The Awakening Essay Questions

It seems that a “radiant peace settled upon her” only “ [as] she at last [finds] herself alone…[as] the children were gone” (Chopin 80). Only when she isn’t expected to behave the way a mother-woman should, does Edna feel peace and the visual imagery associated with the word radiant characterizes her as much happier without her societal role. It is only after Edna understands the potential fulfilment that she can gain by disregarding the social expectations in place for women that she attempts to find it. No longer does she long for the “little glimpses of domestic harmony” instead feeling pity for Adele Ratignolle’s “colourless existence” (Chopin, 183). Here the word “colourless” contrasts with “radiant” as something “radiant” cannot be without colour. Colour and radiance become symbolic of a life fully lived, one including personal happiness and identity. By awakening, Edna seems not only more aware but also more conscious of the rigidity and “colourlessness” that she has borne for so long. She is no longer confined by the expectation that women should sacrifice their own personal happiness and identity to fulfil those of their

The theme of The Awakening is centered on Edna’s journey of individual identification and independence. Chopin condemns gender roles and pleads to the public to look at women as equals and not just commodities to be married off. Women should have all the

Chopin brings forth many physical attributes of Edna that no only apply to women, but that also those that apply to men. By doing this Chopin sets up the idea that Edna is not fit for the typical roles that she has been assigned to fulfill. Since Edna has been assigned masculine attributes this differentiates her from the rest of the women in the novel during the Victorian Era. For instance Chopin writes how Edna is “handsome rather than beautiful”(25)) and furthermore Chopin describes Edna to have “strong, shapely hands” (24), “thick and almost horizontal” (25) eyebrows, “firm, round arms” (28), and “strong, white teeth” (59). These physical descriptions are usually associated to men, however Chopin gives them to her female protagonist

After returning from vacation, Edna is a changed woman. When her husband and children are gone, she moves out of the house and purses her own ambitions. She starts painting and feeling happier. “There were days when she was very happy without knowing why. She was happy to be alive and breathing when her whole being seemed to be one with the sunlight, the color, the odors, the luxuriant warmth of some perfect Southern day” (Chopin 69). Her sacrifice greatly contributed to her disobedient actions.

Throughout The Awakening, a novel by Kate Chopin, the main character, Edna Pontellier showed signs of a growing depression. There are certain events that hasten this, events which eventually lead her to suicide.

This struggle between being a mother and wife. and being a free spirit, is apparent from the beginning of the book. She struggles also with her relationships, those with Leonce, and Robert. “What folly! to bathe at such an hour in such heat!” (Chopin 522) says her husband when Edna and Robert finish with a swim. He is obviously disapproving of their relationship with the water, and how they spend time it it. But he also seems somewhat oblivious to the fact that they are falling in love in front of his eyes, as well as Edna changing her entire

When Edna awoke it was with the conviction that she had slept long and soundly”(Chopin 37). Edna awakens to a new sense of herself, taking in the freedom that she has had on the island all day and forming a new sense of what she desires: freedom from Mr.

Edna blindly struggles to leave behind the conventions of society and her own life. She first begins her transformation while at the beach. The water shows her desire to change and flow with her life instead of being stuck in the life that she has. Each time she becomes unsure of her new path, she returns to the water to reconnect with the flow that she wants to create. Ultimately, however, the requirements of change become too great for her, and Edna is defeated by the process. When she realizes that she cannot make the necessary changes in her life she returns to the water to end her life. The water and her drowning show how Edna is in over her head and cannot tread any longer to stay afloat.

