Story Of An Hour Rhetorical Analysis

Improved Essays
Like many people, authors have attitudes also. Their attitudes can change depending on the situation and they set the tone of the story. They also reveal how the author feels about a certain subject and it is the reader’s job to identify it. In Kate Chopin’s short story, “The Story of An Hour” she writes of a women who finds a newfound freedom prior to her husbands supposed death. In the story Chopin uses diction, character responses, and character thoughts to express her thoughts on men and women’s marital role.
Kate Chopin’s diction in the short story is precise and consistent. Throughout the story her sentences, along with her paragraphs, are short and filled with specific words that appeal to the readers emotions. In the story she uses
…show more content…
Although Chopin is not directly revealing her attitude on the subject, she is using Louise to reveal it. Louise’s thoughts fluctuate from saddened to joyous to shock. As Louise is in her room her thoughts run rampant. “But now there was a dull stare in her eyes, whose gaze was fixed away off yonder on one of those patches of blue sky. It was not a glance of reflection, but rather indicated a suspension of intelligent thought.” This quote in the story shows Louise’s difference; it shows that what she sees is not what most women would reflect on after their husband dies. In the story it says, “She breathed a quick prayer that life might be long. It was only yesterday she had thought with a shudder that life might be long.” This shows how joyful and thankful she was for this unfortunate event. She dreaded life alongside her husband because women in that era were never heard, never considered, and were more or less properties of their husband. With this new found freedom and new sense of well-being she looked forward to the days she didn’t have to answer to anyone else and express her will freely. After years of repressing her feelings she feels relieved and free of

Related Documents

  • Superior Essays

    The woman in both narratives struggled within themselves which rarely left them time to generate love and affection for their spouses. Louise’s feelings for her husband within “The Story of the Hour” is expressed when she says, “And yet she had loved him--sometimes. Often she had not. What did it matter” (Chopin par 13). This lack of love led to feelings of oppression, imprisonment and entrapment by both women.…

    • 1503 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Daniel Deneau’s criticism over “The story of an Hour,” proposes that Louise Mallard experienced something ecstatic, physical, and spiritual. Deneau quotes Kate Chopin when explaining the changes Louise Mallard felt since she learned of her husband’s death. Daniel Deneau has some valid points regarding what Louise Mallard experienced however, I disagree with some aspects of his argument. Deneau explains the ecstatic experience Louise Mallard felt as being a great shock. The author states, “All readers should agree, Louise Mallard receives a great shock, goes through a rapid sequence of reactions, is in a sense of awakened and then seems to drink in ‘a very elixir of life’ (354), and finally receives another shock, a reversal, which proves lethal”…

    • 716 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    My Heroes: Challenging Gender Stereotypes For centuries our world has been plagued by “old fashioned” ideals. Individuals everywhere have been isolated and criticized just for being themselves. The Public Service Announcement (PSA), “My Heroes” shadows two content kids throughout their excursions on Halloween night, while simultaneously challenging gender stereotypes. This particular PSA allows the viewer to observe the children through the parents eyes.…

    • 876 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Yellow Wallpaper vs. The Story of an Hour “The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin and “The Yellow Wallpaper” written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, are very similar with the character, being a trapped woman who craves freedom from her authoritative husband, and theme of the women finding contentment within herself to escape her husband to become a strong and independent women. In both stories the women were described to be unequal with their husbands. During the time these two short stories were written, the early 1900’s, women were seen to be fragile and weak in need of a strong authoritative husbands to protect them. However, the two women described in the stories are going through life changing events which they exhibited in their own…

    • 963 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In the short story by author Kate Chopin, “the Story of an Hour”, the main character shows her true feelings about her marriage after a false report about her husband’s death. Many readers of the audience point that Mrs. Mallard died from the joy of her husband’s arrival but an important aspect that is often overlooked is the ironic juxtaposition set up by the author to truly show her feelings. Mrs. Mallard was not in shock of joy but she was in shock of utter disappointment that ultimately lead to her death. Through the discrete details of their marriage, the author writes the message of marriage and love during this era in the American society. Through the actions of the main character, it is clear that her cause of death was because of…

    • 1345 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    “A man who has given away a small fortune, forsaken a loving family, abandoned his car, watch, and map, and burned the last of his money before traipsing off into the wilderness” (71). The national best selling book, “Into the Wild” written by Jon Krakauer tells the story about a man name Chris McCandless. The story takes place in 1990’s and tells the adventures of the a man who changes his name to Alex Supertramp. The story tells the readers of the book:all the different people he met on his journey, where he want and how he died. As the author writees about Chris’s life and his connections with the story he includes many different types of writting styles including rhetoricstragides.…

