Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

The Awakening
The Awakening
The Awakening
Ebook200 pages2 hours

The Awakening

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

3.5/5

()

Read preview

About this ebook

First published in 1899, this compelling novel shocked readers with its honest treatment of female marital infidelity.

Audiences accustomed to the pieties of late Victorian romantic fiction were taken aback by Chopin’s daring portrayal of twenty-eight-year-old protagonist Edna Pontellier and her struggle to negotiate love and motherhood. She is a woman trapped in a stifling marriage who seeks and finds passionate physical love outside the straitened confines of her domestic situation

This sensuous book tells of the woman’s abandonment of her family, her seduction, and her awakening to desires and passions that threatened to consume her. The novel so disturbed critics and the public that it was banished for decades afterward.

Aside from its unusually frank treatment of a then-controversial subject, the novel is widely admired today for its literary qualities. It is hailed as a work that is beautifully written, and uninhibited in its treatment of infidelity. Few novels have plumbed the psychology of a woman in search of self-discovery who turns away from conventions and becomes involved in an illicit relationship with the perception, artistry, and honesty that Kate Chopin brought to The Awakening.

This powerful and provocative reading experience, rooted firmly in the romantic tradition of Herman Melville and Emily Dickinson has been hailed as an early vision of woman’s emancipation. This sensitive, innovative combination of realistic narrative and psychological complexity contributed to the birth of American modernist literature and has been hailed as the catalyst to creating a genre that inspired authors such as William Faulkner and Ernest Hemingway.
LanguageEnglish
PublisherG&D Media
Release dateJun 17, 2020
ISBN9781722524470
Author

Kate Chopin

Kate Chopin was born in St. Louis, Missouri,In 1851. She began writing shortly after herHusband's death and, from 1889 until her ownDeath, her stories and other miscellaneousWritings appeared in Vogue, Youth's companion,Atlantic Monthly, Century, Saturday EveningPost, and other publications. In addition to The Awakening, Mrs. Chopin published another novel, At Fault, and two collections of short stories and sketches, Bayou Folk and A Night at Acadie. The publication of The Awakening in 1899 occasioned shocked and angry response from reviewers all over the country. The book was taken off the shelves of the St. Louis mercantile library and its author was barred from the fine arts club. Kate Chopin died in 1904.

Read more from Kate Chopin

Related to The Awakening

Related ebooks

Classics For You

View More

Related articles

Related categories

Reviews for The Awakening

Rating: 3.5979992454062883 out of 5 stars
3.5/5

2,449 ratings64 reviews

What did you think?

Tap to rate

Review must be at least 10 words

  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Regarded as highly scandalous when it was published in 1898, this story of a young wife who is bored with her lie as a proper wife and mother in late 19th Century New Orleans and seeks out her own independent life, seems fairly run of the mill in the 21st Century. It is, however, well written and held my interest from beginning to end.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    ... oh my goodness me the reviews.

    Some of them are so unkind, so cruel and so scathing. And for everyone criticising Chopin's writing and saying how they would write this book -- Go! Go write a book with feminist themes that you'd like to see in a book.

    Edna, as a female protagonist, stands for so much more than a selfish woman who has had an affair. She is brave enough, and bold enough to completely abandon society and realise that she is so much more than a mother and a wife. She realises, during the course of the book, that she has a self that neither her husband or her children would ever see.

    This book is full of metaphors and beautifully written. I loved how Chopin created atmosphere and texture and colour, and how she drew on her environment to enhance her writing. It was written in 1899, and was so ground-breaking for its time.

    I don't like books about cheating, or with cheating tropes. I think it's lazy, and I don't find it interesting.

    But I loved this book. This is an important book.

    But more than anything, I love Edna. She is a beautiful, flawed women, and I saw part of myself in her. Furthermore, all these negative comments and reviews make me realise that this is why we need feminism. This is why I need feminism.

    And I will love and defend Edna and her choices till the end of my days. Chopin, I tip my hat to you. I will give this book to my friends, and to anyone who asks.

    (I feel like this review is a little bit harsh - we're all entitled to our different opinions but it makes me a bit sad that people are so unfair to a female protagonist.)
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Required reading in too many English classes, normally I would hate such a text, but this actually is pretty good, and has always been very relevant. It stands the test of time like few do. Not my favorite period or writer, but among the best of each. Recommended.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Edna Pontellier “awakens” during another summer spent with her husband and children on Grande Isle, LA. The sultry nights, the hypnotic lapping of the waves on the beach, the intoxicating scents and the attentions of one person in particular all combine to bring strength to Edna’s inner self. Slowly, she comes to feel that she has stifled the person inside her for her husband, her family and society. She is unable to fully explain what is happening to her, but she knows that she can no longer be untrue to herself.

