Writing Style in The Awakening Essay

The author’s tone can be found through the main protagonist’s diction and language. Edna speaks in a disapproving and saddened tone throughout the book when describing women’s roles in society. When Edna is asked by her husband to join him in celebrating her sister’s marriage she uses gloomy and a disapproving tone: “She won’t go to the marriage. She says a wedding is one of the most lamentable spectacles on earth.” This quote adds to the disapproving tone of the novel as Edna addresses her feelings about marriage to her own husband. The author also has her way of displaying her tone. The narrator discusses Edna’s feelings to the readers in the same saddened tone: "She could not have told why she was crying. Such experiences as the foregoing were not uncommon in her married life. They seemed never before to have weighed much against the abundance of her husband's kindness and a uniform devotion which had become tacit and self-understood." The narrator expresses Edna’s feelings by saying it in a sort of understanding and favorable way and not in a complaining way. This is an example of Chopin’s tone because Edna’s feelings about her husband is disapproving and she is starting to find her independence as a woman.

In order to help to get a point or idea across it is not uncommon to provide two stark contrasts to assist in conveying the point. Writers commonly use this technique in their writing especially when dealing with a story that concerns the evolution of a character. An example of such writing can be found in Kate Chopin's The Awakening. The novel deals with Edna Pontellier's "awakening" from the slumber of the stereotypical southern woman, as she discovers her own identity independent of her husband and children. In order to illustrate the woman that Edna can become in The Awakening, Chopin creates two opposing forces Adele Ratignolle and Mademoiselle Reisz for her best

At first, she is struck by the epitome of Creole wife that is Adele Ratignolle. Adele Ratignolle was widely considered “the embodiment of every womanly grace and charm” with “spun-gold hair...blue eyes...like nothing but sapphires...and lips like crimson fruit” (Chopin, 12). Golden hair, sapphires and crimson fruit are all products that can be owned and by using such words, Chopin is making a statement about the relationship between Adele and her husband: she is a commodity he owns. Adele is also described as being a talented pianist, yet even this is “on account of the children...because she and her husband both considered it a means of brightening the home and making it attractive” (Chopin, 27). Again, the characterization of Adele remains of the physical, the visual, the superficial through the diction of “brightening” and “attractive”. The fact that her opinion is lumped with her husband’s is also an important detail as through this passage. Chopin is demonstrating that Adele has a singular identity––as wife to a Creole––with a singular source of happiness––stemming from her children––and that if Edna were to choose this path, she would be expected to do the

7) She desired passion as expressed in her daydreams prior to marriage, “It was when the face and figure of a great tragedian began to haunt her imagination and stir her senses. The persistence of the infatuation lent it an aspect of genuineness. The hopelessness of it colored it with the lofty tones of a great passion.” (Chopin, ch. 7) But she had no passion in her life. “As the devoted wife of a man who worshiped her, she felt she would take her place with a certain dignity in the world of reality, closing the portals forever behind her upon the realm of romance and dreams.” (Chopin, ch. 7)

In the iconic debated novel “The Awakening”, Kate Chopin’s novel takes place in the Victorian Era, which is in the 19th- century, similarly the novel was published in 1899. Edna is depicted as a woman longing for more, a woman who was looking for more than just a life of complacency and living in the eyes of society. The story uses Edna to exemplify the expectations of women during this era. For example, a woman’s expression of independence was considered immoral. Edna was expected to conform to the expectations of society but the story reveals Edna’s desires which longed for independence in a state of societal dominance. Throughout The Awakening, Chopin’s most significant symbol,

Chopin's The Awakening is full of symbolism.  Rather than hit the reader on the head with blunt literalism, Chopin uses symbols to relay subtle ideas.  Within each narrative segment, Chopin provides a symbol that the reader must fully understand in order to appreciate the novel as a whole.  I will attempt to dissect some of the major symbols and give possible explanations as to their importance within the text.

Kate Chopin was a influential author that introduced powerful female characters to the american literacy world. She was most known for her brilliant book The Awakening. However at that time it received many negative reviews, causing the downfall of Kate’s writing career. Now the book is such a influential story that it is being taught in classrooms throughout the world. This essay will discuss Kate Chopin’s writing career and the impact her writing has on society.

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.

   Throughout her novel, The Awakening, Kate Chopin uses symbolism and imagery to portray the main character's emergence into a state of spiritual awareness. The image that appears the most throughout the novel is that of the sea. “Chopin uses the sea to symbolize freedom, freedom from others and freedom to be one's self” (Martin 58). The protagonist, Edna Pontellier, wants that freedom, and with images of the sea, Chopin shows Edna's awakening desire to be free and her ultimate achievement of that freedom.

In Kate Chopin’s novel, The Awakening a wife and a mother of two, Edna Pontellier, discovers her desires as a woman to live life to the fullest extent and to find her true self. Eventually, her discovery leads to friction between friends, family, and the dominant values of society. Through Chopin's use of Author’s craft and literary elements, the readers have a clear comprehension as to what the author is conveying.

In discussing content, like all great authors, Chopin use symbols and metaphor to allow us to look within the subtext of their works. And many of these symbols and metaphors work to build upon their style, heavily composed of irony. As these are discussed, the themes of the obligations of women in marriage and illusions of independence, will come forward.

    The Awakening, written by Kate Chopin, is full of ideas and understanding about human nature. In Chopin's time, writing a story with such great attention to sensual details in both men and women caused skepticism among readers and critics. However, many critics have different views with deeper thought given to The Awakening. Symbolism, the interpretation of Edna's suicide, and awakenings play important roles in the analysis of all critics.

Ranging from caged parrots to the meadow in Kentucky, symbols and settings in The Awakening are prominent and provide a deeper meaning than the text does alone. Throughout The Awakening by Kate Chopin, symbols and setting recur representing Edna’s current progress in her awakening. The reader can interpret these and see a timeline of Edna’s changes and turmoil as she undergoes her changes and awakening.

Chopin uses the first hand description of Adele from Edna as a literary comparison to previous descriptions of Adele, allowing insight into Edna’s own perceptions and changing world view.

Le mot juste, the perfect word, can be used to write any novel and the perfect sentence can be used to summarize any novel. There are many le mot juste Within the novella The Awakening by Kate Chopin, as it traverses many themes of oppression, transcendentalism, and women's rights. It is about a woman named Edna awakening from the slumber placed by society. Inside the novella contains many phrases about the state of women’s rights. One such phrase that stands out, or rather the lack of it makes it the perfect to summarize the novel. Within the pages of chapter 17 lies the sentence, “But her small boot heel did not make an indenture, not a mark upon the little glittering circlet” (Chopin 52). This one sentence is enough to summarize a good deal of Chopin’s novella The Awakening.