April / Novel of Manners Reading: The Awakening by Kate Chopin

[Dark Muse]

When she is speaking to Mademoiselle Reiz she mentions that she has her own money. She says she one some at the races, and she is starting to sell her sketches, it seems the house she plans to pay for herself, as she says that she could live there simply with one servant for the money she is earning.

But I thought she mentioned something about using her husbands money to pay for the dinner.

[Janine]

When she is speaking to Mademoiselle Reiz she mentions that she has her own money. She says she one some at the races, and she is starting to sell her sketches, it seems the house she plans to pay for herself, as she says that she could live there simply with one servant for the money she is earning.

But I thought she mentioned something about using her husbands money to pay for the dinner.

That's the same impression I got. I thought she made some money; but then again, it seemed she did not really apply herself with much enthusiasm to work on her paintings and sketches; so I wondered how selling those make her much revenue. My friend, who read the story, too, said she thought it mentioned that she had an inheritance of her own. I will have to check back to see if that is in the text.

The thing that really sort of gauled me was her using her husband's money for the rather elaborate and surely expensive farewell dinner. Also, if those group of friends from society, knew this was a 'farewell' dinner, and she would be moving into her own little house soon, then how did her husband think he could hide that fact? Wow, this book was confusing in someways. Things just don't add up when you take a closer look, or do they?

[Dark Muse]

Here what she says to Reiz about getting the house

I have a little money from my mother's estate, which my fahter sends me by driblits. I won a large sum this winter on the races, and I am beginning to sell my sketches. Laidpore is more and more pleased with my work; he says it grows in force and individulaity. I cannot judge of that myself, but I feel I have gained in ease and confidence. However, as I said, I have sold a good man through Laidpore. I can live in the tiny house for littler or nothing, with one servant.

I was a bit confussed about the issue with the husband and the house as well. At one point he seemed to be under the impression that he was going to be living there too. I thought he mentioned something about not having enough room within the place. Or maybe someone else questioned her on that. But just how that was suppose to work I was not quite sure. I do not think Edna really thought ahead, but I think that was perhaps the point, that she acted out of impulse.

[papayahed]

I was a bit confussed about the issue with the husband and the house as well. At one point he seemed to be under the impression that he was going to be living there too. I thought he mentioned something about not having enough room within the place. Or maybe someone else questioned her on that. But just how that was suppose to work I was not quite sure. I do not think Edna really thought ahead, but I think that was perhaps the point, that she acted out of impulse.

I assumed that it never occurred to the husband that Edna was leaving him. He assumed that she wanted the whole family to move to the little house and she didn't correct him in the matter.

[Janine]

I assumed that it never occurred to the husband that Edna was leaving him. He assumed that she wanted the whole family to move to the little house and she didn't correct him in the matter.

papayahed, that's a good point. Perhaps he was deluded about the real significance of the little house and what it meant to Edna. I felt as Dark Muse did in that, Edna did not seem to think out clearly, just what would come next for her or for her family; she acted without any regard to the outcome and the circumstances that would follow her decisions. She was indeed 'impulsive' in her actions and desires. Obviously, she was impulsive at the ending of the story as well, or she would not have done what she did.

[papayahed]

ok, here's the $1000 question - Why did Edna do it? I can't believe it was just about Robert.

[Dark Muse]

I think it was because she was always somewhat weak compared to her friends. She did not have the strength and independence to live as Mademoiselle Reiz had done so, as a woman who was beholden to know man and dedicated to her art, but she also did not have the forbearance to accept her "fate" as it were as Madame Ratigonolle. She never was able to simply stand on her own, I think that is part of the reason she started to the flirtation with Arobin during the time that Robert was gone. She simple shifted her dependency from her husband onto Robert.

Perhaps she could not bare the thought of having to return to her husband though she never officially "left" him, that is they were still bound by marriage she had begun to detach herself from him, but with Robert removed from the picture, there was little she could do but simply return back to the life she had before she met Robert, but after she had within herself already severed those bonds she could not fathom returning to it again.

It reminds me of The Story of An Hour, in which a woman discovers that her husband was killed, and by her own admission he was not cruel to her, and it did not seem as if she was dreadfully unhappy in her marriage, but she was overwhelmed with a great sense or freedom at realizing she was no longer beholden to a man, than she discovers it was a mistake and her husband was in fact still alive, she simply was unable to give up that new found freedom even though it only lasted a moment, and just dropped dead right on the spot.

[papayahed]

I was thinking along those same lines but she had the little house, she could have lived there, but as you said I think she just wasn't strong enough to live in that little house.

And why did Robert leave, was it because as Mrs Rat. said, he looked at it like a "summer fling" and Edna was fooled into thinking it was something more?

[Dark Muse]

I think Robert left becasue he genueinely cared for Edna, and he did not want to be whatever the male equvilavient of a mistress would be. He didn't want to just be the guy on the side. Perhaps when Edna left him to call upon Mrs. Rat. (haha I love that) it was a sign or realization to him that he would never fully have Edna she would always be torn between the two different lives.