Word Choices - AP English Literature - Blog

Is Edna Awake? Or Did She Go Back To Sleep?

While reading the first couple chapters of The Awakening,  I found it hard to stay awake. Much like most of the characters, I felt languish sluggish and languid. The tone of the beginning reminded me of the tide. Kate Chopin often makes reference to the sea, and the beginning of the had the pace of a tide: slow, lazy, and repetitive. 

Edna was often found going to sleep and taking long naps. She was asleep during the times when she played her housewife role. When she was still acting as a domestic societal housewife, she was always falling asleep. She was almost dormant. Once Edna started becoming more aware of her independence, the tone of the novel changed. Edna wasn't falling asleep every other page. Edna was alive and always doing things! She painted, gardened, and glowed on long walks in town.

Sleep became a motif of her oppression and the addictiveness of her role. Now that Edna seemed free of her oppression, she stopped having to take long naps and sleep all throughout the day!

The ending of the novel is what intriuges me the most. Edna is fully awake in that she is fully independent. Other than the manipulating seducting sea, there is no one controlling her or pushing her in a role that she does not wany to play. She is a complete individual. She is fully awake and conscious of her independence. 

But in a way, is she falling back asleep? Literally, she is going into a very long sleep by committing suicide. This is ironic because she is conscious of her role and independence, but her conscious self chose to go back to sleep. Why would we she choose to die? To go to sleep? 

Lastly, is Edna actually free? In the end, the sea turns into a manipulating seductress who curls over her ankles like snakes(115). Is she actually independent or is nature controlling her fate? Is she even awake at all?

Oppression by Drowning

I am having trouble seeing what makes the ending of The Awakening a positive thing for feminism. Pretty much every way that you look at it, Edna going out and trying to be herself aside from the harsh stipulations that an oppressive society provided ends with her eventual  destruction. As a critique on the situation that women in the victorian era were forced to live in, the only positive point might be that Edna was just before her time? Is the story just saying that victorian women could not be progressive, it would ultimately lead to isolation and inevitable destruction?

Aside from that I think that Edna's suicide was the worst possible way that the story could have ended. Especially because she did it right after Robert left her forever. That act implies woman's dependence on male relationships and the story becomes less about her and more about her relationship with Robert with her ill- timed drowning. Not only is killing herself extremely selfish as thinking about her children is brought into the picture, it just seemed like an attempt to escape as she swam out. Is that a point, that escape from the roles women held in the victorian era is impossible beyond actual physical death? How disheartening! I really am not a huge fan of the ending, however poigniant it may have been.

"Accidental" Death

Yesterday in class we had a discussion about whether or not Edna's suicide was premeditated or not. Some people raised the argument that it was accidental, that she didn't realize how far out she was until she couldn't get back. The point was also raised that she had told Victor she would come back for lunch, so it was clear she did plan on returning from her swim.

Personally, I interpreted it as completely planned. She said on more than one occasion that she would sacrifice her body for her children, but not herself. Since her children were forcing her to remain a part of the society she so wished to be free of, the only way out for her was through suicide. The only reason she told Victor she would come back is so that her children's reputation would be saved from the stain of having a crazy mother.

So did she plan her own death? Or was it accidental?

Kate Chopin and Feminism

Kate Chopin bravely exposed an attitude of feminism to an unprepared society in her novel The Awakening. Chopin defied societal assumptions of her time period and wrote the novel using attitudes of characters in regard to gender, changes in the main character, imagery and Edna's suicide to illustrate her feminist position.

Society during Chopin's time period believed women to be a weak, dependent gender whose position lay nothing above mothering and housework.

Chopin relays the basic attitudes of society toward women mainly through her characters Leonce, Edna, Madame Ratignolle, and Madame Reisz. She uses Leonce and Madame Ratignolle to portray examples of what was considered acceptable in society. However, Chopin includes the contrasting characters of Edna and Madame Reisz in an effort to express urges and desires disguised by the female gender.

