"Story Of the Hour" Response

I really enjoyed this story and its unexpected twist. I liked how Mrs. Mallard’s death was not what any reader would have originally jumped to. I also thought it interesting that Mrs. Mallard was seemingly happy over her husband’s dead. This is again a twist to the expected. The author Kate Chopin was really playing with the unexpected and the effects it has on the reader. I connected this to the idea that every person can guess the ending of a story to almost all the literature and story lines they come across. This idea is used in “The Story of an Hour”, to change the direction the reader follows the story. I found this to be clever. Mrs. Mallard’s joy over her husband’s death is the first twist thrown into the story to get a reaction out of the reader. When I read of her joy and the peacefulness and new beginnings around her, I had a immediate reaction of surprise. But then as I thought deeper about it I came to understand Mrs. Mallard’s joy. This twist and the imagery provided to prove such joy allowed me to feel for the character and her oppression and unhappiness with her slow “long” life with Mr. Mallard. Just as the reader comes to terms with Mrs. Mallard’s happiness from finding out her husband is dead, Kate Chopin throws in another twist. Bentley Mallard walking through the door and Mrs Mallard’s death is the next twist in the story. I had an emotional reaction to this twist as well. I felt, as a reader, utter shock at Mrs. Mallard’s death and the reason behind. Her reason for death is hidden within the words: she dies from grief and not joy like all assume. This idea was hard for me to grasp even though I felt sympathy for Mrs. Mallard’s life. This concept is cover up almost by Kate Chopin. “When the doctors came they said she had died of heart disease—of the joy that kills.” This quote is the final phrase used to drive the point home that no one knew Mrs. Mallard’s real desire to be free. This can be directly connected to the time it was written and the average role of the women during the time.

Ethan Frome Literary Criticism Summary

In criticism written by Alfred Kazin in 1987, the novel Ethan Frome is connected to Edith Wharton’s societal class and her moral affairs regarding marriage. Alfred Kazin implies that Edith Wharton’s bitter sense of being trapped in her societal class in wealthy New England created the Starkfield. The criticism gives evident that serves to prove that the chains that Edith Wharton felt in her society allowed her to create a suffocating and “socially hopeless” scene of Starkfield. Her wealthy New England upbringing and they struggle she had to go through to become and educated novelist gave her the frustration and bitterness shown throughout the novel by the character Ethan. The criticism states that Edith Wharton wrote Ethan Frome to symbolize her feelings on resentment of her class through “the dreariness of winter, the bareness of Ethan’s farmhouse, the insufficiency of his sawmill”. Alfred Kazin’s criticism also states that Ethan Frome is a vessel for the subject of illicit love. This criticism states that Edith Wharton was driving the theme “for love to really be love, it must be forbidden, it must fail, it must carry the doomed lovers down with it.” This theme is definitely present throughout Ethan Frome. This theme can be connected to Edith Wharton herself because her marriage to Edward Wharton was an unhappy and unfaithful one. She was known to have a love affair with Morton Fullerton. Her unsuccessful and unhappy marriage can connect to Ethan Frome that the novels obvious bitterness and unhappiness Ethan feels toward Zenna and his need to find escape through Mattie. This is a direct parallel to Edith Wharton’s marriage and affair. The criticism presented the ideas of Edith Wharton’s societal rank and marital affairs had an effect on the novel Ethan Frome. I think that Alfred Kazin made this point through some very clear connections. He used evidence that paralleled Edith Wharton’s life to the inner life of Ethan, Zenna, and Mattie. There is also evidence that connects the wealthy New England society Edith Wharton lived in to the poverty of Starkfield. I agree with the stand that Alfred Kazin takes on the novel Ethan Frome. I thought the connections made between Edith Wharton’s marriage and her affair and Ethan’s marriage and affair add depth to the meaning behind the novel. I think the desperation seen in Ethan’s want for Mattie may have been the way Edith Wharton released her frustration of her world. I agree with the criticism’s take on Ethan Frome being the way Edith Wharton could reveal the bitterness and frustration she felt in the oppression of the society.

"The Yellow Wallpaper" Response

I thought “The Yellow Wallpaper” was random and sporadic in thought. The short story’s narrator jumped from thought to thought throughout the story in a way that is hard to follow. This narration made the story confusing for me. Throughout most of the book I read without understanding for the text. The story seemed to have no plot line. The narrator seemed to just be talking about whatever came to mind. I also did not understand what the wallpapers significance was. For most of the story I had a hard time connecting the wallpaper to the woman. Also the fact that the wallpaper “moved” made no sense to me. I did end up somewhat understanding the wallpaper’s significance at the end of the story. The way I connected it was that the narrator used the wallpaper to signify the containment she felt. The movement of the lady in the wallpaper showed the narrator’s restlessness to be free. In the end when the narrator seemed to become the woman in the wallpaper as she tore the wallpaper down. This action seemed to free the narrator who had at that point become the woman in the wallpaper. This caused the narrator to feel the need to “creep” like she believed the lady in the wallpaper did at night. I also didn’t really understand the idea that the wallpaper moved at night but not during the day. My only understanding of this came by my rationalization that some things look different and more cynical at night. This seemed to radiate through the jumble of text I found this story to be. I feel there was a deeper meaning to the faces the narrator saw in the wallpaper by night. I believe they may have symbolized all the people who were holding her back; such as her husband and their housekeeper. I also didn’t quite understand why her husband called her “little girl” multiple times. I didn’t understand this because he seemed to be downgrading her to no more than a child when it was stated they had a child of their own. My only idea I came up with by the end is that the husband called her such because he saw her thinking she was sick as childish. Overall “The Yellow Wallpaper” confused me and I feel as if I only have a partial understanding of what this story meant to truly convey.