Essays on The Story of An Hour

Kate Chopin's short story "The Story of an Hour" is concerning an unhealthy wife who for a short time supposes her husband is deceased and visualizes a complete new life of independence for herself. The speaker’s portrayal of Mrs. Mallard gives you an idea about someone who removes off the ideas of love and even the greatest of marriages for the wonderful thought of pure independence. This paper provides the complication of the concept of Freedom for Mrs. Mallard as the lead character of the story. It gives the impression like an awful thing to Mrs. Mallard, who's ...

“The Story of An Hour” is a work of American writer, Kate Chopin, who undoubtedly was a great master of short stories since she succeeded in showing character’s complex personality using only a few pages. This story is about a young woman, Mrs. Mallard, who suddenly knew about her husband’s death in a train accident. Firstly, she became upset and depressed but later through her feelings and thoughts it became apparent that she had no reasons to cry. With the death of Mr. Mallard, she could finally find freedom. The author opens another, a real part of ...

The Story of an Hour is set in the late nineteenth century in an American house. The story takes place over just one hour, as the story suggests. Chopin uses a variety of narrative techniques to add depth to her story, such as symbolism, foreshadowing, and point of view. The Story of an Hour is written in third person narrative. The story works well in third person, especially as it begins in the viewpoint of one character and then moves onto another which turns out to be the protagonist. The Story of an Hour begins in the viewpoint of ...

The Necklace and The Story of an Hour have numerous common elements. For example, both are nineteenth century stories and both have unhappily married women as their protagonists. However, the overriding similarity is the central theme of gender roles that emanates from both. Mathilde and Mrs Mallard are both middle-class women of their time and, as a result of this, have very little control over their lives. Rather than providing stability and affection, their husbands are repressing them and hindering their sense of identity.

In both stories, the protagonist is a young married woman. Similar again are the feelings ...

Kate Chopin’s “Desiree’s Baby” and “The Story of an Hour” are both intelligently written and gripping short stories. They have many similarities such as their settings, protagonists and the presence of literary techniques such as symbolism and foretelling. However, there are also many differences, such as the nature of the marriages that are explored in each. Over all, there are many elements which make each story memorable individually, but it is clear that both are written by the same author. “Desiree’s Baby” is set the mid-nineteenth century United States of America, on two plantations in the ...

Literary Comparison of The Story of an Hour and The Necklace

The Story of an Hour by Kate Chopin and The Necklace by Guy de Maupassant are both short stories associated with the trials and tribulations of marriage, as well as love. Both stories also deal with the emotional and physical changes that are attributed to personal life changing events. In The Story of an Hour, the plot revolves around a woman, Louise Mallard, and her reaction to her husband’s death. In The Necklace, the plot is based ...

Introduction – Thesis Statement

The nineteenth century in literature implied various literary classifications, among which there can be mentioned the realism and naturalism. Kate Chopin explores these genres in her writings, and she employs bold themes such as racism, social conventions, or woman’s identity, making her an unconventional writer, appreciated for her writing style and for her original approaches to human matters. A defining feature of Chopin’s writing, which reveals from two of her short stories “Desiree’s Baby” and “The Story of an Hour” is irony.

Supporting Paragraphs

Nothing is what it seems to be in Chopin’s short stories. As such, ...

“Cat in the Rain” by Ernest Hemingway

The title of the story “Cat in the Rain” by Ernest Hemingway carries an inner meaning besides its literal meaning of cat in the rain. Hemingway uses iceberg theory to fix a title for his story. The title has a meaning outwardly and has a deep meaning behind it. Even though, the story says the incident when a cat caught in the rain, the protagonist of the story indirectly refers to the title by confronting the element of confinement that resembles the cat. Thus, the title signifies nothing but the American Woman. “Cat in the Rain has two points ...

Compare and Contrast

Introduction Marriage is an essential component of many societies, as it involves the union between two people in love with one another who would eventually create a family. As a form of social organization, marriage has become the subject of several controversies, with some outside of the purpose of romantic union. Notable pieces of literature attest to that fact, and this study aims to construct an analysis between two literary works – The Story of an Hour by Kate Chopin and A Marriage Proposal by Anton Chekhov, with both literary works establishing that marriage, as a social practice, has found ...

