Kate Chopin's Short Story 'The Storm'

Kate Chopin wrote the short story “The Storm” after her husband had died in 1888 to raise money for herself and her six children. Chopin was raised by her French Creole mother and Chopin married a wealthy New Orleans cotton broker. She used her life and childhood to help her write the story. Within her writing, Chopin used her background to depict the lifestyle and dialect of the Cajun area of America. Chopin gave Bobinot and Caxlixta characteristics of a Creole person including the dialect they used and their names to help imagine the setting. From the early 1800s through the 1900s, many people living in the southern part of Louisiana were descendants of native French people who had travelled to this part of America when the French government owned what is now Louisiana. Many of the descendants were referred to as Creole because they are a descendant of someone who is French, but lived in southern Louisiana. The Creole community was the higher class in the southern Louisiana area with the Arcadians being the lower class. Creole people speak some French, but combine many English words with French words and apply them to their everyday conversations. The use of French and English words combined make up many of the lines in the short story. In this story, Bobinot and Calixta use a French and English dialect to help determine the setting. Cajun slang is used animately. The Cajun slang terms help develop the Creole setting because it gives the readers the understanding of the characteristic depth and more life to the characters. The language and dialect help with the setting more than the names. When speaking, Calixta …show more content…
Chopin utilizes her resources, including her background and her lifestyle when writing, to help her write “The Storm”. She uses the Creole dialect to help readers understand the setting and time of the short story so she could write the story without having to go into much