The Story of an Hour: Emancipation of a Woman

Kate Chopin starts this story introducing the reader about two facts: the heart disease of Mrs.

Mallard and the death of Mr. Mallard because of a train accident. This story represents the dream of

Mrs. Mallard to achieve her freedom. She lives her emancipation just for an hour. In a feminist

psychological analysis, the behavior of Mrs. Mallard can be analyzed from the Id (freedom feeling),

superego (personal role in society), and ego (back to reality) approach.

First of all, the id approach tells the reader that she experiences a mixture of feelings about the

death of her husband. Chopin tells that she “sometimes” loves him. His death means freedom for

her. This expression tells the reader how deep, strong and patriarchal was society at that time. When

she receives the news, she cannot almost control herself of feeling so happy and excited about

thinking how much her life is about to change: “ When she finally does acknowledge the joy, she

feels possessed by it and must abandon herself to it as the word free escapes her lips.” (Sparknotes

Editors, 2007). Her deeper wishes arise and she sees herself enjoying the news, thinking about her

future, new things to come and to do. She sits on a comfortable roomy armchair, watches the

window and faces herself feeling that strange sensation of quiet and peace… maybe, a sensation she

never felt before: freedom. Chopin introduces various symbols to represent her feelings: the

window, square as something with no exit but this time wide opened; the chair, comfortable and relax

giving a sense of peace; and the rain that is a symbol of water, of new things, of rebirth.

Secondly, after some time spending the taste of freedom and victory in her room, Josephine

and Richard knock the door and bring her back to reality. Superego arises and tells her she has to

pretend in front of people. Society is not prepared to that kind of feelings from a wife and less from a

recent widow. Society gives women a big list of duties, among which being an achy wife is well
seen by friends and relatives. She performs her role very well. She has been a good wife, has a well

recognized marriage, people think she is going to be devastated when she knows the news of her

husband death: “What this basically means is that women were just properties to men back in the 1th

centuries, and these women including Mrs. Mallard was trapped and silent by traditions.”

(Antiessays, 2008). Her friends and family are worried about her, because not only she has to deal

with this terrible situation but she also has a heart disease. The blue sky with patches and with clouds

symbolizes that after the clouds, after the funeral service, after some days of pretending; blue sky will

finally be there for her.

Finally, the battle of the id and the superego brings the ego to scenery. Among her wishes of

freedom and her pretending of being a very sad wife, her reality leads her to die. She never realized

or even thought about a possibility of a mistake. She was so happy to even think that something was

going to break her happiness. Seeing her husband entering the house was simply too much to stand.

Her ego betrays her. Her ego lets her fly very high as well as lets her fell down with no mercy (after

one hour). Her desires, her dreams, her plans break off as soon as she sees her husband standing at

the door. She feels frustrated. There was no balance among her Id, her Superego and her Ego. She

cannot manage what she wanted for real, and what was really happening.

As a final arrange among the three parts of psychic structure and seeing it from the feminist

approach, she finally achieved her freedom: death. It was better to her to die instead of facing again

the idea of living under the rules of a man, pretending to be a lovely wife who was not going to be

capable of living on her own and without his husband. She did not want to follow the rules of a

world managed by men, where women were not supposed to feel pleasure, to attend school, to make

an opinion and much less to think by themselves. A world where women were only supposed to take
care of homes, spouses and children. A world where women were taught by society that God created

them to serve men and to attend their husbands. A world where women were not free.
 References

SparkNotes Editors. (2007). SparkNote on The Story of an Hour. Retrieved April 2, 2012, from

http://www.sparknotes.com/short-stories/the-story-of-an-hour/

Anti Essays. (2008). Antiessays on Story of An Hour Critical Analyze. Retrieved on April 1, 2012

from http://www.antiessays.com/free-essays/22639.html