The Cause and Cure for Heart Trouble: A Character Analysis of Louise Mallard
In “The Story of an Hour”, Kate Chopin introduces Louise Mallard, the protagonist, as being “afflicted with a heart trouble” (1). A character analysis of Louise shows an independent woman with heart trouble, and the cure for her ailing heart can be seen as having both physical and emotional components. When faced with the news of her husband’s death, Louise’s reactions are different from that of most women and it can be interpreted as her heart ailments being cured with her new found joy of a future of freedom.
Louise’s physical frailty, due to her heart trouble, is introduced early in “The Story of an Hour”. Out of fear of her reaction due to her heart trouble, Chopin describes Josephine (Louise’s sister) using “broken sentences; veiled hints that revealed in half concealing” (2) to tell Louise of her husband, Brently’s, death. Additionally, Chopin emphasizes Louise’s frailty describing “powerless as her two white slender hands” (10). …show more content…
It can be speculated that Louise is repressing her feelings for her late husband when Chopin explains “And yet she had loved him—sometimes. Often she had not” (15). This makes the reader think that Louise would not allow herself to think what she truly felt until her husband, Brently, died. The reader can also speculate that her husband often did not think of her feelings when Chopin writes “There would be no powerful will bending hers in that blind persistence with which men and women believe they have a right to impose a private will upon a fellow-creature” (14). All of these emotions could be seen as the emotional cause of Louise’s heart
In “The Story of an Hour”, Kate Chopin introduces Louise Mallard, the protagonist, as being “afflicted with a heart trouble” (1). A character analysis of Louise shows an independent woman with heart trouble, and the cure for her ailing heart can be seen as having both physical and emotional components. When faced with the news of her husband’s death, Louise’s reactions are different from that of most women and it can be interpreted as her heart ailments being cured with her new found joy of a future of freedom.
Louise’s physical frailty, due to her heart trouble, is introduced early in “The Story of an Hour”. Out of fear of her reaction due to her heart trouble, Chopin describes Josephine (Louise’s sister) using “broken sentences; veiled hints that revealed in half concealing” (2) to tell Louise of her husband, Brently’s, death. Additionally, Chopin emphasizes Louise’s frailty describing “powerless as her two white slender hands” (10). …show more content…
It can be speculated that Louise is repressing her feelings for her late husband when Chopin explains “And yet she had loved him—sometimes. Often she had not” (15). This makes the reader think that Louise would not allow herself to think what she truly felt until her husband, Brently, died. The reader can also speculate that her husband often did not think of her feelings when Chopin writes “There would be no powerful will bending hers in that blind persistence with which men and women believe they have a right to impose a private will upon a fellow-creature” (14). All of these emotions could be seen as the emotional cause of Louise’s heart