Edna Pontellier has
transformed immensely throughout The Awakening. As the title suggests, Mrs. Pontellier
had undergone a sort of ‘awakening’. In the beginning of the story, she had
been unaware, almost, of her true wishes and personal desires. Edna Pontellier
was content with her position as the wife and mother of Léonce Pontellier and
his children. Throughout the story and until the very end, she develops more
and more as an individual. She is not just a woman or a wife. She is able to
identify herself and someone who has sexual and nonsexual desire, wants and
needs. After assessing the final chapter of this short story, I have been able
to find many different forms of symbolism and examples in which Edna has
transformed. “All along the white beach, up and down, there was no living thing
in sight. A bird with a broken wing was beating the air above, reeling,
fluttering, circling disabled down, down to the water.”(Chopin 175) I am sure
that this damaged bird is meant to represent Edna herself. The bird flies and
flies with the broken wing, but finally allows itself to fall, unable to
sustain itself with its preceding injuries. Edna Pontellier, with her life
falling before her, is unable to keep going. She has done so much to identify
as a free-woman, but with her deep despondency, she cannot go on. Edna no
longer has the will to live. In just the next paragraph, Edna is entering the
water and decides to remove her bathing suit for the first time. “But when she
was there beside the sea, absolutely alone, she cast the unpleasant, pricking
garments from her, and for the first time in her life she stood naked in the
open air, at the mercy of the sun, the breeze that beat upon her, and the waves
that invited her. How strange and awful it seemed to stand naked under the sky!
how delicious! She felt like some new-born creature, opening its eyes in a
familiar world that it had never known.”(Chopin 175) I understand this to be precisely as it states, and more. Kate
Chopin could not have better stated this in any way. Simply, by removing the
bathing suit and allowing the water of the gulf to submerge her body, Edna
Pontellier had allowed herself to become fully conscious. She is awake to the
horrors and beauties of the world around her and of her own self. Edna swims,
further and further into the ocean until she begins to become exhausted. The
story then abruptly, but not surprisingly, ends with her giving in to this exhaustion.
This represents her death, figuratively and spiritually.
I do understand her death at the end of the story, but was it her death spiritually? Would it be possible in a sort of sense of her spirit lives on sort of religious way?
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with you! There were many forms of symbolism in the novel that in my opinion was able to somehow explain Edna's personality to us even if the story couldn't do so itself. Every once in a while, a bird would pop up in the story and I think that it was supposed to represent her all along and we didn't exactly realize that until the very end
ReplyDeleteI agree that Edna grew immensely throughout the novel. An example is when she swam for the first time, and then got scared. At the end, she was no longer scared of the water. She had fully embraced her new identity.
ReplyDeleteAlthough I believe Edna's journey was one of climax, I feel like she did remain the same person inside throughout the novel. She didn't seem to show any new affection towards her children, husband, and herself. I understand your point, however, as the symbolism reflects different emotions.
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