Week 8
I chose Gender criticism and “the story of an hour”
In the short story, “The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin, the protagonist, Mrs. Mallard, is an oppressed woman; looking through the lens of the gender criticism. The fact that she is mentioned in the very first sentence of the short story speaks to when the story takes place as well as to her personality. “Knowing that Mrs. Mallard was afflicted with a heart trouble, great care was taken to break to her as gently possible the news of her husbands death”. The story is already speaking to how weak she, a woman, is. As a reader I am left anxious to read on why it is that she needs the news to be put to her gently, could it because she’s weak? Or she doesn’t take news well? Or she is fragile? There are a lot of possibilities that it could be. An opening line like that speaks about the character of the protagonist and leaves the reader with an impression. In this instance it is that women are weak.
However there are instances of literal irony in the way the author describes her such as “She was young, with a fair, calm face, whose lines bespoke repression and even a certain strength”. That seems to be on the complete opposite side of the spectrum from the Mrs. Mallard of the quote prior than the most recent. The Literal irony is in that she is said to be strong on the outside and seen as weak on the inside. If she were so strong on the conclusion of the story would be a lot different. If she was so weak how did she have the strength to not collapse into pieces in front of the people when she was told? Ironic.
The conflict that Mrs. Mallard find herself in is this; she can not comprehend the devastating news of her husbands death, the gravity of it drives her to the point were she is looking for anything to help her. She is looking for anything to take the pain away. That is why she does not object the spirit that approaches her through the window. The author mentions, “Now her bosom rose and fell tumultuously” because of the spirit that she felt in the air.
The crisis of the story is that she has a poor ultimatum. Her options are; fall apart and die, or get it together and hope to find love again. Being the weak woman that she is, she can not hold herself together to get through this, but if she could than she would have a real shot at finding another life partner. Because it is possible, after all she is a young lady with fair skin, it’s not like she’s a 55 year old widow who now must give up.
The objectification of women seems to be shown in the story as well. The author gives her no lines in the story so Mrs. Mallard never speaks for herself, rather the only thing we know of Mrs. Mallard is what the author has told us about her. That is interesting when you think about the fact that the author of this novel is a woman. Perhaps that means that at the point of history when this story was written, even woman recognized other women as objects.
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