    I really enjoyed this novella. I could not help but think about Edith Wharton’s House of Mirth; I see so many parallels between Lily Bart and Edna. The time frame is similar (late 1890s), as is the inner turmoil of our heroine as she tries to make decisions about her life. While Edna is older than Lily, and has already achieved a measure of success in society (i.e. she has married well, has two charming children and a lovely home), she, like Lily, longs for something that will result in her removal from the society she knows.

    The novella unfolds slowly, with limited dialogue, but a vivid sense of place. There is languorousness about the writing that mimics the languor felt on a hot and humid summer day on Grand Isle. Two scenes provide a perfect contrast and illustrate Edna’s awakening spirit. In one she sits with her husband on the veranda all night with scarcely a word between them and a palpable distance. In the other she spends an afternoon napping, while her friend Robert sits outside under a tree waiting; and despite the physical distance and lack of personal contact portrayed there is a palpable intimacy between them.

    Without expressing her feelings exactly, the novel gave me insight into how Edna must have felt – excited by this new phase of her life, afraid to reveal how much it means to her, unsure she’s chosen wisely, full of regret, and finally accepting.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Loved it! I especially love the ambiguous ending that I enjoy arguing about.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    This book is about the journey of a woman and how she struggles with trying to decide what is best versus what she is supposed to do or think according to society. This book brings attention to women's issues back in the day. The book is not really my style, therefore i really did not enjoy it.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
     The Awakening is a Darwinian fable and, indeed, the finest example of the naturalist "school" in American literature. Edna Pontellier undergoes a multi-staged awakening that is ironic and only partially liberatory. She awakens to the fact that she neither loves nor desires her husband, Leonce Pontellier, and refuses to count among his possessions. She awakens to her love for Robert, who flees to Mexico to escape his love for Edna. She awakens to her need for independence and solitude, and obtains her own apartment, where she has been occupied in transforming herself into an artist. But is Edna an artist? Not in the sense of the pianist, Mademoiselle Reisz, whose brilliant artistry gives Edna the only safe outlet for her intense need for strong, overwhelming emotion throughout the entire book. Her art fails, though, because Edna has come to her realizations about her needs for solitude, independence, and intense emotion only after she has been married to Leonce, a man she does not love, and has two sons by him, for whom she cannot sacrifice her life to love. Near the end of the novel, Doctor Mandelet, who has seen after Adele during her terror inspiring (and tortured) delivery, turns to Edna and tells her that the problem is that Nature fills youth with illusions. These illusions are, Dr. Mandelet notes, following Darwin's theories about disguise in nature, are a decoy of Nature designed to "secure mothers for the race." As he says, "Nature takes no account of moral consequences, of arbitrary conditions which we create, and which we feel obliged to maintain at any cost."
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Early feminist work. Important but depressing.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I will start this interview by saying that this is not the edition of 'The Awakening' I got my hands on back in my college days. Nevertheless, this is an incredible book. On a personal note, I was struggling with nineteenth century literature, when my professor remarked to me that this book was different. And so it has been for me- this is one of my enduring favorites, a mesmerizing character study depicting a woman's quest that was considered scandalous in its day, but remains relevant to today's audience. But this book is more than that, it should not be dismissed as a 'woman's' book, as the emotional turmoil described in this book is something that perhaps transcends gender, as all of us experience certain frustrations and inhibitions in our lives. This is most apparent in the book's conclusion, which is equal parts tragedy and triumph. Beautifully written, with an emotional impact that will not be lost, this is a classic to add to one's personal library.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I found this to be a frustrating story. There were no characters that I really liked. The women were snobby and self-absorbed, the men distant and self-absorbed. I never really felt any empathy for Edna until close to the end of the story, and then, the story was over. Very unsatisfying.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    story of repressed womanhood. written 100 years ago yet very contemporary. new orleans and the islands. mrs. pontellier -- edna - an artist. a less repressed age of innocence. her lover - robert.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    i read this for school and really liked it. the metaphors are a little overboard but presented with nice images, the romance addictive (the love interest is my favorite character!), and the ending, well, i doubt you'd see it coming. It's very much about women's rights, and it's pretty old. People tend to either love or hate it-i loved it...