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Introduction

Marriage is an essential component of many societies, as it involves the union between two people in love with one another who would eventually create a family. As a form of social organization, marriage has become the subject of several controversies, with some outside of the purpose of romantic union. Notable pieces of literature attest to that fact, and this study aims to construct an analysis between two literary works – The Story of an Hour by Kate Chopin and A Marriage Proposal by Anton Chekhov. This study uses both literary works to establish ...

These two masterpieces “the Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin and “A Good Man is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’ Conner are a real picture of the time period when it was written. A Good Man is Hard to Find, is an example of gothic literature which portrays the background of slavery and Civil War, whereas, the historical background of The Story of an Hour is based on women’s behavior and the female desire for independence which was more preferred than love and marriage. It was a time when a typical American woman of the nineteenth ...

I was attracted to Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour” even before I read it. The title was enchanting on some deep level. The story of an hour is a unique turn of phrase, just because we do not usually think of units of temporal measurement as having a unique story to tell. The story explores love from different angles.

After reading it, it is clear that the story is not actually about an hour, but about what happens in that hour. Chopin writes with a beautiful prose. It is simple, but powerful. Her use of simile ...

Kate Chopin was born in Missouri and she has represented the rebellious spirit of her era. She led an unconventional lifestyle, which was depicted in all her writings and was the kind of woman who dared to stand up for her true beliefs and ideas. According to her biographers and literary critics, ‘Kate Chopin’s writing style was a result of her passionate love for the writing style of Guy de Maupassant.’(1996, Le Marquand). Chopin was influenced by Guy de Maupassant who wrote about people’s everyday lives, but she went a step forward. She created her own ...

Readers find many ways to understand the literary works; one of such way would be to comprehend the themes and corresponding these literary works. In addition to it, a read has many choices to analyze and comprehend the themes and corresponding in a story or a poem. This paper focuses on literary devices that can be utilized by the author R. Wayne Clugston, in “Journey into Literature”. From this, literary work of the author two short stories has been selected for themes and corresponding works. The literary writers in the 19th century were very few. The women who wrote ...

The Story of an Hour is an acclaimed literary work by Kate Chopin. Kate is well known for writing story emphasized on freedom or independence of women during the 1890s. Kate’s works were written before any feminist movement was begun. During that time women were considered as property of their husband. This fact impacted author on great way hence she emphasized on liberalization of women in her stories. Throughout the story of an hour, Kate utilizes various literary techniques to display forbidden joy of women’s freedom in male oriented society. Kate’s short story revolves around a ...

The two stories, “Hills like White Elephants” and “The Story of an Hour”, resonate around the feminist and Marxist ideas in unique and interesting ways. The stories are narrated from a third person with the authors keen to bring out capitalism and the ever present male chauvinism. It is this paper’s position that the two stories though within the same context, express different political ideology. The “Hills like White Elephants” appears to support the chauvinist approach in life while “The Story of an Hour” contends and disparages male chauvinism while promoting feminism. This paper shall analyze the political ...

‘Instructor’s name’

A Woman Bound by Gender Roles – the Feminist Voices in Short fiction Today we live in the so called post-feminist generation, yet, it can be said that, in today’s society, it is easier being a man than a woman. Even today, women are discriminated against in certain jobs, forced to obey obsolete religious doctrines, refused basic rights in many societies, and are generally expected to put their families first, sometimes at the cost of their individuality. If things are this bad today, then they were much worse in the nineteenth and early twentieth century. Historically, literature has always ...

Section

The women protagonists in "the story of an Hour" by Kate Chopin, "The Chrysanthemums" by John Steinbeck and "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner are deeply repressed. In “The Story of an Hour”, Mrs. Mallard received the inaccurate shocking news of her husband - Brently Mallard’s death in a railroad accident (Chopin, 213). In the second story "The Chrysanthemums" Elisa, a young married woman who works in an isolated farm is proud of her skills in growing flowers. Her attempts to communicate with the outside world end up in disappointment through the mockery subjected to her by ...

Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour” is a short story that begins and ends with heartbreak. The story begins with the news that Mrs. Louise Mallard's husband, Mr. Brently Mallard has died. Mrs. Mallard, who suffers from heart trouble, reacts to this news rather unusually, unlike how a normal woman would, and secludes herself in her room. What follows are some vague descriptions and Mrs. Mallard’s frequently joyful exclamations of finally being free and being able to live herself for herself. Naturally, this makes readers wonder whether Mrs. Mallard was even happy with her marriage. However, ...

William Faulkner once said that “the human heart in conflict with itself” is the only subject that is truly worth writing about. There are many authors who have applied this advice to their characters throughout literature. From the complicated Nineteen Eighty-Four’s Winston Smith to the simplistic Sam I Am’s Sam, there are too many characters to name who spend the pages of their novel feeling in conflict with their own hearts. Two more examples of such characters are Bernard Marx, from Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World and Louise from Kate Chopin’s The Story of an ...

Literature possesses a vast territory for expressing meaningful human feelings, abstract emotions, or themes. Desperation and comfort is a common theme in literature, encompassed in short stories, poems and dramas and reflected differently through the mechanisms of each literary genres, the style of each literary piece or the personality of the authors. Various literary genres like short stories, poems or dramas, possess their unique mechanisms for reflecting the theme of desperation and comfort. Looking at Dylan Thomas’ “Do Not Go Gentle into that Good Night”, the poet uses techniques specific to poetry space for transmitting his desperate adversity to ...

Question 2.

In reading the stories “Hills like White Elephants” and “The Unicorn in the Garden”, the authors Ernest Hemmingway and James Thurber have introduced strong symbolisms. The first aspect to strike when reading both these stories is how the characters themselves are symbolic of life and death. In “Hills Like white Elephants”, the girl Jig, symbolizes life. She is the one who wants to have a baby. She wants to break away from the life of staleness where all she and her husband ever do is “look at things and try new drinks”. Instead she wants to welcome life – a ...

In “The Story of an Hour,” Kate Chopin presents readers with a view of marriage that is not very commonly heard of these days. After learning that her husband has died, Mrs. Louise Mallard, the main character of the short story, experiences the delight and glee of freedom instead of the depression and sorrow of having lost her life partner. Chop has chosen such a structure for her short story that seems to be well suited for its subject matter. The Story of an Hour by Kate Chopin is one of her most famous work because of how she ...

In “The Story of an Hour,” Kate Chopin strongly employs symbolism throughout the story to intensify the drama. The symbols fit the subject matter of the story perfectly. The short story contains several symbols that make the readers feel a sense of comfort, wellness, and wonderfulness in their mind, somewhat the same feelings that overcome Mrs. Mallard when she learns of the “news of her husband's death.” The symbols in the short story embody Mrs. Mallard’s sense of freedom from the moment she murmurs “free” to herself and intensify the story’s twist ending. The very first symbol ...

‘Desiree’s baby’, written by Kate Chopin, is one of the most anthologized and critically acclaimed short stories of the nineteenth century. First published in the year 1893, the story captures with vivid detail, the societal attitudes that prevailed during the dawning years of that century. It is set in the days where rich, White, plantation owners, had slaves working for them tirelessly, yet did not have the heart or will, to treat the blacks equally, despite the many laws that legally abolished slavery. African Americans were not the only ones, being discriminated and marginalized, but ...

It is widely believed that literature functions as a representative of the period in which it was conceived. More specifically, it is sort of a reminder of the moral values and principles upheld by the society of its era. Throughout the human history, many things have changed, some discovered and some evolved. But one thing has always been constant for the overwhelming majority of human history (at least what we know of it) - women were considered meek individuals, who were forced to bend towards the will of the men of their family and society. ...

Introduction

Females are often misunderstood both in real life and even in literature, this can be perceived from analyzing how the minor characters treat the main female characters in stories such as “The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin and “A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner. Reading the two stories create a notion that the society where the main female characters live in as well as the minor characters does not understand what the woman feel or think. The demonstrated treatment of the minor character towards the female characters suggests gender, sociological and psychological tendencies of neglect, death, ...

