Literary Appreciation free essay sample

Hong Kong Baptist University College of International Education Associate Degree Program 3rd Semester 2012/13 Literary Appreciation (RCS 0031) Term Essay Student name: | Chan Shuk Ying| Student number:| 11638745| Section:| 64| Lecturer name:| Dr. Monica Chen| Date of submission: | 13th December, 2012| Why those short stories are sadness? Is it related to the author background? In this essay, I would like to analysis two stories of Kate Chopin. I would like to analysis these through several ways: Characteristic, theme and symbols. These two stories are â€Å"The Story of an Hour† and â€Å"Desiree’s baby† American author Kate Chopin (1850–1904) wrote two published novels and about a hundred short stories in the 1890s. Actually, she got a very sad childhood. Her sister died in infancy. Her brothers died while she had not twenty-five. And her father died when she only was three. Thus, she just only developed the life with her mother, grandmother, and her great-grandmother. Luckily, she had a good relationship between them. She started to write short stories. Most of her works those theme were feminist, regional local color. Some of the time she was a nonexistent author. In â€Å"The story of an hour†, the background period should be late 19th century. In this period, everyone was tried to promote women’s independence. Since the role of women in this should be husband’s belonging, a symbol of the husband’s status and wealth etc. and the â€Å"Desiree’s baby† is American Civil War which also 19th century. The problem of slavery was very serious. For the women, besides domesticity, women were also expected to be pious, pure, and submissive to men. Even they were able to gain a voice that proof they were republican motherhood. Characters are defined according to the way the author describes what they think, do and say. The characters of these two stories have difference characteristic: | The story of an hour| Desiree’s baby| Characteristic| Mrs. Mallard: * Suppressed, repressed, oppressed, gentle Physical description: para. 8Mr. Mallard * Repressive, dominant, controllingJosephine (Mrs. Mallard’s sister) * Caring, thoughtful, careful, anxiousRichards (Mr.Mallard’s friend) * Caring, thoughtful, protective| Desiree * Helpless, loved amp; trusted her husband (Armand) deeplyArmand (Desiree’s husband) * American realism – race discriminate, dominant * SelfishMadame Valmonde (Desiree’s Mother) * Caring| This table only includes the main characters of these stories. We could found that Mrs. Mallard and Desiree seem love their husband (Mr. Mallard and Armand) deeply. However, we might know that when they know their husband leave them alone and what happen next. Mrs. Mallard was surprised but she close herself into her room, through the window and tell herself â€Å"let it go† (â€Å"Free, free, free! † Chopin, 10). It seems like she found new freedom of women. However, Desiree felt hopeless, helpless after she knew her husband had not loved her anymore. Desiree did not know what she should do because there was one more reason that her husband left her alone, the color of skin. Luckily, there was at least one character(s) that was caring on them. Josephine and Richards did few actions to care her, such as they did not want to tell the fact of the accident of train. And Madame Valmonde also cared Desiree. It should relate Madame Valmonde is Desiree’s mother in law. These things may show the weakness of the author. It may show that she think women should be someone cares about. For the main male character of these two stories, they all show the America main aspect of a matter at that moment; Men domain and race discrimination. Story mention that Armand occur the baby is not white that he discard him and his wife. I think he is so selfish. He thought these will harm for him then discard. Theme is the central idea expressed by the story. From these characteristic and the story, we found the theme of these two: | The story of an hour| Desiree’s baby| Theme| * Women search for selfhood, self-discovery of identify * Female liberation * Emotional repression * Newfound freedom| * Race * Feminism (fair in gender)| We can see that there is the similar point: Female. Since I said before, the majority of Kate Chopin is about Feminism. In â€Å"Desiree’s baby†, we found female characters are more than male. And Kate uses much paragraph to describe the emotional change of Desiree. â€Å"When the baby was about three month sold, Desiree awoke one day to the conviction that there was something in the air menacing her peace. It was at first too subtle to grasp. † â€Å"And the very spirit of Satan seemed suddenly to take hold of him in his dealings with the slaves. Desiree was miserable enough to die. † (Chopin, 17). Kate even wants to magnify the feeling of main characters. â€Å"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. On her face, it may be dead of the joy. However, she may dead because of that newfound freedom gone suddenly. In â€Å"Desiree’s baby†, Kate said Desiree destroy and throw the letter away. This may by show that Desiree wanted to forgot the past and wanted a new life. Thus, she back to Madame Valmonde to life. There is one more similar of these two stories: the ending. Kate told us an unthinkful, unexpected, surprised fact to us. In â€Å"the story of an hour† she told us the reason of Mrs. Mallard dead is the joy. It also could echo to the beginning, Mrs. Mallard had heart trouble.