    • 1046 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    However when you view things from Ms. Mallard’s side of the door you might find things are playing out a little differently than Richard and Josephine might think. When you begin to read and you see things from Ms. Mallards point of view you might believe that the others were correct about Louise. You first see the scene Josephine also witnessed, Ms. Mallard “did not hear the story as many woman have heard the same, with a paralyzed inability to accept its significance. She wept at once, with sudden, wild abandonment, in her sister’s arms. When the storm of grief had spent itself she went away to her room alone.…

    • 1282 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Superior Essays

    In this story, Kate Chopin was attempting to accurately display the emotions that she had felt at the time of her husband 's death through the emotions of Louise Mallard. Yet another example of how Chopin’s life influenced this piece of work was how Louise felt free after learning of her husband’s death. This is a raw display of just how oppressed women were during Kate Chopin’s lifetime; where a woman may feel free and happy when her husband died. In summary, “The Story of an Hour” is an eye-opening piece of literature that drew heavy influence from Kate Chopin’s life and the time she lived…

    • 1516 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour,” which she wrote in 1894, is about a woman who loses all of her freedom when she marries. Mrs. Mallard suffers from a heart disease. Everyone around her treats her as if she is a fragile butterfly. Word comes that her husband died in a train accident. Her sister and friend are the ones who have to deliver the message.…

    • 873 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    When Mrs. Mallard is over by the window looking at the scenery outside, her mood to begin with is quite distraught as Chopin writes, “She sat with her head thrown back upon the cushion of the chair, quite motionless, except when a sob came up into her throat...” (par. 7). Then Mrs. Mallard’s mood shifts to one of numbness as seen when the story says “...there was a dull stare in her eyes...” (par. 8).…

    • 866 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In “The Story of An Hour” by Kate Chopin, the main character and protagonist Mrs. Mallard experiences a spiral of emotions, from shock to freedom from her role as a wife; after learning of her husband’s sudden death. This story takes place in the era when women were known as just a wife and mother. In addition, the narrator starts with assuring the reader of Mrs. Mallard’s heart condition; which makes her appear weak from the start. This story expresses on what people know about freedom and humanity through symbolic meanings that are found in myths and religious cultures. The narrator takes an archetypal feminist approach when analyzing Mrs. Mallard’s steps in discovering a free life for herself, without the burdens her husband brought her.…

    • 713 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    The Story of An Hour - Literary Analysis Marriage in the 1800’s was essentially an idea of a woman being the man’s property. In “The Story of An Hour,” Chopin represents a negative view of marriage by portraying a woman’s relief and joy upon her husband’s death, resulting in the examination of a female’s self-discovery of identity that was lost while fulfilling the role of a good wife. Chopin presents this through the setting of the text as Mrs.Mallard’s emotions transition from numbness to newfound joy. “The Story of An Hour” communicates the transition of a soul moving from being trapped in a cage of domesticity, like a small bird, to of the free, spring world, showing that nature and the soul are connected, as shown through the different…

    • 1145 Words
    • Pages
    Great Essays
  • Great Essays

    Mallard’s dear friend Josephine, who waits outside her bedroom door, is worried that Louise will make herself ill. Louise is breathing in all the emotions of finally feeling alive for the first time. Referencing to her heart the narrator expresses the excitement of that particular moment. “Her pulses beat fast, and the coursing blood warmed and relaxed every inch of her body. ”(Chopin par.…

    • 1433 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Superior Essays

    In Kate Chopin’s short story, “The Story of an Hour”, a married woman receives news of her husband’s death. The reader follows Mrs. Mallard through her unusual emotional reaction to her husband’s death. In this time period of this story, the late 1800s, it was not unusual for women to marry young and take on all of the household responsibilities. Not many people cared whether the women loved their husbands or their families; the primary focus was on their purpose in the household. The language used throughout the story contributes to the imagery of freedom and life, and shows the reader that marriage is a form of oppression in this time period.…

    • 1351 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Forbidden Joy of Independence In the short story of Kate Chopin “The Story of an Hour” she shares a story about a woman named Mrs. Mallard with heart trouble who finds out her husband has been involved in an accident and died. She is in disbelief and later realizes that it is a new start for her to actually have freedom, but then later finds out her husband did not die and she dies of a heart attack. The author shows the process of her disbelief turning into actual relief by describing the scenery outside of her home. The author uses imagery, symbolism and irony to develop the theme of the forbidden joy of independence throughout the story.…

    • 797 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays