The Story of an Hour

Knowing that Mrs. Mallard was afflicted with a heart trouble, great care was taken to break to her as gently as possible the news of her husband's death.

It was her sister Josephine who told her, in broken sentences; veiled hints that revealed in half concealing. Her husband's friend Richards was there, too, near her. It was he who had been in the newspaper office when intelligence of the railroad disaster was received, with Brently Mallard's name leading the list of "killed." He had only taken the time to assure himself of its truth by a second telegram, and had hastened to forestall any less careful, less tender friend in bearing the sad message.

She did not hear the story as many women have heard the same, with a paralyzed inability to accept its significance. She wept at once, with sudden, wild abandonment, in her sister's arms. When the storm of grief had spent itself she went away to her room alone. She would have no one follow her.

There stood, facing the open window, a comfortable, roomy armchair. Into this she sank, pressed down by a physical exhaustion that haunted her body and seemed to reach into her soul.

She could see in the open square before her house the tops of trees that were all aquiver with the new spring life. The delicious breath of rain was in the air. In the street below a peddler was crying his wares. The notes of a distant song which some one was singing reached her faintly, and countless sparrows were twittering in the eaves. There were patches of blue sky showing here and there through the clouds that had met and piled one above the other in the west facing her window.

She sat with her head thrown back upon the cushion of the chair, quite motionless, except when a sob came up into her throat and shook her, as a child who has cried itself to sleep continues to sob in its dreams.

She was young, with a fair, calm face, whose lines bespoke repression and even a certain strength. But now there was a dull stare in her eyes, whose gaze was fixed away off yonder on one of those patches of blue sky. It was not a glance of reflection, but rather indicated a suspension of intelligent thought.

There was something coming to her and she was waiting for it, fearfully. What was it? She did not know; it was too subtle and elusive to name. But she felt it, creeping out of the sky, reaching toward her through the sounds, the scents, the color that filled the air.

Now her bosom rose and fell tumultuously. She was beginning to recognize this thing that was approaching to possess her, and she was striving to beat it back with her will — as powerless as her two white slender hands would have been. When she abandoned herself a little whispered word escaped her slightly parted lips. She said it over and over under her breath: "free, free, free!" The vacant stare and the look of terror that had followed it went from her eyes. They stayed keen and bright. Her pulses beat fast, and the coursing blood warmed and relaxed every inch of her body. She did not stop to ask if it were or were not a monstrous joy that held her. A clear and exalted perception enabled her to dismiss the suggestion as trivial.

She knew that she would weep again when she saw the kind, tender hands folded in death; the face that had never looked save with love upon her, fixed and gray and dead. But she saw beyond that bitter moment a long procession of years to come that would belong to her absolutely. And she opened and spread her arms out to them in welcome. There would be no one to live for her during those coming years; she would live for herself. 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. A kind intention or a cruel intention made the act seem no less a crime as she looked upon it in that brief moment of illumination.

And yet she had loved him — sometimes. Often she had not. What did it matter! What could love, the unsolved mystery, count for in face of this possession of self-assertion which she suddenly recognized as the strongest impulse of her being!

"Free! Body and soul free!" she kept whispering.

Josephine was kneeling before the closed door with her lips to the keyhole, imploring for admission. "Louise, open the door! I beg, open the door — you will make yourself ill. What are you doing, Louise? For heaven's sake open the door."

"Go away. I am not making myself ill." No; she was drinking in a very elixir of life through that open window. Her fancy was running riot along those days ahead of her. Spring days, and summer days, and all sorts of days that would be her own. She breathed a quick prayer that life might be long. It was only yesterday she had thought with a shudder that life might be long.

She arose at length and opened the door to her sister's importunities. There was a feverish triumph in her eyes, and she carried herself unwittingly like a goddess of Victory. She clasped her sister's waist, and together they descended the stairs. Richards stood waiting for them at the bottom.

Someone was opening the front door with a latchkey. It was Brently Mallard who entered, a little travel-stained, composedly carrying his grip-sack and umbrella. He had been far from the scene of the accident, and did not even know there had been one. He stood amazed at Josephine's piercing cry; at Richards' quick motion to screen him from the view of his wife.

But Richards was too late.

When the doctors came they said she had died of heart disease — of the joy that kills.

Footnotes

  1. This ending also contains an example of dramatic irony. The doctors believe that Louise has died of joy, that she was so happily surprised by the arrival of her husband that she had a heart attack. However, readers know that Louise’s surprise is not joyful; having just been set free by his (supposed) death, the shock of her husband’s return, and the return to the status quo, kills her. Since readers know this but the other characters do not, this is an example of dramatic irony. This irony shows that Louise has died misunderstood by the people around her.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  2. In the late 19th century, most doctors were men. Notice how these doctors draw exactly the wrong conclusion: that Louise was so in love with and dependent on her husband that the surprise of his arrival killed her. The doctors make a sexist and false assumption about Louise, assuming her complete devotion to her husband; it’s sexist because the same devotion would not necessarily be assumed of men.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  3. This ending serves as an example of situational irony. At the beginning of the story, Josephine and Richards are worried that the news of her husband’s death will kill Louise, assuming that she would be devastated by it. But she is not devastated, and in fact the opposite of what readers might have expected takes place: the news that her husband hadn’t died ends up killing Louise.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  4. Chopin sets this single sentence off as its own paragraph to add stronger emphasis. This short, declarative sentence forces readers to slow down and experience the information it conveys: that Richards was not able to hide the view Louise’s death from her husband, Brently.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  5. An “importunity” is an annoyingly urgent or persistent request. To call Louise’s sister’s requests that she open the door “importunities” is to say that she was somewhat annoyingly persistent.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  6. Before the news of her husband’s death, the idea of living a long life had seemed terrible to Louise because she didn’t feel that she was free. Now that she is free, she is excited about the idea of living a long life on her own terms. Chopin is showing how deeply the lack of freedom, the bending herself to her husband’s will, had troubled Louise.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  7. When referring to thoughts, the verb phrase "to run riot" means that one's "fancy," or "imagination," is rapidly considering all possibilities without process or moderation. In other words, her imagination was running wild.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  8. In ancient Greek mythology, Nike was the goddess of victory. Because references to Greek mythology are common in English literature, readers might guess that Chopin was thinking of Nike. Either way, to carry yourself like a goddess of Victory is to carry yourself triumphantly, and to do so “unwittingly” means to carry yourself triumphantly without knowing or without trying.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  9. The adjective "feverish" means that something is marked by intense emotion, which applies in this context. However, it can also refer to someone's having the symptoms of a fever: even in her moment of victory, readers are reminded that Louise is in poor health.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  10. Here, self-assertion means the ability to say (assert) one's desires. Personal freedom is what’s so important to Louise, valuing the possession of this self-assertion more highly than the love she had for her husband. It doesn’t matter to her whether she had loved him sometimes or had not. What matters is the freedom, which she describes as her own “strongest impulse.”

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  11. The em dash serves many functions in writing. Here, the sentence contains only one em dash, emphasizing the last thought. This creates a break with the previous idea, the shift from “she had loved him,” to (but only) “sometimes.”

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  12. According to Louise, it doesn’t matter what someone else is forcing you to do; the forcing is itself a crime—whether "kind," "cruel," or otherwise. So even if her relationship with her husband had forced her down a path that was good for her, a path that she found agreeable or fulfilling, it wouldn’t matter. The fact that her husband had forced her down that path would itself be a problem.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  13. Louise continues her moment of epiphany with a strong condemnation of societal expectations. Through Louise, Chopin writes that both men and women believe they have the right to control others; in the 19th century context of the story, the majority of that control would have been exercised by men, making Louise's observations critical of treatment of women at the time.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  14. This is the defining moment of the story. Louise realizes that without her husband she will be able to do the things she wants to do without worrying about what he wants. She realizes that she values this freedom more highly than the love that she’d felt, at times, for her husband.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  15. The adjective "exalted" means that Louise's perception is of a higher order, or very clear and noble. The connotations of the word suggest something like divine perception, which gives Louise clarity that the feeling is positive and not "monstrous."