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This was an English class assigned read, but really I think it might have been the nicest one all year. Despite how much I disliked the character of Edna, the book itself brought up excellent points and was written exceedingly well. Definitely worth the time spent on it.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Good read. A woman trapped in a role as mother and wife and is not content. Taking into consideration that it was first published in 1899, this novel speaks volumes on women and self identity.
  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    SHUDDER! Egads, I had to read this again and again in my undergrad literature career. Each time I found the main character not only unsympathetic, but revolting. Gah! And no, I'm not handing in my feminist card just because I hate this book!
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I have always loved this book. I am from Louisiana and we have a vacation home on Grand Isle (where I am sitting now and writing this). I know that many think of this as a feminist work and I do agree. However I have always had a problem with the ending. Chopin must let Edna die because that is what the readers of that time needed. Any other ending for Edna would have been even more scandalous. I would have loved to know what Chopin was thinking here. Was it to satisfy her readers moral expectations, or was there another meaning that was more personal? This is one I have read more than once and will read again I am sure.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Written just before the turn of the century (1899), this book was a bold statement by Kate Chopin. It was on banned books lists for years because the author dared to give voice to the unspoken ideas that women have lives, minds, thoughts and desires that cannot be dictated by the men in their lives. Some have called it the original of the "romance" genre. As far as literature goes, I found it difficult in the beginning and it totally failed to stir any real emotion for the characters. As far as history goes and a look into the lives and minds of the women in our past, it is worthy of the time spent. Enlightening, but not terribly entertaining.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I read this in high school as an English class assignment. On its own, it seemed like an okay book. The character, Edna, is a bit irritating in terms of characters who let things happen to them, but the way she takes control of her own destiny and the fallout from doing so is interesting, especially in the context of the time period. My own reaction to the book was colored by the fact that an English class has to tear it apart and find every ounce of symbolism that may or may not exist, but I think as a book on its own, it could be very enjoyable.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    Edna Pontellier starts out as an ordinary housewife with a kindly husband and two children. Her life is insipid and dull, but see that she is contented in it only because she knows nothing else. However, when she falls in love with Robert Lebrun, she awakens to her latent sexuality and begins to wish for freedom from the restraints of family, of duty, of domesticity. As Edna becomes aware of her liberty and power as a woman, she fights the role that she has been thrust into. She wishes to free herself from all responsibilities that chain her from the true emancipation she desires. However, Edna's only freedom is in choosing her bonds. Edna finds that she is still captive when she tries to shake off restraint. Though she feels her marriage to be no bar to her enjoyment of life, her love for Robert and the responsibility for her children become the tightest manacles of all.
    The writing is lyrical, but although I sympathize with Edna's struggle, her feeling of being trapped between two worlds, I also find that her willful selfishness makes her a somewhat unsympathetic character. Torn between two worlds, her act of "bravery" is succumbing to passion; she behaves like a child instead of an adult.
    The Awakening is a classic; its dreamy, poetic writing and evocative imagery is strong, but I was unable to actually like the characters.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I came to this book with a few criteria.The Awakening basically fulfilled my objective.The time period was late 19th century......The topic was controversial for the time....The writer was a woman----------------I might add, my e reader copy presented a nice biographical sketch of the authoras an addendum.3.5*
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Book Description The Awakening, originally titled A Solitary Soul, is a novel by Kate Chopin, first published in 1899. Set in New Orleans and the Southern Louisiana coast at the end of the nineteenth century, the plot centers on Edna Pontellier and her struggle to reconcile her increasingly unorthodox views on femininity and motherhood with the prevailing social attitudes of the turn-of-the-century American South. It is one of the earliest American novels that focuses on women's issues without condescension. It is also widely seen as a landmark work of early feminism, generating mixed reaction from contemporary readers and criticism. The novel's blend of realistic narrative, incisive social commentary, and psychological complexity makes The Awakening a precursor of American modernist literature; it prefigures the works of American novelists such as William Faulkner and Ernest Hemingway and echoes the works of contemporaries such as Edith Wharton and Henry James. It can also be considered among the first Southern works in a tradition that would culminate with the modern masterpieces of Faulkner, Flannery O'Connor, Eudora Welty, Katherine Anne Porter, and Tennessee Williams.

