Mrs Mallard Analysis

There are many points in this story that can be viewed from a feminist’s perspective. When she is first told about her husband’s death, the story states, “She did not hear the story as any women have heard the same, with a paralyzed inability to accept its significance” (Axelrod 496). The word “women” is used rather than “people”, this phrasing could be saying that women are unable to comprehend important or significant problems. This also can insinuate that men are more capable of coping with stressful information than women are. Now to move on to Mrs. Mallard at the time in which she first found out about the death of her husband. She herself handled the news, “she wept at once, with sudden, wild abandonment” (Axelrod 496). Choplin …show more content…
Mallard then moves into the bedroom in which she shared with her husband. There she sits down in this “comfortable, roomy armchair” that is positioned in front of a large window (496). Once she takes a seat in the chair, she begins to look out the window. She notices that “the tops of trees that were aquiver with the new spring life” (Axelrod 496). All of this verbiage is leading the way to how Mrs. Mallard is able to escape the “wifely” gender role she has been placed into. The window is a means for escaping. The chair represents the ability to escape. And finally, the beauty she is seeing outside refers to her actually breaking away from the gender role she has been chained …show more content…
Mallard’s change in attitude goes against what is typically viewed as “normal”. Most wives, when they would learn of the tragic deaths of their husbands would be unable to think about a future, their lives are typically very interdependent on their husband’s. Feminism comes into point because she is able to show independent thought from her husband. But it has taken the death of her family, highly criticized by feminists, for her to reach this level of independent thought. It then begins to rain. Her first thoughts of independence begin after the rain is subsiding. She began to whisper “free, free, free!” (Axelrod 496). At this point Mrs. Mallard was realizing she was no longer under the thumb of her husband. Her eyes began to brighten and the dullness leaves them (Axelrod 496). Mrs. Mallard’s changes shows how she is beating the oppression that has plagued her for most of her life. The idea that she can finally be free, has lifted much weight from her shoulders. Independence finally rings through her when she states, “There would be no one to live for during those coming years; she would lie for herself” (Axelrod 496). At this point she has finally realized that she can finally live for herself, that she there is no longer a masculine figure looming over her. At this point she is starting to feel relief and beginning to understand what the rest of her life could entail for