The Awakening in Never too Late to Read Classics

Mar 23, 2015 Sara rated it really liked it

Shelves: literary-fiction

Kate Chopin has written in The Awakening a moving and heartfelt glimpse into the struggles of a woman who is torn between her traditional role as wife and mother and her need to satisfy the dreams and needs of self. Edna Pontellier is as individual as any real person any of us knows and as such she captures our empathy and understanding and awakes in us a bit of our feelings of desire for solitude and fulfillment.

As is so true for most human beings, shattered contentment and self-sacrifice are ...more

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Oct 05, 2022 Shirley (stampartiste) rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: published-1899-and-earlier, read-classics, challenge-bingo-2022

This book has been on my shelf for quite some time. I have been reluctant to read it because I wasn’t sure this story would be my style, but I needed to read a Banned Book for a challenge, so I thought I would finally give it a go.

The first thing that struck me was Chopin’s simple, direct prose. Her style immediately drew me into the story, and her insertion of French expressions just as immediately drew me into the Creole culture of south Louisiana. I knew I would enjoy this story.

I loved the w This book has been on my shelf for quite some time. I have been reluctant to read it because I wasn’t sure this story would be my style, but I needed to read a Banned Book for a challenge, so I thought I would finally give it a go.

The first thing that struck me was Chopin’s simple, direct prose. Her style immediately drew me into the story, and her insertion of French expressions just as immediately drew me into the Creole culture of south Louisiana. I knew I would enjoy this story.

I loved the way that Chopin slowly developed the character of Edna Pontellier, a 28-year old wife and mother at the center of this story. When we first meet Edna, she is spending the summer with her family on the island of Grand Isle, a favorite summer vacationing spot at the turn of the 20th century for New Orleans elite, most particularly the Creoles.

Chopin reveals the slow awakening of Edna Pontellier’s self-awareness as a person separate and apart from her husband and children. Edna's unhappiness is not motivated by a lack of love for her family, nor of mistreatment or disrespect by her husband, Léonce. It is the sudden realization that she does not find satisfaction in motherhood as other women do and there must be more to life than that.

Once Edna and her family return to New Orleans, Edna begins to assert her will (refusing to go to her sister’s wedding, refusing to host the societal norm of “visiting days”, etc.). The turmoil she goes through as she begins to make decisions that are outside the norm, and her loving husband’s patience in giving Edna the freedom to take actions that affect his standing in society made me care deeply for these two people.

The third man character in the story is a 26-year old Creole bachelor, Robert Lebrun, who would playfully and innocently devote himself to one of the women on Grand Isle each summer. His chivalric manners also made me care for this young man whose flirtatious ways lead to circumstances beyond his code of conduct. It is hard for us to fathom today how this book was banned, but in its day, there were strict rules that governed the actions of people in society. Twenty years later, Edith Wharton’s book, The Age of Innocence would also touch on this theme.

The Awakening was a thoughtful story and an enlightening look at how much society has changed in a hundred years. ...more

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Jan 19, 2021 Beth rated it really liked it

I don't agree with how Edna, the main character, chose to fight for what she believed but perhaps she didn't know her ideas were something other women desired or that they might be worth fighting for. As it turns out, I believe her actions were selfish. However, under the age-old circumstances in which she found herself, it was the best she could do sadly. ...more

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