heart disease- of joy that kills.” (Chopin, 58) In the short story “The Story of an Hour”, Kate Chopin tells a story of women confined in a repressive marriage and uses a literary element called foreshadowing to add suspense or tension in the story and hints about things that will occur later in the story. Literary devices include imagery, foreshadowing, plot, setting, and point of view. The combination of these literary devices allows authors to effectively convey what message will be in the story. The literary device called Foreshadowing plays a significant role in the short story as well as other literary devices such as imagery and symbolism which combine and create a unique way of how the story unfolds.

Kate Chopin’s The Story of an Hour is a brilliant short story of irony and emotion. The story demonstrates conflicts that take us through the character’s emotions as she finds out about the death of her husband. Without the well written series of conflicts and events this story, the reader would not understand the depth of Mrs. Mallard’s inner conflict and the resolution at the end of the story. The conflict allows us to follow the emotions and unfold the irony of the situation in “The Story of an Hour.”

The “Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin is a short story about a woman who struggles with the oppression she experiences at the hands of her husband and her secret desire for independence. Louise Mallard didn’t realize how upset she was in her marriage until she found out about her husband’s death. She grieves for only a short period of time before mentally creating a new life for herself. This new life she envisions help her to see the silver lining in a tragic event. Chopin uses symbolism throughout the story to portray the theme of a quest for identity.

Margarita Engle, a poet, and novelist, once said, “Marriage without love is just one more twisted form of slavery.” In the eighteenth century, marriage was the exit door of many women from their homes whether they believed in love and filled their hearts with hope, or had no choice, and they were sold to men as if they were cattle. In The Story of an Hour, Kate Chopin shows complex issues such as marriage, independence, symbols, and ironies. After hearing the news that Brently Mallard was dead in a railroad accident, Richards, Mr. Mallard’s friend, went to the house to be next to Mrs. Mallard and to help her at this difficult moment. Contrary to what everyone was worried about, Mrs. Mallard knew that she would lament her husband’s death, but she was full of hope, dreaming of her freedom, appreciating life beyond the window, and a new beginning. Unfortunately, Mrs. Mallard’s dreams faded when she went downstairs and her husband arrived alive, and she could not stand it and died. Focusing on The Story of an Hour, there are three main points related to women in the early eighteenth century, such as oppressive marriages, women’s new perspective and ways of liberation, and women’s submission and obedience that demonstrates how women survived, even though they were not heard.

"The story of an hour" related when Mrs.Mallard,a women last supper from heart problems here 's news of her husband. She gets the news that her husband was involved in a tragic train wreck. She was so shocked from her husband death, that she just excused herself and immediately walked to her bedroom where she shows how she really feels. She is upset by her husband sudden death; however she has something to be happy about now that her husband has passed away. Mrs. Mallard starts to feel extremely happy because now she can finally be own person. "When she abandoned her self a little whispered word escape her slightly parted lips. She said... Free free free"(Chopin 307). Here for the first time you see Mrs.Mallard really coming out of

In "Story of an Hour", we begin with the climatic event, the news of her husbands death. Mrs. Mallard has heart problems so when her sister Josephine attempted to break the news to her; she tried to break it as gently as possible. Mrs. Mallard first seems to be in pain by going to her room and sitting in her armchair near the window while sobbing like a child. After a few moments, she begins to repeat the word free. This is one of the turning points in the story. We now realize that she's not in sorrow, but in glee that her husband is dead. She is now free; free from her unhappy relationship. Chopin now surprises everyone with another turning point. The husband walks in through the front door. He was alive, far from dead. As soon as Mrs. Mallard sees her husband, she collapses to the floor. The doctor claims that she died of a heart disease, but ironically the truth is, she died of despair. She was so glad that she was free, and then it all seemed to be a fantasy. It turned out that she wasn't free, and her heart couldn't take the pain to keep living in a suppressed relationship. She may just be better of dead although she did want a new life. Depending on how one looks at it, one may still argue that she was free in the end...free through death.

In “The Story of an Hour” (1894), Kate Chopin presents a woman in the last hour of her life and the emotional and psychological changes that occur upon hearing of her husbands’ death. Chopin sends the protagonist, Mrs. Mallard, on a roller coaster of emotional up’s and down’s, and self-actualizing psychological hairpin turns, which is all set in motion by the news of her husband’s death. This extreme “joy ride” comes to an abrupt and ultimately final halt for Mrs. Mallard when she sees her husband walk through the door unscathed. Chopin ends her short story ambiguously with the death of Mrs. Mallard, imploring her reader to determine the true cause of her death.

Everyone who reads a story will interpret things slightly different than the person who reads it before or after him or her. This idea plays out with most every story, book, song, and movie. These interpretations create conflict and allow people to discuss different ideas and opinions. Without this conflict of thought there is no one devoting time to debate the true meaning of a text. Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour” tells about a woman who is informed of her husbands death, processes the emotions, and becomes content with this new status as an individual person – losing all the expectations that society expected her to live by within a marriage. This story however is written in a way that the reader has the final interpretation of the text. There are many different interpretations on not only the reason for the main character’s death, but also on the overwhelming emotions that she faces.

“The Story of The Hour” fully answers its title. It is a story about a woman living her last hour. Not so many things happen during that hour, but in contrast, many thoughts fly through main character’s head and a reader can form an accurate portrait of a woman’s life from these thoughts. Somebody tells her that her husband is dead. After that she dives into the whirl of thoughts regarding the impact of husband’s death on her future. Some facts or beliefs make this woman think that her husband’s death is a rather fortunate event. It all ends soon after that, when she sees her husband alive and dies. In “The Story of The Hour” Kate Chopin doubts mere foundation of a thing called “marriage” and suggests an alternative viewpoint based on early examples of a feminist movement.

Kate Chopin's short story, "The Story of an Hour" is largely about the forms of repression that women were forced to endure during the epoch in which the story was written (1894) and during much of the time that preceded it. During this time period, women quite frequently had to subjugate themselves to the will of their husbands, or to some other man who had a significant amount of control over their lives. Chopin chooses to address this phenomenon in an indirect manner with this particular short story, although she does so in a thematic manner which, of course, is the ""¦idea that lies behind the story. Every story narrows a broad underlying idea, shapes it in a unique way, and makes the underlying idea concrete" (Clugston 2010, 7.1) The theme that "The Story of an Hour" is based upon is the notion of the liberation of women from the overbearing influence of men. Chopin chooses to illustrate this theme quite dramatically through literary devices of symbolism and metaphor.