During the era after the Civil War, many authors started writing more about real life tales. These authors wanted to present life in an accurately realistic light. They particularly started writing about fate because they believed that everyone’s destiny was ruled by fate. The Story of an Hour by Kate Choplin, Eveline by James Joyce, and A Rose for Emily by William Faulkner were also written in the era after the Civil War. Even though these short stories were written by three different authors, it is surprising that the primary characters of these stories are female and have ...

Analysis of "The Story of an Hour" by Kate Chopin

"The Story of an Hour" by Kate Chopin contains a most unique theme of freedom within death. However, the miraculous and graceful way in which the character Mrs. Mallard meets freedom within death is exquisite. A sense of sadness is expected of a widow. Upon hearing of her husband’s passing Mrs. Mallard “wept at once, with sudden, wild abandonment” indicating that she was indeed mourning her husband. Yet, Chopin twists descriptive adjectives like new, delicious, joy, dream and free into the description of Mrs. Mallard’s experience to promote a sense of freedom within an event that should ...

Mel and female gender roles are often included in Kate Chopin's short stories, and at times the female characters in her stories tend to challenge these roles. In a majority of her stories, such as “Desiree's Baby”, “The Story of an Hour”, “At the Cadian Ball”, “The Storm, and “The Awakening”, the female character are shown to undergo a transformation from women who are dependent on their husbands, and weak to more independent and stronger women. The female characters are all examples of how women change throughout these stories while the men are the dominant hurdle that these women ...

“The Story of an Hour” stands out to be Kate Chopin’s most famous stories. Different critics and scholars have written various subjects and themes addressed in Chopin’s work. The story portrays the inherent conflict between social norms and the need for personhood. The story bears a short yet interesting storyline.

The protagonist, Louise, is informed of her husband’s death but later discovers he is alive after all. The story describes of how she endures a series of emotions after hearing her husband’s death, who is believed to have succumbed to a railroad tragedy. Her sister, ...

Abstract

This paper will analyse three of the literary elements – tone, point of view and symbolism - in Kate Chopin’s The Story of an Hour. Each of these elements will be analysed in turn so that their contribution to the overall meaning of the story can be assessed. These three elements have been chosen because they are crucial to a full understanding of the story and also because, as this paper will demonstrate, at certain points of the story they are closely interlinked: that the tone depends on the point of view, that the symbolism depends on the ...

The Story of an Hour by Kate Chopin

The Story Of An Hour is a short story that narrates the time that pass by between the moment protagonist, Louise Mallard, leans of the news that her husband died and later discovers that indeed her husband is still alive. Once she hears of her husband’s death, Mallard perceives herself as a liberated woman but her perceived joy is short-lived.

Symbolism

The troubled heart The heart trouble that Mallard suffers from depicts a woman’s perceived physical weaknesses. It further represents Mallard’s hesitancy regarding her troubled marriage and her need for freedom. Mallard’s heart illness is the ...

There are various approaches of women and feminism in the literature of the early 20th century. For depicting the feminine psych, authors use various literary devices for allowing readers to enter the mind of their characters. Susan Glaspell’s “Trifle” uses symbolism and irony for resenting her character, Mrs. Wright and for illustrating her hardships that drove her to murdering her husband. Moreover, after studying Glaspell’s “Trifle”, the manner in which she develops the narration indicates that she considers Mrs. Wright’s action as justified. Mrs. Wright, a character of the early 20th century, resembles Kate Chopin’s ...

The story of Louse Mallard, who dies of a heart condition from the surprise showing up of her presumed dead husband suggests a succesful conspiracy to cover up major issues in their marriage. The fact that Louise died concealing the abusive nature of her husband reveals the dreadful reality of women surviving in abusive relationships and opt to conceal the truth. This paper seeks to analyze Allen Stein's Women and Autonomy in Kate Chopin's short Fiction and Joseph Rossenblum's The story of an hour. Allen supports Kate Chopin efforts in revealing the reality of difficulties that women encounter in ...

