Hello everyone! My name is Selena and welcome to my blog! She/Her is a blog about feminist figures and literature. I will mainly be focusing on some of my favorite prose and poetry while occasionally dabbling into other types of writing. Today’s blog will be focusing on my favorite author and novella, Kate Chopin’s The Awakening! As one of the first feminist texts, The Awakening is my favorite piece of literature because of how it handles bodily autonomy and the right to your identity. A case-study piece for the 19th century, The Awakening highlights the importance of stepping out of societal norms and into your body. Without further ado, let’s get started! Beware, Spoilers Ahead!
During an era in which women were expected to tend to the children and household, feminism in the nineteenth century was not nearly as strong as in the twenty-first-century. It had just barely become an official political concept and sought women’s rights. The first wave occurred through middle-class white women. Kate Chopin, the author of “The Story of an Hour,” decided to release her honest and frank treatment of feminism during the turn of the century. The Awakening, published in 1899, describes Chopin’s story of Edna, a middle-class Creole white woman after she “awakens.” Chopin’s novella was highly controversial at the time of its publication due to its depiction of Creole women. Readers at the time were furious with Chopin for the infidelity, sexuality, and overall defiance described in the work. Now, the piece is a staple in feminist fiction. It is seen as ahead of its time and one of the first feminist pieces in literature. However, it is a story not only of feminism and gender roles but also of psychological imbalance. A psychoanalytic view of Edna reveals that indulging her id and losing her mother early in life caused her demise.
Edna’s infidelity demonstrates how her ego is dominated by her id. Her affair with Robert fulfills her romantic and loving desires. Edna is married to a caring husband with whom she shares two children, yet she begins an affair with Robert and goes against societal standards for the sake of her pleasure. While the two never engage in sexual intercourse, they do fall in love. He makes her feel young again to an early age in which she had more freedom and fewer things were expected of her. She feels like a child who can roam and play around, like a girl in her earliest teenage years that is curious and learning lessons about life, and a young woman that has been sent out into the exciting real world for the first time. Unlike Edna, Robert has a strong ego. He may engage in the affair, yet he recognizes that it is inappropriate and can never become anything more. Society, or his superego, cause him to feel guilt for what he is doing, and he flees to Mexico in an attempt to separate himself from Edna. Even after Robert’s departure, Edna still longs for him. Thus, her ego is weak, and cannot balance the id and the superego.
Edna’s affair with Alcee fulfills her lustful desires. The two never fall in love, but they engage in sexual intercourse on multiple accounts. Alcee serves to convey the importance of sex to Edna. She never truly felt pleasure in her marriage, so she engages in infidelity with a known playboy. Alcee reminds Edna of when she was younger and unwed and having a physical relationship with him provides her with a sense of pleasure. Despite being in love with Robert, Edna sleeps with Alcee because she desires him in those very moments and acts on impulse. The heat that Alcee provides is so intense that Edna feels no guilt for having her children stay with their grandmother while she and Alcee commit adulterous acts. Society expects her to be the perfect housewife and mother-woman, yet she neglects her husband and children to fulfill her desires. Thus, Edna lacks a strong ego as the id and her instinctual desires hold more power than the superego and societal pressures.
The sea represents both Edna’s regression and demise as she uses it to fulfill her desire to return to the womb. Her ability to swim leads to her rebirth. It is after learning, in the sea, that she is capable of swimming that Edna discovers a new power inside herself and desires the freedom that women within her society are repressed from. Discovering that she has control over her body gives her strength, and she wants to use it to break the confinements that are placed upon women. Water is often associated with birth and wombs, and Edna even personifies the sea. A personification of the sea represents Edna’s late mother whom she lost at a young age. Mothers are commonly known to provide their children with affection such as warm embraces, which is what Edna feels with the sea. For Edna, being in the water establishes a feeling of being inside the womb. It is within the water that Edna realizes her potential and is reborn. The symbolism of rebirth is further conveyed through Edna declaring that she felt like a baby in the water. Edna regresses and sees herself as a reborn individual that must figure out the ways of life once more. Edna had been dependent on others for her entire life, yet she was still never able to reach her potential. It was not until she ventured out on her own and discarded her dependence on others that she could create her identity and freedom. She no longer needs men, women, or children for guidance as she has built her strength and has been reborn into an individual that is stronger than the former.
Edna drowns herself to fulfill her desire of keeping her freedom. Throughout the novella, Edna finds her identity and utilizes her newfound freedom to the fullest; however, she also realizes that her society, the superego, is not yet prepared for the role of women to transform. Despite her attempts at separating herself from tradition and gaining independence, she will forever be trapped within her expected role if she continues to live in her society. During her final moments, thought of her husband and her children, yet she also thought about how they could not control her. Edna acknowledges that she is a wife and a mother, but she also acknowledges that the two roles are not her sole purpose or identity. Before her rebirth through the water, society created Edna’s identity for her; however, after her rebirth, she creates one for herself and refuses to let it go. To Edna, suicide is the only option if she wants to keep her identity and independence; it is her solution to saving what is left of her and preventing herself from once again falling victim to society’s standards. Suicide is Edna’s last act of indulgence with the id. Her ego failed to regulate the id as her desires ended up destroying her reputation and relationships with the men in her life. Edna’s last desire is to maintain her awakened self and suicide is what will release it. Water and the sea are what rebirth Edna and bring her power, yet it is also what bring her demise. It can also be stated, however, that Edna’s demise is another rebirth as it takes place within the sea, and water is often associated with the womb.
By bringing her demise, Edna is also taking ownership of her independence and freedom. She dies as the true self that she created and frees herself from the pressures of her society. While this is just a surface-level look into one of the most influential feminist texts of all time, I strongly urge everyone to read The Awakening. There are a variety of other lenses and messages that come with the story. Until next time!
-Selena Tomas, Blogger.
Selena Tomas- Managing Editor & Poetry Editor: Selena is a Senior at Lewis University majoring in English. She has a concentration in Literature and Language, as well as General Writing. Selena is a writing tutor at the Lewis University Writing Center, and the Presidential Advisor of Sigma Tau Delta. She plans to pursue a Ph.D. in hopes of becoming an English professor. Outside Lewis, Selena enjoys reading, writing, and spending time with her baby brother. She has two poems published in the forthcoming issue of The Opal.