by Kate Chopin
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
"When she abandoned herself a little whispered word escaped her slightly parted lips. She said it over and over under her breath: "free, free, free!""
Kate Chopin's The Story of an Hour details the moments preceding her death. I first realized the story was describing the moments leading up to her death after reading the aforementioned quote. The repetition of the word "free" is a poetic device alluding to the perceived feeling of being liberated from worldly concerns that occurs when one dies -- the escape of the spirit from the body at long last, if you will. As I delved farther into the short story, my conclusions regarding the plot of the story were affirmed. On the last page of the story, once again separation of body and soul are referenced: "Free! Body and soul free!"
The very last paragraph of the story spins an ironic tone to the piece as we realize that her husband had indeed survived; yet, it was only when the wife learns news of this did she actually die. It was the extreme shock of learning her husband was not dead that killed her. This is entirely contrary to the way one would expect the short story to end: with the wife dying slowly from the misery incurred after learning of her lover's passing.
It is thus highly ironic that instead of dying from a "broken heart" (resulting from her husband's passing), she died from a heart attack that was induced from such extreme joy learning that he, indeed, had survived. The closing sentence explains my conjecture, when Chopin writes, "when the doctors came they said she had died of heart disease -- of the joy that kills." The main character dies directly after experiencing such intense joy that she was not prepared to handle in her troubled emotional state.
No comments:
Post a Comment