Selfishness In The Painted Door

Primarily, a main component of Thomas Hobbes theory, is the idea that followers by nature, are selfish and only concerned with their own self-preservation, and thus followers need leaders and government to maintain social order. An example of human selfishness in “The Painted Door” happens when Ann is alone to her thoughts. Ann has just gone back to painting the door after veiwing the storm outside her window, and Ann is considering her life with John and how John treats her. Although John treats Ann respectfully, and gives Ann everything that she could ask for, Ann feels vindicated about John’s need to take care of other people, and Ann feels that as John’s wife, it is John’s duty to take care of her, and not others, like his father. While Ann knows her thoughts about John are “just an effort to convince herself that [Ann] did have a …show more content…
John works himself until he has lost all the youthfulness he possessed prior to marrying Ann, for the sole reason that Ann is not from a farm, and doesn’t know what it is like to live on a farm, and so that Ann can keep the youthful vanities that she feels John is robbing from her. Likewise, Calixta in “The Storm” is also blatantly selfish in her total disregard for the welfare of her husband and child, Bobinot and Bibi, who are trapped outside in a storm. When Alcee first arrives to Calixta and Bobinot’s house, Calixta is going around her house getting the house ready for the rapidly approaching storm, commenting to Alcee about the weather, but soon Calixta’s thoughts switch to how “she was a little fuller of figure than five years before when she married, but she had lost nothing of her vivacity. [Calixta’s] blue eyes still retained their melting quality; and her yellow hair, disheveled by the wind and rain, curled more stubbornly than ever about her ears and temples” (Chopin