“The Story of an Hour,” “I Want a Wife” and “Trifles” all touch on the subject of marriage and especially the role of a woman according to the standards set by society. They highlight the irony of married women, though sailing in the same boat that is marriage; all face the same problems all on their own. In the three stories, the importance of a woman is secondary to the man in the institution of marriage. Perhaps one of the more prominent themes in all the three books is how both genders identify with each other and their accepted ...

Kate Chopin, the author of the short stories, "The Storm" and "Story of an Hour," was a tremendously forward-thinking and feminist author - in both of these tales, marriage is viewed as a restrictive hold on the women who are the subjects of each story. In "The Storm," the desperate Calixta temporarily frees herself of her stifling marriage by engaging in a passionate love affair with a paramour from her past who finds himself in her house in the wake of a nasty storm. Meanwhile, in "Story of an Hour," a woman discovers that her husband has passed away, ...

Kate Chopin’s "The Story of An Hour" is one of her most celebrated works. It reflects the kind of life that women had to undergo in the 1880s male dominated society where women were expected to be highly subjective and any questioning of a man’s decision was actually considered to be a down casting act and anyone who did that was essentially considered to be an outcast. Mrs. Mallard, being a woman who suffered from a heart attack, experienced lots of difficulties in her life due to lack of freedom. She considered herself to be among the ...

I have chosen to examine four short stories whose characters are people with physical markings or mental disorders. People who have these traits are unusual and regarded as odd by "normal" people. Usually, they develop some mental powers and become able to achieve much more than people who have neither physical nor mental problems. Maybe these "marked" people achieve success because they believe in themselves, whereas, "normal", healthy people tend to be paradoxically more self-conscious which hold them back. However, they are always there to judge the challenged ones. The stories that were particularly interesting to me are: Roman ...

Nothing beats the joy of coming to terms with one’s identity. However, defining one’s identity is always a challenge, especially in the face of cultural restrictions. It also becomes more challenging when there are stereotypes that restrict chances of personal growth. In an attempt to overcome these challenges, and define their identity, some people may be forced to break ranks with their past. Although culture and stereotypes influence people’s way of life, the ability to define one’s identity lies with self. Culture has a great impact on how people define their growth. Through the beautiful ...

Cate Chopin in her book The Story of an Hour tells of a story of how repressive marriage can be especially to women. The protagonist of the story, Louise Mallard just gets the feeling of freedom right after she heard of his death, a thing that is not anticipated in any marriage whatsoever but her happiness about it makes the reader understand the fact that in as much as she was married and lived with him, she was never happy in the marriage. Freedom to Mrs. Mallard is only achievable in the absence of the other party therefore implying ...

In “The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin, describes the last hour in the life of Louise Mallard, who is trapped in an unhappy marriage with a husband she did not really love, but has a brief moment when it appears that freedom is at hand thanks to his untimely death. After all, this was an era when divorce was rare and social, economic and educational opportunities for women were very limited. All of Chopin’s women characters in her fictional work also shared a strong desire to escape from the constraints of Victorian marriage and family life. ...

The Story of an Hour by Kate Chopin is full of irony and incongruity in the feelings of the main character Mrs. Mallard. Marriage is shown as constraining and her desire for freedom and independence is expressed vividly. Her public demonstration of sadness at her husband’s death stands in stark contrast to the ‘monstrous joy’ she feels at the thought of having a ‘Body and soul free!’ The narrator describes the emotions of Mrs. Mallard with powerful and vibrant words. The character has a deep inner life with a lot of desires, feelings and emotions. The thoughts she ...

The first essay answers questions regarding Kate Chopin’s short story “The Story of an Hour,” where the ending offers more than a small shock as to how and why the female protagonist dies. She does feel a joy that kills, but unfortunately, it is not the joy that ended her life, rather it was the cruel taking away of a joyful life that she intended on living after her husband’s death. The second essay deals with questions regarding Shirley Jackson’s equally shocking story “The Lottery,” which gives a frightening portrayal of what happens when people blindly ...