Alyssa Sittineri The Awakening
I. Introduction
• The Awakening by Kate Chopin
• Novel
• First published in 1899 during the literary period of Realism which in the United States was a period where writers wrote about realistic or fictional events specifically after the American Civil War. It was also during the time where Women’s Rights beginning to emerge as more and more women’s rights activist groups were forming. A woman’s role in society and at home were changing as more years went along.
• Protagonist- Edna Pontellier is a married twenty-eight year old who is a graceful woman that during the course of the novel is constantly changing in discovery of who she is on the inside.
• Antagonist- Society. During this time period of the
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The main character Edna Pontellier is on vacation with her family. Her husband Leonce Pontellier is a man of tradition and wealth. During Edna’s stay at the Grand Isle, she becomes close with a man named Robert LeBrun. Edna and Robert become close and spend every minute they can with one another. One day Robert suddenly leaves to find opportunity in Mexico, leaving Edna. The Pontellier family moves back to their home in New Orleans. Edna becomes unsettled with her life and especially her married life. Mr.Pontellier goes on a business trip to New York City and the children go to Iberville leaving Edna at home alone. Edna faces real eye opening things for her as she goes on a mission of sorts in self-discovery. She moves out of the house to be financially independent from her husband to a little house down the block. During this time she frequently visits her friends from the Grand Isle. One day Robert returns to town and Edna is caught completely off guard. Soon after Roberts return they professes their love for one another and Robert expresses his hope to one day marry Edna. However, this makes Edna feel torn about the choices she will have to make. Later she returns to the Grand Isle, and swims far out to sea and it is assumed that she has drowned …show more content…
Not only do I believe that I gained lessons from it but it also made me view life a whole lot different than before. The novel has taught me to be more open and comfortable with myself when it comes to being who I am as a person and when it comes to addressing how I feel. When you try to push and push your honest feelings away from your thoughts it can come back and hurt you in the long run, like it did to Edna. If Edna was more open to how she felt and got help when she felt like she was drowning in her own mind, she could have had a different pathway that would not have ended on her death. Although Edna’s actions and the way she handled the situation when it wasn’t going well also taught me and hopefully to others that taking the opportunity to get help when you need it is literally the difference between having a life ahead of you and ending the life you had. In my opinion, this novel is one of the best that I have ever read for a class and I would have read it on my free time if I otherwise had the choice. I am glad I read this book because it was very intriguing when it came to developing the plot and Edna’s character. I also enjoyed how Kate Chopin made the novel develop and that looking back on the novel more things are evident once the reader has learned an important fact about the plot. For instance, at first it was not clear to me that Robert and Edna really had a thing for one
The video, Eyes on the Prize: Awakenings, gives an influential look into the beginning of the civil rights movement. It shared many different events that helped bring about the movement and eventually caused that Black society would have the same or similar rights as the White’s. The main events that took placed happened in the southern states, particularly in Alabama. In the US blacks were segregated and were not allowed the same rights or privileges as the white race. They also were of the poorer class and that made it harder for them to have a voice in specific matters. However, it was very strict in the south and almost everything has either a black or white section. As time passed blacks began to show small acts of courage of standing up for themselves and demanding equality.
Edna and Mrs. Mallard are both victims of the 1800s, they both show that by their displeasure in being married. Edna shows her displeasure in novel by frolicking around with other men, and by openly disagreeing with her husband which at that time was a social faux pas. Mrs. Mallard showed her displeasure by simply liking the fact that she was finally
Events in history have influenced writers’ style, and the importance in their stories. Alice Walker wrote a novel which was very much subjective by the time period of the 1940’s. There was a great deal of bigotry and tyranny during that time, particularly for Women of color. Women were mentally and physically abused and belittled by man purely because of their race and femininity. Women were considered as ignorant individuals that simply knew how to handle housework and care for the children.
The Portrayal of the Plight of Women by the Author, In Their Particular Period of Time
The Awakening, by Kate Chopin, is the story of a woman who is seeking freedom. Edna Pontellier feels confined in her role as mother and wife and finds freedom in her romantic interest, Robert Lebrun. Although she views Robert as her liberator, he is the ultimate cause of her demise. Edna sees Robert as an image of freedom, which brings her to rebel against her role in society. This pursuit of freedom, however, causes her death. Chopin uses many images to clarify the relationship between Robert and Edna and to show that Robert is the cause of both her freedom and her destruction.