Just as Edna did not conform to the standards of her peers, Kate Chopin rebelled against her own peers by writing the novel, The Awakening. She uses attitudes of characters in her novel toward gender, changes in Edna and her suicide to possibly express her own feminist attitudes. 

The Moment of Awakening

While many people are blogging about the frustrating ending of "The Awakening", I'm choosing to concentrate on a moment in the book that I thought to be one of the most groundbreaking realizations made by Edna. It occurs on page 56 at the beginning of the third paragraph. In this paragraph, after visiting Madame Ratignolle, Edna has a sudden epiphany that the life which women were expected to live was not the life for her. It reads:

Edna felt depressed rather than soothed after leaving them. The little glimpse of domestic harmony     which had been offered her, gave her no regret, no longing. It was not a condition of life which fitted her,     and she could see in it but an appalling and hopeless ennui.

I think that this is the moment that Edna has truly "awoken". She is realizing that she is perfectly content with living outside of the restrictions that society has placed on women. She doesn't need all of these things that society tells her that she needs, and she doesn't have to act the way society tells her to act. Now although she does realize this, she does not fully act on this realization until the very end of the novel.  

 

 

Even More Existentialism?

Maybe I'm reading too far into everything that we've discussed this far in class, but The Awakening definitely is giving off some existential vibes. To me, the basic concept of existentialism is a citizen of a society becoming an individual primarily based upon them breaking free from the societal constructs that have been imposed upon them and doing the things that they truly want to do. The novel primarily focuses on Edna's struggle with her emotions and reactions when dealing with her considerations of marital infidelity. Although she recognizes that her surrounding society greatly looks down upon the ideas that she is formulating, Edna finds great satisfaction in her secret love, feeling joy and new freedom after she has expressed it. Through loving who she wants, Edna is able to break free from the societal norms and explore new uncharted paths. However, inevitably the pressure of society is too much for her and she is forced to take her own life. With an existentialist mindset, Ednas' struggle seems to be based primarily on her desire for individuality within a stifling societal construct. Had she been able to find an escape from the ideas harshly imposed upon her, she would have no doubt relished in the freedom that it would have allotted her, and thus not been led to death.

Kate Chopin

Kate Chopin was born February 8th, 1850 in St. Louis, Missouri. Her father, a successful businessman died when she was four. Chopin had two brothers and two sisters. Both her sisters died in infancy, and both her brothers died in their early twenties. Since she didn't start writing until her forties, none of her family got to see her success.

When she was twenty, Chopin married her husband, Oscar Chopin, and moved to New Orleans until their cotton brokerage failed. At that time, Chopin was 29, one year after she had her sixth and last child. They all moved to Cloutierville to manage several plantations and a general store.

When Chopin's youngest child was four, her husband died leaving the family with a modern approximation of $250,000 in debt. Chopin was reported to have flirted a great deal with men of the neighborhood, and may have had an affair with a married farmer.

Unfortunately, she was unable to run the plantations and the general store by herself, so she was convinced by her mother to return to St. Louis where money was no longer a concern. A year later her mother died. As a result, Chopin fell into a state of depression. A local doctor convinced her that writing could be very therapeutic.

In her early 40s, Chopin was writing short stories and articles, appearing in publications such as the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. She wrote her first novel in 1890, then her second and last novel, The Awakening, in 1899. Since The Awakening included many feminist themes, Chopin was discouraged from writing novels and continued with short stories until her death in 1904 from a brain hemorrhage. 

Individuality or Irresponsibility?

What struck me, and most of my class, the most about Edna's suicide was not pity for a character who felt she had no other option to happiness except death, but incredulity at her total disregard for how her actions affected others. 

