The Awakening

On publication, 'The Awakening' was almost unanimously condemned by literary critics. In the repressed atmosphere of late Victorian society, the story of a married woman who leaves the stifling control of husband and family to pursue independence and sexual fulfillment, was social and religious anathema. Chopin was expelled from the St Louis Fine Arts Club and the book removed from the shelves of the city's library. Later generations have been kinder. The realism, incisive social comments and honest depiction of both psychological tensions and female sexuality in 'The Awakening' are now all accepted as legitimate topics for a literary work. Kate Chopin's seminal book has become almost universally admired as a depiction of one woman's struggle for freedom, equality, and independence.

Annotation

An American classic of sexual expression that paved the way for the modern novel, The Awakening is both a remarkable novel in its own right and a startling reminder of how far women in this century have come. The story of a married woman who pursues love outside a stuffy, middle-class marriage, the novel portrays the mind of a woman seeking fulfillment of her essential nature.

Editorial Reviews

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Times

Kate Chopin is a pioneer in the treatment of sexuality in American literature… She does not speak only to women,but she speaks most powerfully about them.

Publishers Weekly

Chopin's (1850-1904) The Awakening, whose heroine rejects her husband and children as she indulges in solitude and in an adulterous infatuation, was embraced by the women's movement 70 years after its publication. Although they pale in comparison to the novel, these stories, which comprise Chopin's third and last short-fiction collection, serve to flesh out the Chopin oeuvre and deserve a place on women's studies syllabi. As in The Awakening , the author's social critiques here demythologize women, marriage, religion and family. A women escapes ``the incessant chatter'' of other females at a party and retires to the male domain of the smoking room, where she puffs on hashish and dreams of a love affair torn asunder. The perverse Mrs. Mallard revels in her newfound freedom when informed that her husband is a casualty of a train accident and dies of a heart attack when he shows up alive. Her fiance is wasted by illness and reeks death, and a repulsed Dorothea bolts; elsewhere, a monk is lured by the voice of a woman, a former intimate. And in a twist on the plot of The Awakening , a husband, plagued by suspicions of his late wife's infidelity, casts himself in the river.

About The Author:

Kate Chopin (1850–1904) was an author of short stories and novels, mostly of a Louisiana Creole background. She is now considered to have been a forerunner of feminist authors of the 20th century.