There is no outward display of affection. She “was not a mother/woman.” The children take care of themselves with some help from a nurse.
2. Leonce is angered when Edna tells him she went out. Why is he angry?
Whether coerced or through self realizations, there were many awakenings in the book. The first was that Edna was not the traditional mother like Adèle, the second was that she enjoyed doing things for herself instead of for her children and husband. This second awakening is shown when Edna takes time to talk
Edna gains metaphorical wings in the form of self-actualization and newfound freedom. However, she strays too close to the harmful and unobtainable thing that is a relationship outside of marriage with someone she actually loves, Robert. In doing so, she brings about her own downfall.
The main outcome of the Awakening was a resistance in contrast to spiritual law which leaked into different zones of colonial life. In spite of the fact that a religious development, the Awakening had ramifications in social and political circles also. Traditions of thoughtfulness and obligingness, the overseeing standards of life in the colonies, were put aside for a more difficult stage. The Great Awakening is generally partitioned into four times of American history. The initially happened while America was still a part of the English settlements. Such religious masterminds as Jonathan Edwards and George Whitfield urged a scholarly method to scripture. Amid this period, the houses of worship in the colonies were still particularly fixing
Sacrifices can define one’s character; the definition can either be the highest dignity or the lowest degradation of the value of one’s life. In The Awakening, Kate Chopin implicitly conveys the sacrifice Edna Pontellier makes in the life which provides insight of her character and attributions to her “awakening.” She sacrificed her past of a lively and youthful life and compressed it to a domestic and reserved lifestyle of housewife picturesque. However, she meets multiple acquaintances who help her express her dreams and true identity. Mrs. Pontellier’s sacrifice established her awakening to be defiant and drift away from the societal role of an obedient mother, as well as, highlighting the difference between society’s expectations of
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.
A small, homely woman, Mademoiselle is distant and reserved in her interaction with the other guests on Grand Isle. Although she is often called upon to entertain people at gatherings with her expert piano playing, she realizes that Edna is the only one of the guests who is truly touched and moved by the music. Mademoiselle Reisz seeks out Edna shortly after Robert’s departure to Mexico, and her exchange with Edna by the shore fosters a relationship that continues upon their return home to New Orleans. Edna is inexplicably drawn to the older woman, whose lifestyle she envies, despite finding her disagreeable and difficult. In fact, neither Edna nor Mademoiselle Reisz can claim to be particularly fond of the other, but Mademoiselle Reisz understands Edna’s passions and enjoys the company and the opportunity to share her thoughts on art and love. Through her relationship with the pianist, Edna increases her awareness of herself as a woman capable of passionate art and passionate love. While the two capacities are interconnected, Mademoiselle Reisz serves to further each specifically. Not only is the pianist in touch with her own artistic emotions, she is, on a more pragmatic level, in touch with the traveling Robert and is the only one to whom he speaks of his love for Edna. Mademoiselle Reisz is the woman that Edna could have become, had she
The subjects of the two novels, Edna Pontellier and the Narrator, undergo a similar change; at the onset of the novel they meet all societies expectations and standards for women of their time- Mrs. Pontellier is described as shy and reserved and neither protagonist ever disobey their husbands- but with each coming page, the women convert into someone unrecognizable to their antierior selves. Though their metamorphose are both ignited by a new environment, they had internally harbored yet suppressed their need for independence and freedom. Like these two, every woman holds creativity and free will; however during this time they were unable to practice them, as doing so was almost unheard of and rarely tolerated. The Narrator and Edna themselves serve to represent the healthy creative urges within women that have been suppressed.
In the context of awakening, the only thing that matters is whether you are present or whether you are lost in your mind. If you are truly present in this moment, then you are an awakened being, at least for this moment. If you are in the mind, you are entering a world of past memory and future imagining. You are entering a world of idea, concept, opinion and belief. You are entering a world of illusion and separation. If you believe in your thoughts, ideas, opinions and beliefs as somehow being true, you will become absorbed into the world of the mind and disconnected from Presence.