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  16. The notion of a "monstrous joy" presents an oxymoron; things that are monstrous are not considered joyful. However, Chopin's choice of words serve to emphasize the tension of this moment: Louise doesn’t stop to ask whether she is joyful about the coming realization—a joy that would be “monstrous” because it is about her husband’s death, something that should not produce joy.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  17. The beating of her pulse and blood coursing through her body are examples of kinesthetic imagery that help convey the heightened state in which this epiphany about personal freedom takes hold of her.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  18. In this metaphor, Louise’s efforts to prevent herself from admitting that she’s excited to be free from her husband are compared to a physical fight, in which her “white slender hands” (a strong visual image suggesting her frailty) aren’t strong enough to fight off the realization that she’s trying to ignore.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  19. Chopin again employs imagery in order to emphasize the power of this moment. The unknown feeling approaches her physically—visual imagery such as "creeping" and "reaching" convey the slow, yet steady, approach. The references to the sky, the sounds, the scents, and the color of the air harken back to the springtime imagery from a couple paragraphs earlier. This is Louise's moment of renewal.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  20. This paragraph and the next one mark a shift in perspective and, therefore, a significant shift in tone. Earlier, Louise was observed from a distance, with a focus on other characters’ thoughts rather than her own. They saw her as fragile and vulnerable, which determined the language and tone of the story. Now, her own thoughts take center stage—“What was it?” is a question she is actually asking herself—and the whole tone of the story becomes more optimistic and excited. This optimism foreshadows her eventual feeling about the news of her husband’s death.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  21. The suspension of “intelligent” thought here doesn’t mean that she is thinking unintelligently; rather, she isn’t consciously thinking anything—she’s staring blankly, vacantly, at the patch of blue sky. This detail creates a sense of anticipation: her thoughts have been suspended, which implies a pause that will eventually end.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  22. In this simile, Louise is compared to a child that has exhausted itself from crying, yet cannot stop even in sleep. This simile reemphasizes Louise's fragility and vulnerability, which were introduced at the beginning of the story.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  23. Louise isn’t the one crying in this sentence; the peddler is. In this context, “crying” means “crying out” or “calling out.” He is advertising the wares he has for sale.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  24. In contrast to the storm metaphor earlier, notice the optimistic springtime imagery in this paragraph. The “delicious breath of rain” is both an olfactory and gustatory image evoking the smell or “taste” of rain in the air. The “countless sparrows” twittering is an auditory image, and the “patches of blue sky” showing through the clouds are visual. All of these examples of imagery suggest a moment of positive change that seems at odds with the news Louise has just received.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  25. Comparing Louise's grief to a storm emphasizes the enormous anguish she is expressing. In this metaphor, the tears she is crying correlate to the rain of a storm; that is, they are fierce, intense tears that illustrate Louise's "wild abandonment." Also, these stormy tears should be understood, somewhat paradoxically, in relation to the optimistic springtime images that follow in the next paragraph: her tears are the rains that usher in a sunnier season.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  26. Chopin contrasts Louise Mallard with how other women would be expected to react to such news: shock, paralysis, and an inability to comprehend events. However, Louise is not paralyzed by the news; she understands it immediately. Her ability to accept her husband’s death foreshadows her eventual reaction to the news, her true feelings about it, which she may not even understand at this point.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  27. The choice of words, such as “veiled hints" and "half concealing," contribute to an evasive, cautious tone. Additionally, readers are not told anything about Louise’s thoughts, only those of the characters around her. The evasiveness and caution in the language are a result of these characters’ worrying about Louise, creating a subdued, yet anticipatory, tone as they share the news of Louise's husband's death and consider her reaction.

    — Stephen Kernaghan

  28. Kate Chopin introduces Louise Mallard as a woman with a health condition whom others need to deal carefully with. The others worry that the news of Louise’s husband’s death could threaten her own life if not delivered gently. This initial portrayal characterizes Louise as delicate and needing careful attention.

    — Stephen Kernaghan