    Book Review This is a very controversial book on what it's like to be a woman. It gives a brilliant insight in gender roles at the end of the 19th and women's coping with their struggle for independence. Chopin's writing style makes it easy to follow the plot and feel for the protagonist. I recommend this book to anyone interested in reading about the old south from a woman's point of view. 
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Loved it as much this time as the first time I read it in college.
  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    I don't remember the writing, only that I didn't like the story. It falls into a category of stories that I find problematic -- in which female characters who have affairs must somehow die.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I loved this book when I first read it in college. I decided to reread it as my daughter was reading it for school and unfortunately it didn't move me this time. I found that the story moved very slowly. That I really didn't like the entitled characters. And the first time I read it I could identify with Edna. This time I really disliked Edna. Perhaps I could forgive her leaving a husband that she didn't like. But her disinterest in her children made me angry. And the ending really bothered me this time.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A married woman has an awakening of spirit after falling in love with a young man on a vacation by the seaside, which leads her to new social and spiritual freedoms. It's interesting that despite her husband's insistence that his wife must be ill to behave this way, many of her friends and allies (and some strangers/acquaintances) remain true and support her. Told with sparse prose, this story is considered a strong feminist tale, and considering the period in which it was written, it certainly is. Though it's old fashioned by today's standards, it's still a beautiful, touching story.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I was first introduced to this book at the library. Students would pour in with their required reading assignment in hand and would flock to this book. I think they chose it because it was short and it had the potential to have sex scenes in it. Those are both terrible reasons to pick up this book. In many not so subtle ways the book immediately demonstrates that Mr. Pontellier is quite a jerk. That general theme reminds me a lot of Virginia Woolf’s To the Lighthouse where the men bluster and have expectations that aren’t to be questioned. There is the expectation of women to take care of everything to please her husband, as if that was the only purpose of a wife. The situation translates so well over time where women were viewed as objects, robots, there to serve a function. Anyone who rebelled against this was thought to tear at the seams of good society. However, just like many other classics (Madame Bovary) the woman who is unhappy with this domestic arrangement makes mistakes in just hoping for a change. Those mistakes always lead to tragic results. I really enjoyed the book for the lyrical language and the plight of poor Mrs. Pontellier. The Awakening is the prototype of feminist novels and I am sorry I put it off for so long.Favorite passages:"In short, Mrs. Pontellier was beginning to realize her position in the universe as a human being, and to recognize her relations as an individual to the world within and about her. This may seem like a ponderous weight of wisdom to descend upon the soul of a young woman of twenty-eight--perhaps more wisdom than the Holy Ghost is usually pleased to vouchsafe to any woman. p. 18"The voice of the sea is seductive; never ceasing, whispering, clamoring, murmuring, inviting the soul to wander for a spell in abysses of solitude; to lose itself in mazes of inward contemplation. The voice of the sea speaks to the soul. The touch of the sea is sensuous, enfolding the body in its soft, close embrace." p. 18"With a writhing motion she settled herself more securely in the hammock. She perceived that her will had blazed up, stubborn and resistant. She could not at that moment have done other than denied and resisted. She wondered if her husband had ever spoken to her like that before, and if she had submitted to his command. Of course she had; she remembered that she had. But she could not realize why or how she should have yielded, feeling as she then did." p. 35"and she tried to discover wherein this summer had been different from any and every other summer of her life. She could only realize that she herself--her present self--was in some way different from the other self. That she was seeing with different eyes and making the acquaintance of new conditions in herself that colored and changed her environment, she did not yet suspect." p. 44"The past was nothing to her; offered no lesson which she was willing to heed. The future was a mystery which she never attempted to penetrate. The present alone was significant; was hers, to torture her as it was doing then with the biting conviction that she had lost that which she had held, that she had been denied that which her impassioned, newly awakened being demanded." p. 48"Mr Pontellier had been a rather courteous husband so long as he met a certain submissiveness in his wife But her and unexpected line of conduct completely bewildered him It shocked him her absolute disregard for her duties a wife angered him. When Mr Pontelier became rude Edna grew insolent She had resolved never to take another step backward" p. 75"It sometimes entered Mr Pontellier's to wonder if his wife were not growing a little unbalanced mentally. He could plainly that she was not herself. That is he could not see that she was becoming herself and daily casting aside that fictitious which we assume like a garment with which to appear before the world." p. 80"Or else she stayed indoors and nursed a mood with which she was becoming too familiar for her own comfort and peace of mind. It was not despair but it seemed to her as if life were passing by leaving its promise broken and unfulfilled." p.100"She felt as if a mist had been lifted from her eyes enabling her to look upon and comprehend the significance of life that monster made up of beauty and brutality." p. 125 "Every step which she took toward relieving herself from obligations added to her strength and expansion as an individual. She began to look with her own eyes to see and to apprehend the deeper undercurrents of life." p. 150"She had pictured him seeking her at the very first hour and he had lived under the same sky since day before yesterday while only by accident had he stumbled upon her." p. 175"You have been a very very foolish boy your time dreaming of impossible things when you speak of Mr Pontellier setting me free. I am no longer one of Mr possessions to dispose of or not give myself where I choose If he were to say "Here Robert take her and be happy; she is yours!" I should laugh at you both." p. 185
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I know this book supposed to be about the woman's sexual awakening and her awakening to the fact that, as a good wife and mother she's expected to subsume herself in the happiness of her family and she refuses to do such a thing. I was a little disappointed, though, that the only way she could think of expressing herself and asserting her individuality was through romance which I find to be many a woman's downfall and far from the meaning of life.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Probably one of the most important books I've read... and I always forget about it! Forced to read in high school I fell in love with literature. And then, re-read as an adult... as a writer... simply unforgettable. I turn to it again and again for work with transitions and scenery. Brilliant.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I read this book in either junior high or high school and, even though my circumstances were very different than the protagonist's, I identified so strongly with the feeling of being confined and restricted and just wanting to break free.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This book is always a bit difficult for me to read, but it's just so touching. Chopin really makes me feel Edna's confusion. The end always makes me cry.