Throughout The Awakening, Edna treats her children similarly to how she treats most of the men she knows. While she loves them from time to time, she resents how they limit her freedom. Admittedly, she did not have much of a choice in her marriage, or becoming a mother, but their existence is not the fault of the children. Edna looks at her suicide as a way to escape her responsiblities as a mother and fulfill her own desires. 

Each action people take or choice they make has some sort of influence over the people around them. This scene brings up an interesting question of where, exactly, to draw the line between when one's responsiblity to the people they affect should trump his or her desire for self-fulfillment. In Edna's case, was it right for her to abandon her children in order to liberate herself from her identity crisis? In general, should we consider how our decisions affect the well-being of others? The emotions of others? 

This question is one that has been disputed by philosophers decades ago and my friends just last week. While there is probably no definitive solution, actively thinking about where I fall on the continuum - between valuing actions affecting my self-interest versus the well-being of others - has helped me better understand myself and those around me.

A different ending?

While reading The Awakening I found myself starting to like the book. Edna was her own person and I respected her for that. I have to admit that I was very excited when Robert came home as well as shocked and sad when he left (I got a little too attached to the book). I definitely did not see the end coming and, though some people had said it was an obvious conclusion to the book, I honestly thought Edna would keep living her life to the fullest instead of committing suicide. What did you guys think the ending would be like?

Possession

In the time that Edna and Robert spend apart, Edna stops thinking of herself as a "possession" and starts thinking of herself as an individual who does not have to be forced to do things. Edna tells him that "I am no  longer one of Mr. Pontellier's possessions...I give myself where I choose" (108). On the other hand, Robert still has the notion that women are possessions of their husband. This is explained when Robert tells Edna that he had a dream that "men set their wives free" (108).

This difference in belief plays a role in breaking Edna and Robert apart, because Robert thinks that the reason that the two of them cannot be together is because currently Edna is property of Leonce, not because of love. On the other hand, Edna sees the relationship as her way of being independent and free from social conventions.

Basically Edna tries to escape her marriage where she is viewed as property, only to end up in another relationship where the man once again views her as property. This confuses me in regards to what Chopin is trying to tell us, because it seems like Chopin is saying that women can't escape being regarded as property in a relationship, which is an odd thing to say in a novel that can be viewed through a feminist lens.

Women: Oiling the Machine of Conspicuous Consumption

    Since our in-class discussion about Veblen's ideas on conspicuous consuption, I've been thinking about how awful and ironic it is that women, such key victims of the system are some of the primary engines behind it. Clearly, women from early times have been posed to be trophies. Their looks and structure are subject to unwarranted evaluation by men who seek them as ornamental additions to their belongings- additions which the size of her hands or the flutter of her eyelashes can determine. As Benjamin explained, these women end up as the object in the subject-object relationship, which makes them unequal to men and, more importantly, makes it both the women's and the men's responsibility to change that.

    But instead of being an indignant force of suppressed people, women keep the relationship- keep the mechanism in charge of their abuse- on its feet. Useless and leisurely tasks such as the ones Veblen described have skyrocketed in the past century. Martha Stewart, the Home Improvement Channel, and the Fashion Industry, in my opinion, are major culprits. Besides this, women continue to seek reinforcement on their appearance, and men continue to provide it, conditioning themselves to place value in appearances. And while, yes, there are counterexamples to all of these- men who enjoy scrapbooking, men who value women for who they are, and women who judge men for their looks, I still retain that women as a whole think that their appearances matter more than men do. If you don't believe me, check out recent plastic surgery statistics.

    I will go further by saying that the recent trends of social materialism especially present in the female population, have progressed conspicuous consupmtion in ways that Veblen could never have dreamed were possible. Honeslty, when was the last time you heard a story of a male shop-aholic or a news report about men fighting over a Black Friday sale at 4am? Both of my parents are equally un-artistic, yet why does the idea of my dad redecorating our house frighten me much more than the idea of my mom redecorating it? While men still value their property, I believe that the overal male worry about the detail and quality of their things has gone down in the past century, while women's has gone up. I have never seen a man relish his belongings and the stately condition of his house the way Leonce in the Awakening did. It's as if this responsibility of upholding the system of conspicuous consumption has been transferred to women. Suddenly, in this transfer she possesses a new basic fuction as a partner: to take care of children, to manage the household and do womanly things, to provide sex, and to oil the machine that stops her from becoming anything more.

