Kate Chopin
Kate Chopin’s most famous work nowadays is the novel The Awakening, but at the turn of the last century she was more famous for her short fiction, published in American magazines like the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Youth’s Companion, and Vogue. A prolific writer, over the
...5) The Locket
10) A Reflection
11) Desiree's Baby
12) The Kiss
14) At Fault
18) The Awakening
The Awakening charts Edna Pontellier’s journey of self-discovery. The time spent with a younger friend on a summer holiday on Grand Isle in Lousiana unlocks a feeling in her that she can’t close away again. On returning to her family home in New Orleans, she starts to transition from unthinking housewife and mother into something freer and more confident, although this doesn’t meet with the full approval of the society she’s a part
...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.
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