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Summary of The Story of an Hour by Kate Chopin

THE STORY OF AN HOUR Kate Chopin was a forgotten American voice until her literary excellence and skill was rescued in the 1950 's . Born Katherine O 'Flaherty , she married Oscar Chopin when she was twenty and moved with her husband to Louisiana . When he died a young man , she and her six children , financially independent , began to write while raising her children . Kate Chopin became a good example of an American realist in the way that she tried to represent American life the way it is actually lived

In The

Story of an Hour , the main character is Mrs . Mallard who is suffering from a heart condition . At the beginning of the story , Mrs Mallard is told that her husband is killed in a railroad disaster and she reacts with uncontrolled weeping and crying . Mrs . Mallard locks herself into her room and is secluded from the outside the world and all who care about her . However , in a strange turn of events , Mrs . Mallard 's emotion turns from despair to a sense of freedom as she recites the word free ' over and over as she sits secluded in her room . This new found sense of freedom does not last long and is abruptly stopped when her sister , Josephine , arrives at her door to present Mrs . Mallard with her husband , the man who had been presumed dead . One would think that Mrs Mallard would be overcome with joy and had this reunion occurred earlier , this would have been the case . However , it all comes too late as Mrs . Mallard sees this new sense of freedom ripped away from her as quickly as it came . This event , which is seen as a tragedy in the eyes of Mrs . Mallard , the reader is led to believe , causes her to collapse and die

The title : The Story of an Hour , could be seen as a representation of how brief of a glimpse into the last hour of Mrs . Mallard 's life . Within the story , everything happens to Mrs . Mallard very quickly and in rapid succession . The first reaction of the reader may be that Mrs . Mallard died of a preexisting heart condition that had finally caught up with her and that the death of her husband and the prolonged weeping finally did her in . But when the reader discovers that it is rather the husband 's earthly presence which does Mrs . Mallard in , it is an example of dramatic irony . The story is too brief to give an adequate amount of detail as to why Mrs . Mallard might have felt this way . The story was written in 1894 when women were not allowed to vote on a national scale and in many states , women were not allowed to hold property of any kind or enter into contracts by themselves . The rights of women were severely limited and many , no doubt , must have felt oppressed but Mrs . Mallard 's reaction was atypical for her time and leaves the reader wishing that more background into...

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