some realistic fiction discusses relevant social issues what important social issue does Kate chopins The story of an hour primarily focus on is given below
Explanation:
“The Story of an Hour” is Kate Chopin’s short story about the thoughts of a woman after she is told that her husband has died in an accident. The story first appeared in Vogue in 1894 and is today one of Chopin’s most popular works.
“The Story of an Hour” characters
- Louise Mallard
- Brently Mallard: husband of Louise
- Josephine: sister of Louise
- Richards: friend of Brently Mallard
“The Story of an Hour” time and place
The story is set in the late nineteenth century in the Mallard residence, the home of Brently and Louise Mallard.
“The Story of an Hour” themes
Readers and scholars often focus on the idea of freedom in “The Story of an Hour,” on selfhood, self-fulfillment, the meaning of love, or what Chopin calls the “possession of self-assertion.”
When Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour” was written and published
It was written on April 19, 1894, and first published in Vogue on December 6, 1894, under the title “The Dream of an Hour,” one of nineteen Kate Chopin stories that Vogue published. It was reprinted in St. Louis Life on January 5, 1895. The St. Louis Life version includes several changes in the text.
You can find out when Kate Chopin wrote each of her short stories and when and where each was first published.
What critics and scholars say about “The Story of an Hour”
-A great deal has been written about this story for many years. The story is “one of feminism’s sacred texts,” Susan Cahill writing in 1975, when readers were first discovering Kate Chopin.
“Love has been, for Louise and others, the primary purpose of life, but through her new perspective, Louise comprehends that ‘love, the unsolved mystery’ counts for very little. . . . Love is not a substitute for selfhood; indeed, selfhood is love’s precondition.” Barbara C. Ewell
“Mrs. Mallard will grieve for the husband who had loved her but will eventually revel in the ‘monstrous joy’ of self-fulfillment, beyond ideological strictures and the repressive effects of love.” Mary Papke
Kate Chopin “was a life-long connoisseur of rickety marriages, and all her wisdom is on display in her piercing analysis of this thoroughly average one.” Christopher Benfey
“In the mid- to late 1890s, Vogue was the place where Chopin published her most daring and surprising stories [‘The Story of an Hour’ and eighteen others]. . . . Because she had Vogue as a market—and a well-paying one—Kate Chopin wrote the critical, ironic, brilliant stories about women for which she is known today. Alone among magazines of the 1890s, Vogue published fearless and truthful portrayals of women’s lives.” Emily Toth
Her husband’s death forces Louise to reconcile her “inside” and “outside” consciousness—a female double consciousness within Louise’s thoughts. Though constrained by biological determinism, social conditioning, and marriage, Louise reclaims her own life—but at a price. Her death is the result of the complications in uniting both halves of her world. Angelyn Mitchell
Louise Mallard’s death isn’t caused by her joy at seeing her husband’s return or by her sudden realization that his death has granted her autonomy. She dies as a result of the strain she is under. The irony of her death is that even if her sudden epiphany is freeing, her autonomy is empty, because she has no place in society. Mark Cunningham
Louise’s death is the culmination of her being “an immature and shallow egotist,” Lawrence Berkove says. He focuses on the scene in Louise’s bedroom and points out how unrealistic her notion of love is. Her death, he writes, is the only place that will offer her the absolute freedom she desires.
