A Pair of Silk Stockings

by Kate Chopin

BOOKS

Genres: Classics, Short Stories, Fiction, School, Historical Fiction, Feminism, American

Paperback

Published January 1, 2015

About the author

Kate Chopin was an American author whose fiction grew out of the complex cultures and contradictions of Louisiana life, and she gradually became one of the most distinctive voices in nineteenth century literature. Raised in a household shaped by strong women of French and Irish heritage, she developed an early love for books and storytelling, and that immersion in language later shaped the quiet precision of her prose. After marrying and moving to New Orleans, then later to the small community of Cloutierville, she absorbed the rhythms, customs, and tensions of Creole and Cajun society, finding in its people the material that would feed both her sympathy and her sharp observational eye. When personal loss left her searching for direction, she began writing with the encouragement of a family friend, discovering not only a therapeutic outlet but a genuine vocation. Within a few years, her stories appeared in major magazines such as The Atlantic Monthly, Vogue, and The Century, where readers encountered her local-color sketches, her portrayals of women navigating desire and constraint, and her nuanced depictions of life in the American South. She published two story collections, Bayou Folk and A Night in Acadie, introducing characters whose emotional lives were depicted with unusual honesty. Her short fiction often explored subjects others avoided, including interracial relationships, female autonomy, and the quiet but powerful inner conflicts of everyday people. That same unflinching quality shaped The Awakening, the novel that would later become her most celebrated work. At the time of its publication, however, its frank treatment of a married woman’s emotional and sensual awakening unsettled many critics, who judged it harshly, yet Chopin continued to write stories that revealed her commitment to portraying women as fully human, with desires and ambitions that stretched beyond the confines of convention. She admired the psychological clarity of Guy de Maupassant, but she pushed beyond his influence to craft a voice that was unmistakably her own, direct yet lyrical, and deeply attuned to the inner lives of her characters. Though some of her contemporaries viewed her themes as daring or even improper, others recognized her narrative skill, and within a decade of her passing she was already being described as a writer of remarkable talent. Her rediscovery in the twentieth century led readers to appreciate how modern her concerns truly were: the struggle for selfhood, the tension between social expectations and private longing, and the resilience of women seeking lives that felt authentically theirs. Today, her stories and novels are widely read, admired for their clarity, emotional intelligence, and the boldness with which they illuminate the complexities of human experience.

Reviews

[Maureen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kate Chopin wrote “A Pair of Silk Stockings” in April, 1896.

Mrs Sommers finds herself in the unexpected and fortunate position of having an extra 15 dollars to spend. Her first thought is for her children, but when she arrives at the store, her priorities appear to change!
Enjoyable little story. Thanks to Tina for the link. https://www.katechopin.org/pdfs/Kate%...

[Carol · Rating 3 out of 5]

The purchase of A PAIR OF SILK STOCKINGS begins a "rare" and fun little shopping spree that a mother wishes would go on forever.

Not my favorite Kate Chopin, but ok.

[Katya]

