Reflection- Kate Chopin's "The Awakening"

For this reflection, we were supposed to read an excerpt from the novel The Awakening by Kate Chopin.  The part of this novel in our book was very short, but I think I understand it enough to write an entire three-hundred and twenty-five word reflection.  Before the excerpt of the story, I read the "Before You Read" on realism and the life of Kate Chopin.  Kate Chopin is known for her writing because she is considered to be the first American woman who "frankly (wrote) about the suppressed passion and discontentment" of women in their confined state of their roles.  During this time--which is the Civil War time period--women had a very specific role in society.  They were supposed to be very delicate and ladylike and extremely sensitive to things like sunlight and curse words.  As I have said in previous reflections, my favorite movie in the whole wide world is Gone With the Wind.  From watching the movie so many times and from knowledge I already knew, I was able to understand The Awakening.  Kate Chopin was making the point of opening up the curtains of the sheltered woman's life and talking about how unsatisfying it really was.  Women were just expected to smile and go along with everything that their husbands.  I think that it was awesome that a woman like Kate Chopin had the guts to speak out for women.  The woman in the excerpt from her story is crying and wants to be by herself.  It seems, to the reader, that she is finally breaking down from all the stress of life.  I am sure her husband had said something sexist without knowing it (because that was normal at the time) and it was just the straw that broke the camels back.  Having a husband back then must have been horrible!  You never really married for love, and the men just expected the women to do everything and were worth nothing and had no idea about anything.  I know for a fact that I am no feminist or anything--frankly, the annoy me so much--but that would not have been fair.  I am all for equality between people, no matter race or gender.


Wilhelm, Jeffrey D., Douglas Fisher, Beverly Ann. Chin, and Jacqueline Jones. Royster. Glencoe Literature. New York: Glencoe/McGraw-Hill, 2009. Print.