The Easy Way Out

When first reading the ending, I was astonished. Edna had just had a reasonably normal conversation with Victor and there was no indication, to me, that she was in the state of mind of killing herself. While we find out that Edna had thought of this prior to actually doing it, unlike Meursault, I do not feel comfortable with her reason why she killed herself. I think that she is just taking the easy way out, as cliché as that sounds, but it’s true. Edna is tired of the guilt she has for her children and specifically states that she knows how to get out of that guilt, suicide. I think that this ending also undermines the whole feminist view to this book because she is giving up her goal of becoming an individual. It also shows that although she might love her children, she also hates them enough to kill herself. She blames them for her confinement and inability to truly become free

 

Political Incorrectness & Decoy Motifs.

I found it very interesting when Mr. Heidkamp brought up race and how it is represented in The Awakening.  Chopin seems really removed and uncomfortable with the topic of race. She mentions black house servants several time throughout the book, referring to them as "negro" and "darky."  It's as if she didn't know how to portray them as real people, and therefor fails to give them personalities.  I've never read a novel where a black person was referred to as a "darky," and it makes me as uncomfortable reading it as I'm sure Chopin was writing it. I didn't see it in Frederick Douglass's narrative & I didn't see it in Huck Finn, either- and if you'd expect to find language like that anywhere, that's where it'd be.

 

Another thing I found bothersome was that Chopin made the lady in black a recurring image, but never took the character or idea of her in any direction or gave her presence any meaning.  Sure, she was always one step behind the lovers, always clad in black, but the question I have is why?  I'm sure she was there for a reason, but what exactly does she represent?  I always thought she was some sort of bad omen, but nothing ever became of her.  

A Solitary Soul

This week in our groups, when I was the contextualizer, I found some very interesting information.  Before being published, The Awakening, was to be published under the title, A Solitary Soul.  No one knows for sure why it was changed, but it is speculated that Chopin's publisher changed it.

That being said, I wanted to discuss both titles.  A Solitary Soul, really captures how Edna feels throughout the novel.  She feels alone in her emotions towards Robert and her desire for independence.  Once she moves back into the city, she spends most of her time alone, which really contributes to her feelings of solitude.  The Awakening, however represents the transformation Edna has during the novel.  She goes from a submissive, passive wife to a relatively independent woman.  In some ways I think it emphasizes the feminist ideas Chopin is trying to get across better.  Still the originally title sounds less cliche.

Which do you think is better?

Women Shouldn't Read

There are a lot of gender ideas in The Awakening, and sometimes reading about submissive wives annoyed me. To me, however, the most annoying event in the whole book was when Robert and Edna were at the small coffee shop and "He looked at Edna's book, which he had read; and he told her the end, to save her the trouble of wading through it, he said" (107).

This small action angered me so much that I put the book down and texted my friend that Robert was a jerk. Even if I look past the idea of ruining the ending of a book that you know someone is reading, which is pretty unnacceptable, the language used to justify his action implies that women struggle to read. He wanted to spare her the "trouble" of "wading" through the book. Not the time commitment of reading, but the immense struggle a woman must go through to read. In other words, reading is another activity just for men, and if a woman tries it, she will ultimately get bewildered and will need rescuing by a man.

Every time I reread "wading through it," I get more upset at Robert. I might be overthinking this small scene, but to me it feels like Robert is enforcing the inferiority of women and the idea that they need a man's help with everything.