Book preview

The Awakening - Kate Chopin

I

A green and yellow parrot, which hung in a cage outside the door, kept repeating over and over: "Allez vous-en! Allez vous-en! Sapristi!* That’s all right!"

He could speak a little Spanish, and also a language which nobody understood, unless it was the mocking-bird that hung on the other side of the door, whistling his fluty notes out upon the breeze with maddening persistence.

Mr. Pontellier, unable to read his newspaper with any degree of comfort, arose with an expression and an exclamation of disgust. He walked down the gallery and across the narrow bridges which connected the Lebrun cottages one with the other. He had been seated before the door of the main house. The parrot and the mockingbird were the property of Madame Lebrun, and they had the right to make all the noise they wished. Mr. Pontellier had the privilege of quitting their society when they ceased to be entertaining.

He stopped before the door of his own cottage, which was the fourth one from the main building and next to the last. Seating himself in a wicker rocker which was there, he once more applied himself to the task of reading the newspaper. The day was Sunday; the paper was a day old. The Sunday papers had not yet reached Grand Isle. He was already acquainted with the market reports, and he glanced restlessly over the editorials and bits of news which he had not had time to read before quitting New Orleans the day before.

Mr. Pontellier wore eye-glasses. He was a man of forty, of medium height and rather slender build; he stooped a little. His hair was brown and straight, parted on one side. His beard was neatly and closely trimmed.

Once in a while he withdrew his glance from the newspaper and looked about him. There was more noise than ever over at the house. The main building was called the house, to distinguish it from the cottages. The chattering and whistling birds were still at it. Two young girls, the Farival twins, were playing a duet from Zampa upon the piano. Madame Lebrun was bustling in and out, giving orders in a high key to a yard-boy whenever she got inside the house, and directions in an equally high voice to a dining-room servant whenever she got outside. She was a fresh, pretty woman, clad always in white with elbow sleeves. Her starched skirts crinkled as she came and went. Farther down, before one of the cottages, a lady in black was walking demurely up and down, telling her beads. A good many persons of the pension had gone over to the Chênière Caminada in Beaudelet’s lugger to hear mass. Some young people were out under the wateroaks playing croquet. Mr. Pontellier’s two children were there—sturdy little fellows of four and five. A quadroon nurse followed them about with a faraway, meditative air.

Mr. Pontellier finally lit a cigar and began to smoke, letting the paper drag idly from his hand. He fixed his gaze upon a white sunshade that was advancing at snail’s pace from the beach. He could see it plainly between the gaunt trunks of the water-oaks and across the stretch of yellow camomile. The gulf looked far away, melting hazily into the blue of the horizon. The sunshade continued to approach slowly. Beneath its pink-lined shelter were his wife, Mrs. Pontellier, and young Robert Lebrun. When they reached the cottage, the two seated themselves with some appearance of fatigue upon the upper step of the porch, facing each other, each leaning against a supporting post.