It instead imposed a thick, blind, deaf haze inside his mind, keeping him from listening and understanding his wife. When her husband leaves on a business trip, Edna takes this opportunity to “[free] her soul of responsibility” (Chopin, 32) and explore the simplicities in her surroundings. Robert, a friend of Edna’s, takes her out for a day and leaves “her free to drift whithersoever she chose to set her sails” (Chopin, 34); an unprecedented break from societal norms. She sees her “home from the outside looked like a prison” (Chopin, 59), and she desperately wants to escape. However, her true civil disobedience begins in her affair with Alcée Arobin. Edna took “off her wedding ring, flung it upon the carpet. When she saw it lying there, she stamped her heel upon it” (Chopin, 52); although she cannot divorce her husband, she left him for another man. She continues to break traditional roles for women by going to sit “in the library after dinner and read Emerson” (Chopin, 73). Women being able to read was common, but it was strange for women to read literature by a transcendentalist instead of reading to their children or doing housework. As her affair continues, she allows Alcée to stay over at her house, leaving her with “no despondency

Edna feels like she has thrown away her youthful life to settle down with people she does not truly love. She does, however, love Robert very much but also realizes that society would never accept her if she ditched her family and ran away with Robert. She is truly heart broken, and this whole time, she is just thinking about this in her head without talking about it with someone. It becomes a psychological battle that grows very intense. Eventually Edna feels so desperate that she decides the best way to solve it is just to end her life.

Edna's life was described through vivid images of how "the tan of the seashore had left her face, and her forehead was smooth, white, and polished beneath her heavy, yellow brown hair"(Chopin 63). This imagery allows the reader to put him or herself in that time and perfectly imagine what Edna sees. Because of the elaborate details, the reader better understands what it was like to live in that time period. In addition to the detailed images, Chopin uses allusions such as "He whispered an anxious inquiry of the lady in black, who did not notice him or reply, but kept her eyes fasted upon the pages of her velvet prayer book"(Chopin 42). The velvet prayer book is alluding to the bible that the woman is intensely reading. Evidently, in this time period, the importance of religion was extremely apparent in society. Chopin's use of figurative language throughout the novel helps the reader to truly understand how society was in the

Later, Edna moves away from her husband and children (Chopin 1343). She pushes the boundaries of performativity and gender norms even more. Edna wants to be with her lover, but he is not having any of it. While trying to convince him to say, she gets word that her friend has entered childbirth. So, Edna goes to her. When Edna returns, her lover is gone, with note a note of

In Kate Chopin’s novel, The Awakening, the constant boundaries and restrictions placed on Edna Pontellier by society will lead to her struggle for freedom and her ultimate suicide. Her husband Leonce Pontellier, the current women of society, and the Grand Isle make it evident that Edna is trapped in a patriarchal society. Despite these people, Edna has a need to be free and she is able to escape from the society that she despises. The sea, Robert Lebrun, and Mademoiselle Reisz serve as Edna’s outlets from conformity. “Edna's journey for personal independence involves finding the words to express herself. She commits suicide rather than sacrificing her independent,

Immersion into the frame of mind of Edna Pontellier, in Kate Chopin’s The Awakening, is a fascinating experience, one with many conflicting internal and external influences. Like a marionette, Edna acts as a slave to her perceived social constraints in the beginning of The Awakening, a poignant contrast to her emotionally fueled, self-destructive choices towards the end. In the opening chapters of Edna’s story, she is described from an external viewpoint. Readers do not especially see the interworking of her thoughts and feelings through Chopin’s initial character sketch, “Mrs. Pontellier’s eyes were quick and bright; they were a yellowish brown, about the color of her hair” (5). Such a description is effective in producing a mental image of her appearance, yet her inner-identity remains a mystery. Although there is some foreshadowing lending readers to assume Edna’s dissatisfaction with her life, “She could not have told why she was crying. Such experiences as the foregoing were not uncommon in her married life” (Chopin 8). The true reasons for her distaste of being a housewife and mother are not revealed until later on. Eventually, the reader forms an understanding of Edna’s “lack of identity”, manifested through the relationships she becomes tangled in, from friendships to romance.

According to Carley Bogard, “Kate Chopin’s “The Awakening”, though placed in the highly structured New Orleans Creole Society at the turn of the century, is still the clearest statement of the feminine dilemma that we have” (Bogard, Carley). Looking through the eyes of Carley Bogard, she looks at the The Awakening as “a refusal to compromise”. She says that, “I want to argue that Edna’s awakening is a double one. The first is her awareness that she wants autonomy as a human being. At the same time,