A primeira vez que li esta coletânea de Kate Chopin, a primeira vez, aliás, que li Kate Chopin, foi em 2017, numa altura em que a data da compra do livro e a data da sua leitura ainda coincidiam. Portanto, há oito anos. Da experiência já pouco recordava, mas lembrava-me bem do conto que abre esta seleção e lhe dá nome. Esse ficou comigo ao longo de quase uma década e eu teria ainda podido recordá-lo quase linha a linha ainda antes de o ter relido. Releituras, aliás, são coisa a que estou pouco acostumada, mas queria avançar para o O despertar e, com a pouca disponibilidade de tempo (e vontade) com que agora me encontro, decidi recuperar este pequenino amuse-bouche.
E sem espanto: Um par de meias de seda resiste como o momento alto desta recolha. Nada mais simples: temos uma Sra. Sommers e a Sra. Sommers dá por si, inesperadamente, com 15 dólares a mais na sua bolsa. Em que os poderá gastar uma mãe de pelo menos quatro crianças, certamente viúva, decididamente desamparada, e com um rendimento incerto? Essa é a exploração essencial deste pequeníssimo conto onde as circunstâncias de vida da protagonista parecem ecoar a realidade da escritora - viúva aos trinta e poucos anos, com seis filhos a cargo. Os outros oito contos, no entanto, não se ficam atrás deste primeiro (apesar da minha evidente preferência por alguns deles).
Habitada por mulheres, aristocratas e criolas, esta coletânea ferve numa rebeldia emancipatória em que as protagonistas seduzem, tomam a dianteira nos namoros, se comprazem com a liberdade da viuvez e planeiam relações extra-conjugais numa evidente resposta ao condicionalismo imposto pelo casamento e pela descendência (que vários dos contos também abordam). Ambientadas no sul profundo, onde as plantações são cruzadas pelo Bayou, e as cicatrizes da escravatura ainda se fazem sentir, estas histórias estão cheias de mulheres que têm de encontrar forma de resistir à tradição e à autoridade que concorrem para as obliterar em corpo e espírito.
Salpicadas de pormenores autobiográficos, começam por aparentar ser escritos singelos, mas acabam por conseguir abordar, com uma dose de ironia considerável, a natureza das relações de poder (homem/mulher, branco/negro patrão/assalariado), as tensões raciais e o colorido cultural de uma região que congrega heranças geográficas tão distintas como a francesa, a Cajun (do Canadá), a espanhola e a africana.
Aperitivo degustado, vamos agora à refeição principal.

Um par de meias de seda
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Azélie
⭐️⭐️⭐️
Uma mulher de respeito
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
O sonho de uma hora
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Um cavalheiro de Bayon Têche
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Uma noite em Acadie
⭐️⭐️⭐️
O bebé de Desirée
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
O divórcio de Madame Célestin
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
No baile canadiano
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

[Teresa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Um par de meias de seda
Uma mãe de família que planeia gastar um dinheiro extra a comprar roupas para os filhos.
5*

O sonho de uma hora
Uma senhora recebe a notícia de que o marido faleceu num acidente de comboio.
5*

O bebé de Desirée
Uma jovem adoptada em criança, um dia descobre no seu filho algo que a aterroriza.
5*

Estes são os três contos, dos nove desta colectânea, de que mais gostei. São histórias comoventes - e reveladoras da opressão feminina pela sociedade da época - tratadas com ousadia por Kate Chopin; uma escritora norte-americana (1850-1904), cuja obra coloca em causa a submissão a que as mulheres estavam sujeitas.

[Carmo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kate Chopin aponta o dedo com muita classe a temas muito delicados para serem abordados no séc XIX; por uma mulher, e sobre as mulheres principalmente.
A maioria dos contos começam e desenrolam-se com extrema delicadeza e alguma subtileza, para terminarem com uma machadada fatal nas convenções sociais. Adorei, e alguns deles emocionaram-me sobremaneira.

[Célia Loureiro · Rating 4 out of 5]

”Na sua opinião, o amor era sinónimo de degradação, algo que quase tinha vergonha de confessar a si próprio; e sabia que não tinha forças para o reprimir.”

Kate Chopin (1851-1904) foi uma autora norte-americana que viveu toda a vida no Louisiana. Peguei nas suas Meias de Seda convencida de que se tratava de uma novela sobre o dilema de uma mãe entre gastar, ou não, o dinheiro extra que recebeu consigo ou com os filhos. No entanto, esta edição contém sim uma compilação de contos da autora. Em todos é transversal a delicadeza com que aborda a vontade das mulheres, a sua submissão – ou insubmissão – face aos homens da sua época, e também um cuidado em retratar a vida de famílias crioulas e de origens francófonas (portanto marginais) do Louisiana.

Todos os nove contos aqui compilados (Meias de Seda, Azélie, Uma Mulher de Respeito, O Sonho de uma Hora, Um Cavalheiro de Bayon Têche, Uma Noite em Arcadie, o Bebé de Desirée, O Divórcio de Madame Célestin e No Baile Canadiano) evidenciam o espírito crítico da autora, bem como a sua luta pelos direitos (e a voz) das mulheres. Emocionou-me também o modo como mistura brancos e negros, jogando com a dignidade e os sentimentos e expectativas destas personagens de grande carácter.

