Plot and Character Analysis of The Story of An Hour by Kate Chopin - Essay Example

special attention given to just how the story is to be told, authors can open the story to a variety of interpretations illustrating the complexities of life during a particular period in history. A close examination of Kate Chopin’s short story “The Story of an Hour” illustrates how the written word can be a powerful representation of the weight of social constraints on women during this period in time. In this very short story, Chopin shows how her main character, Louise Mallard, was effectively dehumanized by the expectations of role fulfillment imposed upon her by her husband and her society.

The story begins by illustrating the perceived condition of Louise’s health as she reportedly has a weak heart. “It was her sister Josephine who told her, in broken sentences; veiled hints that revealed in half concealing” (Chopin). What her sister Josephine told her was that Louise’s husband was killed in a recent railroad accident, information that had been confirmed by a close family friend. Louise’s reaction to the news is remarked as somewhat surprising, but takes on greater significance later in the story.

“She wept at once, with sudden, wild abandonment, in her sister’s arms” (Chopin). From this point, there isn’t a great deal of physical action to the story. Louise retires to her room alone and sits in a chair looking out the window. As she reflects upon the news she has just received, Louise begins to see the remainder of her life in ways that might have been highly unexpected at the time. Instead of feeling that her life was over because her husband is dead, Louise begins to see her life as just beginning.

She will finally have a chance to make some of her own decisions. Although her life has been turned upside down, Chopin demonstrates through Louise’s thoughts that her world had already been upside down under the external conditions she’d been forced to accept and only now, with the death of her husband, was it righting