The Sexy Sea

While in class, my group briefly touched upon the idea of Edna's description of the sea right before the end. Edna states, "The touch of the sea is sensuous, enfolding the body in its soft, close embrace" (115). Now, throughout the book there were descriptions of the water that personified it into a sexy, living thing. But I found this line to mean a little more than the usual for Edna. On page 13 Edna says, "The voice of the sea is sensuos, enfolding the body in its soft, close embrace." The only difference between these lines is 'touch' and 'voice'. In the beginning of the story, Edna is listening the water, listening to Madame Ratignolle, listening to her husband, listening to Robert flirt. She has not yet changed her ways and continues to be the perfect house wife while the meer inkling of a different life is tickling the edges of her thoughts with general disregard. Edna does not do anything to tempt the 'sexiness' (of the sea or Robert), and while she embraces the freedom of the water and its appeal, she pushes Robert away, with casual ignorance of any love. And then, she changes. Very slowly at times with steps backward, but eventual removal from her past self. Then she touches the passion; the sexiness; the unsociable with her affair with Adolin and then Robert. She finally touches freedom instead of just listening to it. At the end, the significance of fully immersing herself in the sea, naked, shows Edna's release from that freedom. She completely lets herself go, all dreams and aspirations, into that "sensuous" sea.

Why This Ending?

In class today we discussed our different views on the ending of the awakening. Some people connected it to a statement about feminism and saying that it might have symbolized the ultimate power Edna had. I believe that this was a feminist statement in the sense that Edna is an example of how society and its expectations can slowly deteriorate someones sense or purpose and eventually they hit rock bottom. Chopin seems to be using this incredibly depressing tale to make a statement that deems society as something that just binds women from reaching their true potential.

Throughout the novel Edna has thrown hints at the reader that this ending might surface as the only answer to her misery. Edna always seemed to be unhappy that she could never be happy and appreciate what was given to her and what most women would kill for at her age. In the beginning of the novel everyone praises Leonce for being the perfect husband and Edna cannot understand why she doesn't feel over the moon about being his wife. Later in the novel Edna experiences a realization that sets her apart from the rest:

Edna felt depressed rather than soothed after leaving them. The little glimpse of domestic harmony which had been offered to her, gave her no regret, no longing. It was not a condition of life which fitted her, and she could see in it byr appalling and hopeless ennui (56).

Here Edna experiences a breaking point in the sense that she now realizes her life will never satisfy her because it does not fit her desires but this realization does not make her any happier than she previouslywas. It, in fact, just separates her further from the the outside world. In spite of this realization, she still cannot feel free and connected to the world she lives in and she resolves her problems by taking herself out of the equation.

The fact that she could not live as herself and still feel as if she is acknowledged as an individual in her society pushed her to suicide and I believe that is the statement that Chopin is making about our world. The way our society is structured, expecting so much restraint from our women is slavery for a women's soul and it will lead to our demise. 

Edna's Role in her Marriage

After applying Veblen's ideas of conspicuous consumption and conspicuous leisure to the Pontellier's marriage, it has become evident to me that Edna really did not have a role.  Her contrabution to their marriage was almost nonexistant, for instance, in terms of conspicuous consumption, Edna did not care to by useless objects.  In one instance, Mr. Pontellier asked Edna to accompany him in buying some new fixtures, but Edna refuses saying that they do not need anything else.  In the other sense, Edna refuses to partake in conspicuous leisure by going out on Tuesdays, there by not making herself free for other people to use.

Along with these, Edna also has no connection with her children.  Stereotypical mother's are viewed as being overly protective of their children and the main caregivers to their needs Edna, however, does not do this either, as there are always servants or quadroons who take the role of watching over the kids.  

Another thing worth noting, is that instead of the "woman's" role being left empty, Mr. Pontellier takes control of the "duties" and does them himself.  He goes out and buys a wedding gift for Edna's sister when she refuses to do so, and he constantly worries about how others will view his family's actions.

