Story Of An Hour -character Analysis Essay, Research Paper

Victoria Hubble October 14, 1999

Character Analysis

Essay #4

?The Story of an Hour,? by Kate Chopin is an ironic story because, Louise

Mallard realizes the independence that she gains from her husband?s death. The

moment she realizes this freedom, and is willing to take this new way of life into her

arms, her husband returns, and she dies. Mrs. Mallard has a revelation of all these

liberations she was going to live with, and within minutes, came to realization of her

confinement.

Louise Mallard?s initial reaction to her husband?s death was one that any

normal person would have except it is characterized by the happiness that overcomes

her as the story develops. Although she is upset about the news of her husband?s

death, she comes to the realization of a completely different lifestyle that she has

never known before. Independence or freedom are the major differences between her

life before and her life now. She felt content with her life before, simply because she

didn?t know any different. She always had someone else?s will pushed against her own,

whether it was her father or her husband, she has always had someone to control her

life for her. As she undergoes this incredible emotional breakthrough, a great amount

of weight lifts off her shoulders because she felt how much her opinion impacted

others , and at the same time, she realized that she didn?t have to listen to someone

else?s opinions or outlooks on anything.

This new emotional insight is a major turning point in Louise?s life and it is

quickly changed by the trauma of her husband?s return. Mrs. Mallard realizes that

she now has the ability to live her own life. This realization suffers a drastic change

when Brently Mallard, her husband walks in the door. The exorbitant change comes in

when she recognizes that this freedom she has been anticipating is no longer a

reality. She is in extreme shock because she was reborn to a new way of life and it was

stripped away from her immediately once she acknowledged that she had to live her

life with someone else again. She felt like the efforts of her entire transformation of

herself was done all for nothing and she might as well die.

?The Story of an Hour? deals with rebirth, emotional breakthrough, and

extreme shock. The character Louise goes through these emotions in the period of an

hour, as if it were a process. She changes from a woman who is treated like broken

china, to a woman who walks like a goddess. And the irony of it all is, when she has

embraced her freedom and the glory of the years before, her husband returns, and

the shock and disappointment kills her.