O bebé de Desirée foi o meu conto favorito, de tal modo que a autora, que já havia conquistado a minha atenção até então, arrebatou de vez a minha admiração.
De salientar também o modo como se aventura por questões de honra e sexualidade, com certeza escandalosas para a época, mas que evidenciam bem a sua pertinência no mundo das letras na viragem do século.

[Renee M · Rating 5 out of 5]

Deceptively simple. A perfect little story about the choices most women have made through the centuries. Family First. Often to the detriment of self.

The heroine has one luxurious day to herself, not taking anything away from loved ones, but merely spending a bit of unaccounted money on herself, a bit of time to her own needs. There's a longing here with which we can all identify. It is a powerful story even in our times. I cannot imagine how it must have resonated in hers.

[Duane Parker · Rating 4 out of 5]

A smile provoking short story from Kate Chopin. It's universal and timeless. Mrs. Sommers, frugal and conscientious Mrs. Sommers, suddenly finds herself with a few extra dollars, and she must decide how to spend it. Of course she knows that she should spend it on her children and she thinks through the items that they need. But out shopping, she inadvertently lays her hand on a pair of silk stockings, and they are on sale so she buys them. Well, one thing leads to another and Mrs. Sommers has spent the day and her extra money treatiing herself to a few small pleasures. We've all been there, we've done the same thing, and watching Mrs. Sommers do it is what brings a smile to your face.

[Amanda B · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5/5🌟

[Mafalda Fernandes · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5*
O que me ri com as personagens criadas pela Kate Chopin!!

Um par de meias de seda - 4*
Azélie - 4.5*
Uma mulher de respeito - 4.5*
O sonho de uma hora - 5*
Um cavalheiro de Bayon Têche - 4.5*
Uma noite em Arcadie - 4*
O bebé de Desirée - 4.5*
O divórcio de Madame Célestin - 4*
No baile canadiano - 4.5*

[Martina · Rating 5 out of 5]

Estou rendida a esta autora. Excelente, excelente, excelente.

[António Jacinto · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hesitei entre 4 e 5 estrelas. Os contos são excelentes, sem palavreado a mais, e muito acutilantes e subtis. Está sempre presente o prisma da mulher, o seu aprisionamento, o recalcamento e a inibição da vontade. Uma luta constante entre emancipação e opressão social. A pair of silk stockings (um par de meias de seda) põe-nos logo ao nível da densidade e psiquismo narrativos. Uma mulher de respeito fez-me lembrar um conto de Steinbeck, versando a sexualidade reprimida feminina (Os crisântemos de "O Longo Vale"). The story of an hour (o sonho de uma hora) é uma espécie de grito reprimido das mulheres, um extraordinário retrato da condição feminina. E No baile canadiano, mais uma vez assistimos ao papel opressivo de uma sociedade conservadora que torna homens e mulheres seus juguetes - embora, neste conto, a ironia confira às mulheres a consolação de certas escolhas. Finalmente, O divórcio de Madame Célestin poupa-nos a grandes comentários: aquela falsa determinação diz tudo sobre o que uma mulher tem de suportar. O efeito de ironia é desconcertante. Muitíssimo bom.
A tradução mereceria uma revisão, pela quantidade de gralhas. Mas a tradutora fez um bom trabalho.

[Janete on hiatus due health issues · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was an Okay story, but I was expecting more from this, especially from the end. I'd like the end to be more striking.

SYNOPSIS: "A Pair of Silk Stockings" is a short story written by Kate Chopin. Published in 1897, the story takes place in an unnamed city--a city large enough to have a department store, a fashionable restaurant, a theatre, and a cable car."

[Bob · Rating 4 out of 5]

A quick little internet read, four pages. Chopin is one of the best short story writers I have come across. In this one, a woman takes a little break away from the grinding responsibilities of life and spends a little time and money on herself.

[K. Anna Kraft · Rating 4 out of 5]

This story was just as good in the reread as it was when I first picked it up in high school. It doesn't do it justice, but I've arranged my thoughts into a haiku:

"You don't feel the weight
As burdens mount day by day,
Until they're jilted."

