Escapism In The Awakening

In The Awakening, Chopin highlights the ways in which a women may find freedom despite their strict societal rules and regulations. Critics argue that “the society a woman like Edna faced, for each inherently suggests that the patriarchal-social pressures forced upon such a woman were either inescapably deterministic or, somehow, entirely avoidable through a kind of mythical rebirth achieved through the act of suicide.”(Ramos, 2010, p. 146) The patriarchal pressures that are put upon women leave them with the need for a form of escapism. In the novel, Chopin acknowledges this need and provides Edna with way in which to have a sense of passive resistance to her uphold the role that society expects of her. One of the ways Edna does this is through …show more content…
12) Drawing was one of the many acceptable hobbies for a women to have during the period when the novel was written. Art, music, and sowing were often undertake by ladies of the house in their free time. Music evokes a very strong reaction from Edna. During an evening in which the children have an impromptu recital, Mademoiselle Reisz plays a song on the piano for Edna. The narrator states that “the very first chords which Mademoiselle Reisz struck upon the piano sent a keen tremor down Mrs. Pontellier’s spinal column.”(p. 26) The music adheres to and stirs the feeling of an awakening that Edna had recently discovered. Although Edna had listened to music before, she muses that “perhaps it was the first time she was ready, perhaps the first time her being was tempered to take an impression of the abiding truth.”(p. 26) Through music, Edna is able to feel things that she doesn’t feel in her normal life. The passionate music ignites the awakening desire in Edna to explore her own passions. Chopin uses the different forms of socially acceptable leisure activities to persuade Edna to indulge in her own wants and