What folly! to bathe at such an hour in such heat! exclaimed Mr. Pontellier. He himself had taken a plunge at daylight. That was why the morning seemed long to him.

You are burnt beyond recognition, he added, looking at his wife as one looks at a valuable piece of personal property which has suffered some damage. She held up her hands, strong, shapely hands, and surveyed them critically, drawing up her fawn sleeves above the wrists. Looking at them reminded her of her rings, which she had given to her husband before leaving for the beach. She silently reached out to him, and he, understanding, took the rings from his vest pocket and dropped them into her open palm. She slipped them upon her fingers; then clasping her knees, she looked across at Robert and began to laugh. The rings sparkled upon her fingers. He sent back an answering smile.

What is it? asked Pontellier, looking lazily and amused from one to the other. It was some utter nonsense; some adventure out there in the water, and they both tried to relate it at once. It did not seem half so amusing when told. They realized this, and so did Mr. Pontellier. He yawned and stretched himself. Then he got up, saying he had half a mind to go over to Klein’s hotel and play a game of billiards.

Come go along, Lebrun, he proposed to Robert. But Robert admitted quite frankly that he preferred to stay where he was and talk to Mrs. Pontellier.

Well, send him about his business when he bores you, Edna, instructed her husband as he prepared to leave.

Here, take the umbrella, she exclaimed, holding it out to him. He accepted the sunshade, and lifting it over his head descended the steps and walked away.

Coming back to dinner? his wife called after him. He halted a moment and shrugged his shoulders. He felt in his vest pocket; there was a ten-dollar bill there. He did not know; perhaps he would return for the early dinner and perhaps he would not. It all depended upon the company which he found over at Klein’s and the size of the game. He did not say this, but she understood it, and laughed, nodding good-by to him.

Both children wanted to follow their father when they saw him starting out. He kissed them and promised to bring them back bonbons and peanuts.

* Go away! Go away! For heaven’s sake!

II

Mrs. Pontellier’s eyes were quick and bright; they were a yellowish brown, about the color of her hair. She had a way of turning them swiftly upon an object and holding them there as if lost in some inward maze of contemplation or thought.

Her eyebrows were a shade darker than her hair. They were thick and almost horizontal, emphasizing the depth of her eyes. She was rather handsome than beautiful. Her face was captivating by reason of a certain frankness of expression and a contradictory subtle play of features. Her manner was engaging.

Robert rolled a cigarette. He smoked cigarettes because he could not afford cigars, he said. He had a cigar in his pocket which Mr. Pontellier had presented him with, and he was saving it for his after-dinner smoke.

This seemed quite proper and natural on his part. In coloring he was not unlike his companion. A clean-shaved face made the resemblance more pronounced than it would otherwise have been. There rested no shadow of care upon his open countenance. His eyes gathered in and reflected the light and languor of the summer day.

Mrs. Pontellier reached over for a palm-leaf fan that lay on the porch and began to fan herself, while Robert sent between his lips light puffs from his cigarette. They chatted incessantly: about the things around them; their amusing adventure out in the water—it had again assumed its entertaining aspect; about the wind, the trees, the people who had gone to the Chênière; about the children playing croquet under the oaks, and the Farival twins, who were now performing the overture to The Poet and the Peasant.

Robert talked a good deal about himself. He was very young, and did not know any better. Mrs. Pontellier talked a little about herself for the same reason. Each was interested in what the other said. Robert spoke of his intention to go to Mexico in the autumn, where fortune awaited him. He was always intending to go to Mexico, but some way never got there. Meanwhile he held on to his modest position in a mercantile house in New Orleans, where an equal familiarity with English, French and Spanish gave him no small value as a clerk and correspondent.

He was spending his summer vacation, as he always did, with his mother at Grand Isle. In former times, before Robert could remember, the house had been a summer luxury of the Lebruns. Now, flanked by its dozen or more cottages, which were always filled with exclusive visitors from the Quartier Francais, it enabled Madame Lebrun to maintain the easy and comfortable existence which appeared to be her birthright.

Mrs. Pontellier talked about her father’s Mississippi plantation and her girlhood home in the old Kentucky bluegrass country. She was an American woman, with a small infusion of French which seemed to have been lost in dilution. She read a letter from her sister, who was away in the East, and who had engaged herself to be married. Robert was interested, and wanted to know what manner of girls the sisters were, what the father was like, and how long the mother had been dead.

