kate chopin
Kate Chopin woke people up to the feelings and minds of women writers in the nineteenth century by crossing forbidden borders of the Victorian Era. Author and feminist Kate Chopin was born on February 8, 1850, in St. Louis, Missouri. The American writer wrote the short story "The Story of an Hour" in 1894 (Toth 5). Chopin lived during the Victorian Era and was a first hand witness to the suppression women faced in the late nineteenth century. Unlike most women at that time, Chopin was far from a conformist (Petry 8). She showed increasing concern for women and she responded with scandalous writings dealing explicitly with love, sex, and marriage (Thomas 19). "The Story of an Hour" revolves around what goes through a person's head when informed that a close family member has died, in this case the husband. Upon hearing of her husband's death, Mrs. Mallard was faced with conflicting emotions that she does not quite understand. In this famous short story, Kate's refusal to be silenced is all too evident. Her well- thought out stories reflect her own life as well as her interest in female independence, male dominance, and issues of selfhood, during a time period in which it was unexpected and not always embraced with open arm
Moving to Louisiana had caused Chopin to grow up fast resulting in her great independence. Looking back on the critics changing views from outrage to admiration, it is easy to see how far we as a nation have come in accepting women as writers. Hearing the news of her husband's death in a railroad accident, Mrs. Mallard isolates herself in her room. Moving away from what she called home for 20 years would be a big step for Chopin, she now has to make her own decisions and learn of a whole new world miles away from what she calls home. She married Oscar Chopin in 1870 when she was 20 years old. The Sacred Heart was taught by nuns who educated their student's "to be knowledgeable, clear, and independent thinkers" (Toth 15). Another death in the family had caused Chopin to live life on her own as she was beginning to get used to. Oscar Chopin died when Chopin was only 32 years old. Women were molded into an ideal form from the time they were born, they were told how to dress, how to act and how they should speak. Mallard exhibits is the conscious and subconscious feeling that women hold towards men and their dominance over them especially in the nineteenth century. A contrast between what you think would actually happen during those times and what actually happens is being presented.
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