[Lilli Feldeborn]

Kate Chopin doing Kate Chopin things, we love the last paragraph, we love liminality, we love my professor, we love her

[Linda · Rating 3 out of 5]

$15 and a longing for more in life.

[Phrodrick slowed his growing backlog · Rating 1 out of 5]

Apologies to Kate Chopin fans, the Kindle edition is a shame

It has been a few years since I last read Kate Chopin Stories. I was looking forward to this collection. First mistake, it is only this story.
This is a warning to potential buyers of A Pair of Silk Stockings Kindle Edition. This version looks to be a bad photocopy of a newspaper or magazine edition.
In part because it is printed in double column, changing the font size is a problem. That plus the low contrast in the copy, the result is hard to impossible to read. I gave up on the first page.

The late Ms Chopin deserved something better.

[Viji (Bookish endeavors) · Rating 4 out of 5]

A touching story. A woman,well-off in the past but left to struggle after marriage,comes upon 15 dollars unexpectedly. She decides to spend it for herself. In this story,we can see the picture of a woman who hasn't taken care of any needs of herself for a while. In her daily struggles,she even forgets to have her luncheon. A true picture of real life.

[Joana Lourenço · Rating 4 out of 5]

This might be my favourite writer at the time. I love the way she writes and I love the way she represents women, their strength and their oppression, and how she's aware of racism even on not so ouvert manners. This just goes to show we should judge history and apply the same moral standards we have now. There were always people who were aware.
I would have loved to have read these stories in a longer format. I wanted to know more! The stories were fun and the plot twists at the end often left me thinking and made the reading fun.

[Luigi Galicia · Rating 4 out of 5]

todos sus cuentos un con giros muy inesperados al final jajaja me encantó

[kalina⭐️ · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.75

[Amanda · Rating 4 out of 5]

“There was something coming to her and she was waiting for it, fearfully. What was it? She did not know; it was too subtle and elusive to name. But she felt it, creeping out of the sky, reaching toward her through the sounds, the scents, the colour that filled the air.”

“She took the little one from the nurse’s arms with no word of explanation, and descending the steps, walked away, under the live-oak branches. It was an October afternoon; the sun was just sinking. Out in the still fields the negroes were picking cotton. Désirée had not changed the thin white garment nor the slippers which she wore. Her hair was uncovered and the sun’s rays brought a golden gleam from its brown meshes. She did not take the broad, beaten road which led to the far-off plantation of Valmondé. She walked across a deserted field, where the stubble bruised her tender feet, so delicately shod, and tore her thin gown to shreds. She disappeared among the reeds and willows that grew thick along the banks of the deep, sluggish bayou; and she did not come back again.”

“She knew that she would weep again when she saw the kind, tender hands folded in death; the face that had never looked save with love upon her, fixed and grey and dead. But she saw beyond that bitter moment a long procession of years to come that would belong to her absolutely. And she opened and spread her arms out to them in welcome.”

[Sheila · Rating 2 out of 5]

This short story, and its message, could have been written today, even though it was written over 100 years ago. And it could have been titled, "How to come into some extra money, and spend it all on yourself in 1 afternoon". This story can often be found online, or in collections of Kate Chopin stories such as The Awakening and Selected Stories

[Laila · Rating 4 out of 5]

cant blame a girl for deciding to take herself out on a little shopping spree. not everything gotta go to them kids!

[Preetam Chatterjee · Rating 5 out of 5]

“A Pair of Silk Stockings” is a romantic story without a lover—and that absence is precisely its power. Kate Chopin redefines romance as an interior awakening, desire directed not toward another person, but toward the self long denied expression.

Mrs. Sommers, a poor woman with fifteen unexpected dollars, plans responsibly: shoes for the children, necessities for the household. But one small indulgence—a pair of silk stockings—unravels her intentions. What follows is not moral collapse, but emotional resurrection.

Chopin treats consumption not as frivolity but as revelation. The stockings awaken Mrs. Sommers to forgotten sensations: softness, beauty, and pleasure without justification. She moves through theaters and restaurants as if inhabiting another life—one that belongs to her, not to duty.

Romance here is not adultery or rebellion; it is self-recognition. Mrs. Sommers does not abandon her family. She momentarily remembers herself. Chopin refuses to punish her for this memory. There is no guilt imposed by the narrative, only melancholy at its impermanence.