When Mrs. Pontellier folded the letter it was time for her to dress for the early dinner.

I see Léonce isn’t coming back, she said, with a glance in the direction whence her husband had disappeared. Robert supposed he was not, as there were a good many New Orleans club men over at Klein’s.

When Mrs. Pontellier left him to enter her room, the young man descended the steps and strolled over toward the croquet players, where, during the half-hour before dinner, he amused himself with the little Pontellier children, who were very fond of him.

III

It was eleven o’clock that night when Mr. Pontellier returned from Klein’s hotel. He was in an excellent humor, in high spirits, and very talkative. His entrance awoke his wife, who was in bed and fast asleep when he came in. He talked to her while he undressed, telling her anecdotes and bits of news and gossip that he had gathered during the day. From his trousers pockets he took a fistful of crumpled bank notes and a good deal of silver coin, which he piled on the bureau indiscriminately with keys, knife, handkerchief, and whatever else happened to be in his pockets. She was overcome with sleep, and answered him with little half utterances.

He thought it very discouraging that his wife, who was the sole object of his existence, evinced so little interest in things which concerned him, and valued so little his conversation.

Mr. Pontellier had forgotten the bonbons and peanuts for the boys. Notwithstanding he loved them very much, and went into the adjoining room where they slept to take a look at them and make sure that they were resting comfortably. The result of his investigation was far from satisfactory. He turned and shifted the youngsters about in bed. One of them began to kick and talk about a basket full of crabs.

Mr. Pontellier returned to his wife with the information that Raoul had a high fever and needed looking after. Then he lit a cigar and went and sat near the open door to smoke it.

Mrs. Pontellier was quite sure Raoul had no fever. He had gone to bed perfectly well, she said, and nothing had ailed him all day. Mr. Pontellier was too well acquainted with fever symptoms to be mistaken. He assured her the child was consuming at that moment in the next room.

He reproached his wife with her inattention, her habitual neglect of the children. If it was not a mother’s place to look after children, whose on earth was it? He himself had his hands full with his brokerage business. He could not be in two places at once; making a living for his family on the street, and staying at home to see that no harm befell them. He talked in a monotonous, insistent way.

Mrs. Pontellier sprang out of bed and went into the next room. She soon came back and sat on the edge of the bed, leaning her head down on the pillow. She said nothing, and refused to answer her husband when he questioned her. When his cigar was smoked out he went to bed, and in half a minute he was fast asleep.

Mrs. Pontellier was by that time thoroughly awake. She began to cry a little, and wiped her eyes on the sleeve of her peignoir. Blowing out the candle, which her husband had left burning, she slipped her bare feet into a pair of satin mules at the foot of the bed and went out on the porch, where she sat down in the wicker chair and began to rock gently to and fro.

It was then past midnight. The cottages were all dark. A single faint light gleamed out from the hallway of the house. There was no sound abroad except the hooting of an old owl in the top of a water-oak, and the everlasting voice of the sea, that was not uplifted at that soft hour. It broke like a mournful lullaby upon the night.

The tears came so fast to Mrs. Pontellier’s eyes that the damp sleeve of her peignoir no longer served to dry them. She was holding the back of her chair with one hand; her loose sleeve had slipped almost to the shoulder of her uplifted arm. Turning, she thrust her face, steaming and wet, into the bend of her arm, and she went on crying there, not caring any longer to dry her face, her eyes, her arms. She could not have told why she was crying. Such experiences as the foregoing were not uncommon in her married life. They seemed never before to have weighed much against the abundance of her husband’s kindness and a uniform devotion which had come to be tacit and self-understood.

An indescribable oppression, which seemed to generate in some unfamiliar part of her consciousness, filled her whole being with a vague anguish. It was like a shadow, like a mist passing across her soul’s summer day. It was strange and unfamiliar; it was a mood. She did not sit there inwardly upbraiding her husband, lamenting at Fate, which had directed her footsteps to the path which they had taken. She was just having a good cry all to herself. The mosquitoes made merry over her, biting her firm, round arms and nipping at her bare insteps.

The little stinging, buzzing imps succeeded in dispelling a mood which might have held her there in the darkness half a night longer.

The following morning Mr. Pontellier was up in good time to take the rockaway which was to convey him to the steamer at the wharf. He was returning to the city to his business,

Enjoying the preview?
Page 1 of 1