“Story of an Hour” Essay “The Story of an Hour”, by Kate Chopin, is a tale about a woman, Louise Mallard, discovering her husband perished in a railroad accident. Louise cried and went to her room, where she found peace in the fact that she was now “free”. She overcomes her tragedy only to walk downstairs and find her husband entering the house. In shock, Louise’s heart troubles ended her life at the sight of her not-so-dead husband. Her feelings throughout the story transition from sorrow into relief with great happiness. The traumatic incident, of her husband’s passing, was told to her in carefully chosen words due to her heart trouble, and she reacted the way any loving wife would at the sound of this horrific news; she was overcome with grief. “She wept at once, with sudden, wild abandonment, in her sister’s arms” (287). She went into her room to be alone. The narrator states “she sat with her head thrown back upon the cushion of the chair, quite motionless, except when a sob came up into her throat and shook her, as a child who has cried itself to sleep continues to sob in its dreams” (288). Then her mood began to change. She became emotionless with a “dull stare in her eyes” (288) as if in thought. The sorrow Louise felt slowly drifted away as if it were a leaf in the wind. Louise came to a great realization in the middle of the story which changed her perspective on the situation as a whole. She was happy. She no longer had such a colossal commitment to one person for the rest of her life. On page 288, she whispered under her breath one word over and over “free, free, free”. Suddenly, Louise was able to relax and breathe. “Her pulses beat fast, and the coursing blood warmed and relaxed every inch of her body” (288-289). She loved her husband, however, the thought of being by herself again was exciting to her and she realized the “possession of self-assertion” was really “the strongest impulse of her being” (288). Her sister, Josephine, was concerned that she had locked herself in her room with the intention of making herself ill, but Louise was “drinking in a very elixir of life through that open window” (289). She came out of her room to joyfully join her sister downstairs, but when she got there, her husband opened the door and Louise “died of heart disease---of joy that kills” (289). The mood drastically changes in the last paragraph to shocking disappointment. “The Story of an Hour” reflects women’s standards of the time where they had no power for themselves and had to rely on a man to lead their lives. The message is very powerful and is shown through the transitioning mood of the main character, Louise, as her emotional state goes from sorrowful to relief over the death of her husband. This single alteration in Louise’s state of mind portrays how she became free from the expectations set forth by society towards women and could independently live her life how she pleased.

Story of an Hour Essay

Related Documents

Recommended Documents

Description

Related Documents

Want to Download This Document?

Free up your schedule!

Take 5 seconds to unlock