Edna, Meursault, and the Sun

Before Edna’s suicide (intentional or not) a particular line jumped out at me. She commented that she did not notice “anything special except that the sun was hot” (114). I immediately thought of Mersault’s comment about the sun’s heat, describing it as “cymbals of sunlight crashing on my forehead” (Camus 59). In both of these novels, the sun has been a central element in an ending of sorts. While Edna’s comment about the sun came at the end of the novel itself, Meursault’s came when his life as a free man was coming to an end.

While Edna was going to the beach while despondent, the sun was the only thing she noticed. While Meursault did not explicitly state the same thing, the sun was frequently in his thoughts and drove him to commit murder.

Coincidence? I think not.

The sun is an important motif in both novels, and although the novels were written during different time periods, the sun plays a similar role in both.

The Answer

Suicide was a really… well, a weird way to end this novel.  I did not expect that to be the end when I  tarted reading.  In the end Edna really embraces her inner existential feminism view of her life.  She knew that he was going to leave her husband and her children behind; she was really only thinking about herself.  She did not care what people would think of her.  In killing herself she finally had the relief that she needed since she was not happy with her life.  She was exhausted not only mentally, but  hysically.  She just kept swimming and even though she was tired, she had the stamina to keep going so she could finally let go to life.  Yes, that last sentence was weird but it is what happened to her.  For Edna suicide was really the only way to “fix” what was wrong with her life.

Awakening vs. Veblen

After reading the article by Veblen I found numerous correlations between the two readings. The fact that Edna had been forced to stay at home, and that Leonce did not like it when she left the house on a Tuesday, are also examples seen in Veblen's reading as he examples that the women is used to display the home's wealth. Veblen also mentions that women are the ones that must display the conspcious leisure in the home, which is when they display a waste of time or waste of money, and men cannot display this in the home because it would associate them with weakness. Based upon the reading for today, Edna has slowly started to realize just how much she is being oppressed by her husband, and it is clear that she wants to get out of the situation in some manner, although she is still not quite sure how yet. It is also very clear at this point that she is still thinking about Robert from the summer, especially based upon her reactions to the letters that she saw where Robert was subtly mentioning her.

Art

Edna takes up painting. She paints instead of caring for her children and gives up cleaning the house.  As Mademoiselle Reisz puts it, "To be an artist includes much; one must possess many gifts--absolute gifts-- which have not been acquired by one's own effort. And, moreover, to succeed, the artist must possess the courageous soul...The brave soul. The soul that dares and defines" (64).  Art is something that demands creativity and originality, but, most importantly, it requires a sense of self.  Edna is developing a sense of self.  She begins to do what she wants whenever she wants regardless of what expectaions are upon her.  Instead of caring for the kids and the house, she paints.  In reality as well, painters and artists in general are people driven by a sense of selfhood and create art based upon how they feel. They, I believe, have strong senses of who they are.  Edna is developing into one of these people and she takes up painting symbolically to show that she is a developing character. 

Kill Sexism

In The Awakening, Edna faces the stereotypes and gender roles women have faced throughout history. Her husband expects her to occupy a domestic sphere and thinks there is something mentally wrong with her when she acts independently. She is treated like an object. For instance, when she is sunburned Leonce looked "at his wife as one looks at a valuable piece of personal property which had suffered some damage" (2). Is the sexism Edna experiences still existent today?

 Women making career choices often consider factors like marriage and raising children before such factors are actually immediately relevant. Cleaning product commercials feature women doing the housework. Women are sexualized in the media.

Yet, I would argue that in the over a hundred years since The Awakening was published, sexism has been on the decline. I think the major difference is the decrease in power of gender-discriminatory stereotypes. Sure, women face stereotypes today, but they are not the same unwritten rules that applied to Edna. I may witness women doing housework on t.v., but that does not make me think that housework is the only option open to me in my future. There might be a shortage of powerful women today, but that can only be expected given a human history of discrimination towards women. I believe that with each successive generation, children will put less and less stock in the stereotypes that once were socially demanded norms. Sexism is not dead, but each new generation can take a step towards destroying it, by rejecting the discrimination that once was the norm.