The story’s restraint is radical. Chopin does not sentimentalize poverty, nor does she moralize desire. Pleasure is not framed as sin, but as human necessity. Romance becomes the brief alignment between inner longing and external permission.

The ending—Mrs. Sommers wishing the cable car would never stop—is one of the most quietly devastating in American literature. The romance cannot continue. Reality will resume. But the knowledge remains.

“A Pair of Silk Stockings” endures because it expands the definition of romantic fulfillment. Love need not be interpersonal. Sometimes it is the recognition that one’s own desires are real and worthy.

Chopin’s genius lies in treating this recognition as neither heroic nor shameful, but profoundly human.

Romance, she suggests, begins the moment a person remembers who they were before necessity took over.

Recommended.

[Sandysbookaday (on indefinite hiatus) · Rating 4 out of 5]

EXCERPT: The neighbours sometimes talked of certain "better days" that little Mrs. Sommers had known before she had ever thought of being Mrs. Sommers. She herself indulged in no such morbid retrospection. She had no time - no second of time to devote to the past. The needs of the present absorbed her every faculty. A vision of the future like some dim, gaunt monster sometimes appalled her, but luckily tomorrow never comes.

ABOUT 'A PAIR OF SILK STOCKINGS': "A Pair of Silk Stockings" is a short story written by Kate Chopin. Published in 1897, the story follows Mrs. Sommers who prefers spending a windfall on herself, rather than on her children.

MY THOUGHTS: She had the best of intentions when setting out, but . . .

I first came across Kate Chopin when I was given a copy of her novel Awakening to read. The link to my review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

It seems Kate likes to write about women whose own desires come to the fore.

A Pair of Silk Stockings is a very short, short story in which Mrs. Sommers does what. no doubt, we have all wished to do at one time or another.

Thank you to Tina and Maureen for the link. https://www.katechopin.org/pdfs/Kate%...

MEET THE AUTHOR: Kate Chopin was an American novelist and short-story writer best known for her startling 1899 novel, The Awakening. Born in St. Louis, she moved to New Orleans after marrying Oscar Chopin in 1870. Less than a decade later Oscar's cotton business fell on hard times and they moved to his family's plantation in the Natchitoches Parish of northwestern Louisiana. Oscar died in 1882 and Kate was suddenly a young widow with six children. She turned to writing and published her first poem in 1889. The Awakening, considered Chopin's masterpiece, was subject to harsh criticism at the time for its frank approach to sexual themes. It was rediscovered in the 1960s and has since become a standard of American literature, appreciated for its sophistication and artistry. Chopin's short stories of Cajun and Creole life are collected in Bayou Folk (1894) and A Night in Acadie (1897), and include "Desiree's Baby," "The Story of an Hour" and "The Storm."

https://sandysbookaday.wordpress.com/...

[BookishDramas · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had forgotten that I had read KC's books way back in high school.
Thanks to Sandysbookaday's review I remembered this.
This was a renewal of connection, re-reading this short story after 36 years, a story of a thrifty mother who had seen better days and a different life now at the edge of penury with a brood of six children, who unwittingly succumbs to a little self indulgence while in the market. This short essay of sorts by KC does not point to any point of view but just states in a short period when the lady lowers her guard and looks beyond her hard life.
Times have changed but not the expectations from a mother but in the 19th century this would have been scandalized, those were different times.
This is a short 15-20 minute story which is not out of place even in todays society.

[bambi · Rating 4 out of 5]

A Pair of Silk Stockings von Kate Chopin ist so kurz und trotzdem unglaublich eindrucksvoll. Ich liebe, wie gut sie mit wenigen Seiten so viele Gefühle ausdrücken kann. Diese Mischung aus Sehnsucht, Freiheit und ein bisschen Melancholie ist perfekt eingefangen. Der Schreibstil ist elegant, klar und trotzdem poetisch.

[Nina · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed this one a lot. The main character's thoughts and feelings are really well written, and when you look at her bckground, her thoughts about buying something for herself become more important and less selfish. 5 out of 5 stars