Victimization

      So far in the novel, people tend to victimize Mrs. Pontellier. She is viewed as a woman who is degraded in her skill level and intellectual promise. She is also viewed as a stay-at-home mother who wants to do more with her life than take care of children and clean their home. While I agree with these views, I also think that Mr. Pontellier is typically seen as a controlling husband who doesn’t care what his wife does.  “He did not know perhaps he would return from the early dinner and perhaps he would not,” (Chopin 3). He was supposed to go and meet his pals for a game of billiards, and wasn’t sure how long the game would last. This could also be interpreted as Mr. Pontellier did not want to come home to eat dinner with his wife and children, and maybe he didn’t.
In this time period, it wasn’t ideal to marry the person you loved. You married to get the best deal for you and your family. Of course there were those few cases of the ones who did marry for love, but it was rare. In the novel, Mr. Pontellier is also a victim. He doesn’t seem to be in love with his wife, but he still does things for her when she asks. She asked him to hold her rings while she goes to “hang out” with Robert in the gulf, and he obliges with no problem. “She silently reached out to him, and he, understanding, took the rings from his vest pocket and dropped them into her open palm,” (3). At least they had developed an understanding, when many others may have had nothing but constant arguing. In this era, you had to make the most out of what you had. He shouldn’t be victimized for not being in love with his wife because she doesn’t seem to be in love with him either.