Edna's First Steps

In The Awakening, the main character Edna comes to the audience as someone who is very held back almost as if she was a little girl still holding her parents hands. Edna expresses that she does not feel quite at home down in New Orleans and for some reason seems to be unhappy with a life many women would die for. Although Edna might have the perfect life in the classic Creole housewife's point of view, she was not acknowledged as a separate being apart from her husband and due to this Edna's personality is lost.

In our last reading, we see Edna start to take baby steps towards her freedom. As all of Edna's supposed friends and family are playing by the water, she takes the initiative to teach herself how to swim. This experience is liberating for Edna and almost appears to be her first steps.

But that night she was like the little tottering, stumbling, clutching child, who of a sudden realizes its powers, and walks for the first time alone, boldly and with over-confidence. She could have shouted for joy (27).

Swimming alone empowers Edna to take her first steps to becoming her own person. When she swims too far out that shows her over-confidence in a skill she seemed to just unlock. When others attempt to take away what she had worked so hard for, Edna's new found individuality stays strong: "'How easy it is!' she thought. 'It is nothing,' she said aloud; 'Why did I not discover before that it was nothing. Think of the time I have lost splashing the baby!'" (27). Edna's first strokes in the water seemed to give her a purpose that was all her own and she was not going to let anyone take the individuality she had just come upon.

As Edna swam out to her own world in the ocean with no ones help but by herself she began to take those first steps away from the people who were still holding her hand as if she was a child. In this novel, swimming serves as a stepping stone in Edna's life. She is not close to reaching her full potentioal, so now the question is: Will her detachment from others help her in her journey to find her identity or with the lack of someone else to acknowledge her individuality take her back to square one?

Hints Toward The Future

As mentioned in a previous comment of mine, while knowing that the book tells a story of marital infidelity (pretty clearly stated on the back), the several chapters that we have read hold incredible foreshadowing. The motifs of the sea and swimming, all have served as areas of focus. In numerous places the sea is referred to as sensual and inviting, and in chapter 6 is a direct cause of Edna's contemplation of her thoughts towards herself as an individual human being, defined as different from her typical gender stereotype. The use of such words as "seductive" and sensuous provide the reader with thoughts that lead towards the idea of Edna branching away from her husband, who appears to be far from any type of romantic persona in Edna's mind (13). Additionally, the motif of swimming also lends itself to a foreshadowing as she experiences such troubles with swimming at first, but eventually succeeds in freeing herself from her fear (27-28). When I first read those sections I immediately saw a parallel between her efforts to swim with her efforts to find happiness away her unhappy marriage, and with her success in swimming I can only assume that she will succeed in breaking away from her husband. Thus, these motifs propel the story forward and hint at possibilities of the work to come. Are there other instances of foreshadowing that you have seen so far?

The Naked Man

On page 25 of The Awakening, Edna Pontellier is so moved by the music, I thought I was misreading. She feels for the first time in a long time passionate emotion and evokes pictures in her mind of the music. Each song has its different picture, but the most important picture is the one of the naked man. The song was titled Solitude and I think that has a huge significance. The title itself has helped her picture this isolated, naked man on the seashore looking at a bird. Of the multiple motifs we were told about, this passage has 4, piano and music/seashore/bird/clothes. I am also pretty sure that it is not a coincidence that all four motifs are in the same passage. I think that Chopin is trying to tell the reader that Edna is having a huge intellectual upbringing in this passage. The music of Mademoiselle Reisz has given her one of her emotional feelings ever and she associates this emotion with a man. Possibly, she is not having that same emotion with Leonce and is longing for it and every deep emotion she has, she is reminded that Leonce is not giving her the same emotion so she has to come up with imaginary men to satisfy her emotion.

