Kate Chopin’s groundbreaking depiction of a woman who dares to defy the expectations of society in the pursuit of her desire
When The Awakening was first published in 1899, charges of sordidness and immorality seemed to consign it into obscurity and irreparably damage its author’s reputation. But a century after her death, it is widely regarded as Kate Chopin’s great achievement. Through careful, subtle changes of style, Chopin shows the transformation of Edna Pontellier, a young wife and mother, who – with tragic consequences – refuses to be caged by married and domestic life, and claims for herself moral and erotic freedom.
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About The Awakening and Selected Stories
Introduction by Kaye Gibbons Edited and with notes by Nina Baym Commentary by Elizabeth Blackwell, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Charlotte Perkins Gilman, and from The Picayune’s Creole Cook Book The Awakening shocked turn-of-the-century readers with its forthright treatment of sex and suicide. Departing from literary convention, Kate Chopin failed to condemn her heroine’s desire for an affair with the son of a Louisiana resort owner whom she meets on vacation. The power of sensuality, the delusion of ecstatic love, and the solitude that accompanies the trappings of middle- and upper-class life are the themes of this now-classic novel. As Kaye Gibbons points out in her Introduction, Chopin “was writing American realism before most Americans could bear to hear that they were living it.” This edition includes selected stories from Chopin’s Bayou Folk and A Night in Acadie.
Kate Chopin (1851-1904) did not begin to write until she was thirty-six years old. Up to that time, her life gave no hint of either literary talent or literary ambition. Yet after the publication of her first stories in 1889,… More about Kate Chopin
About Kate Chopin
Kate Chopin (1851-1904) did not begin to write until she was thirty-six years old. Up to that time, her life gave no hint of either literary talent or literary ambition. Yet after the publication of her first stories in 1889,… More about Kate Chopin