Sleepy

In class the other day, we were dicussing what one should look for when reading The Awakening.  One of the ideas brought up was sleep.  Through the first 16 chapers, it was brought up constantly.  Multiple times Edna is over come with feelings of sleepiness.  When she goes to church with Robert, she is so overcome she has to take a nap, stretching over many hours, while Robert waits for her in the hot summer sun.

I think Edna sometimes uses sleep as an excuse to avoid things.  Instead of attempting to stay awake during the service, she disrupts it by getting up and leaving.  This shows how much she didn't want to be there.  She later begins to do the same thing with swimming after she learns how.

Sleepy Edna

While reading the beginning chapters of The Awakening, I was able to interpret Edna Pontellier as a very lethargic woman. Not exactly a woman who is constantly sleeping, but more so her hypnotic personality and mental structure. 

At the beginning of the novel, Edna exists in a sort of semi-conscious state. She seems as if she doesn't exactly know what she wants and seems distant from the characters around her. For example, even Edna's stare was described in the story as, "if lost in some inward maze of contemplation or thought."

Although, we only know of present Edna. She may have not been this "lethargic" character throughout her whole life. When her history was mentioned, she had always been a romantic, enamored with a cavalry officer at a very young age, in love with a man visiting a neighboring plantation in her teens, and infatuated with a tragedian as a young woman. 

Her final marriage with husband Léonce Pontellier was considered an "accident" to her. She saw her marriage as the end to her life of passion and the beginning of a life of responsibility. I believe that this is the reason for her "sleepiness". Her passionate feelings and ambitions have banished and she is now unconscious to her own mentality. 

Robert Lebrun may change this. Even though she is denying his serious passion now, I believe she may realize that her fantasies and yearnings are only latent. Robert has the ability to rekindle her remarkable hidden passion, resulting in her mere awakening to reliving once again. 

Unconditional Love?

Throughout chapter 1-8, Mrs. Pontellier does not seem to take a very maternal position in the family. She does take care of her kids the same way any mother would but she seems to lack the most important ingredient...love. "She was fond of her children in an uneven, impulsive way. She would sometimes gather them passionately to her heart; she would sometimes forget them." (18) Edna is very detached from her children and husband and I think one of the reasons she acts detached is because she does not want to be in that relationship or be a part of that family all the time. On page 18, Chopin mentions Edna's irrational crush on the tragedian. It seems as though her feelings toward the tragedian got in the way of her feelings for her husband (if there are any?). Are her feelings for the tragedian the main cause of her detachment from her family? Or could it be Mr. Pontellier who is lacking in the husband department?

Robert

So far in The Awakening I have found Robert to be the most interesting character.  At first glance, he seems to be a sligh dog that persuades women into having affairs with him by staying at their side all summer long.  However,  this label may be inaccurate as new evidence arose after Mrs. Ratignolle warned Robert to "let Mrs. Pontellier alone," because she "might make the unfortunate blunder of taking you seriously" (19).  I found this interesting because the statement makes it seem as though Robert is actually no harm and simply takes pleasure in aiding the wives in their day to day activities.  In essence, his flirtacious personality is a joke.

Unfortunately my confidence in this idea was soon lost, as Robert responded to Mrs. Ratignolle's plea with anger, because he thinks she sees him as a clown or he is merely there for the women's pleasure.  This outburst revealed that Robert may in fact being trying to lure the women into cheating on their husbands and has been unsuccessful or secretive about it.  Their is evidence to support that Robert is trying to woo Mrs. Pontlelier, for example, "He once quietly rested his head against Mrs. Pontellier's arm.  As gently she repulsed him.  Once again he repeated the offense" (11). 

As of now I think it is unclear whether or not Robert has serious intentions about his flirting, but I'm sure that will be cleared up in the story eventually.  However if I have missed something I'd love to hear!