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Awakening By Edna Pontellier

Updated October 22, 2019
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Awakening By Edna Pontellier essay

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.. mpson, Edna was changing, she thought of her marriage to Leonce as a safe haven, there was not excitement or passion.

She feels trapped and needs to escape. Months passed and Edna became more and more enthralled in finding her identityshe neglected her duties as a housewife and those as a mother. She fought her way off of the path and found herself in the cruel, yet sometimes fulfilling wilderness. The only woman who understood the battle that Edna was about to endure was Mademoiselle Reisz.

“Edna truly admires Mademoiselle Reisz. Edna appreciates her talent for playing the piano, while the other people on the Grand Isle dont appreciate her, because she does not fit their idea of what a proper woman should be, she is eccentric and bold. Her music touches Edna, it stirs something up inside her. (Thompson) Perhaps every woman awakens at one point in her life. Some choose to chase after a dream while others are more apt to cope with reality.

Edna awakened to find herself next to a man she did not love and a life that did not compensate her emotional and sexual urges. The sea began to touch her as it never did before, “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. 17) Edna found herself touched by piano piece, which she ironically entitled “Solitude,” that her friend Madame Ratignolle played. “When she heard it there came before her imagination the figure of a man standing beside a desolate rock on the sea shore. He was naked.

His attitude was one of hopeless resignation as he looked toward a distant bird winging its flight away from him.” (P. 35) Edna never dared to think of the significance the image had for hermost likely out of fear of what it could be. Yet, she longed to be that bird. She longed to fly gracefully away from her passion and away from her need for the naked man, who stands on the brink of a sexual symbol for Herthe Sea.

To be that bird, she had to gather the courage to be independent from men, and to find the courage to be happy with herself as an individual. Edna began to realize that she enjoyed the company of other men, particularly Robert, “just as one misses the sun on a cloudy day without having thought much about the sun when it was shining.” (P. 33) “As Edna walked along the street she was thinking of Robert. She was still under the spell of her infatuation.

She had tried to forget him, realizing the inutility of remembering. But the thought of him was like an obsession, ever pressing itself upon her. It was not that she dwelt upon details of their acquaintance, or recalled in any special or peculiar way his personality; it was his being, his existence, which dominated her thought, fading sometimes as if it would melt into the mist of the forgotten, reviving again with an intensity which filled her with an incomprehensible longing.” (P. 71) Edna explained why she chose to “love” Robert, “Why do you suppose a woman knows why she loves? Does she select? Does she say to herself: ‘Go to! Here is a distinguished statesman with presidential possibilities; I shall proceed to fall in love with him.'” (P.

107) There is irony in her explanationshe was the person she was mockingshe had thought exactly that when she married Léonce. Edna had given up herself while waiting for Robert to return from Mexico. She had the power to be free, to soar high, but she chose to hang on to the fantasy of what could never be. Sadly, a fantasy is always much sweeter than reality, because when Robert returned, Edna found herself admitting, “he had seemed nearer to her off there in Mexico.” (P. 136) The man returned to his post on the rock.

The bird, infatuated with his return, remained by his feet and with great devotion and admiration looked up at this creature and said, “It was you who awoke me last summer out of a life-long stupid dream.” (P. 143) Edna associated her awakening with Robert and unawarely lost the independence she had sought after by being so superficially dependent on a man. Throughout her life, Edna had always witnessed women with a man slung on their arms and had only encountered a few who were absent of one. Society deemed the latter as outcasts and told Edna that their days were deficient of happiness, comfort, and compassion.

Edna was not strong enough to gain an independent soul and an independent arm. She could barely continue fighting the battle for the possession of her soul, and so, it was necessary that she found her support through Robert. When the man saw the bird perched at his feetreality struck him. He could not proceed with this “love” any longer, because his conscience repeatedly scolded him, “She is a married woman with children.” To resolve a guilty conscience, he kicked the bird from the ledge, in which they both once stood and justified his action by saying, “I love you. Good-by–because I love you.” (P.

148) With his farewell, her aspirations and her hopes quickly faded away. She believed that without him she would go back to being a prisoner. Time after time, another Robert would come by. With sweetness and gracefulness, he would unlock her cage and expose her once again to the marvels of freedom. Soon enough though, that Robert would leave her just as abrupt and cruel as the original one had.

Once again, Edna would view life behind bars and would be unable to experience the utter beauty of life. Without a key, Edna was unable to escape from her cage. She did not have the strength to bend the bars and give herself the freedom she had been longing for. Perhaps, she knew the truthshe would have never been entirely as free as she wanted. She would never be so in love forever like the couple at Grande Isle, because fantasies must always come to an end.

It was more likely that she would become the woman dressed in black, wallow in her own pity, and count what little she had. Edna’s only escape was the sea that once awakened her to the possibilities of beauty, love, lust, and independence. Once Robert had struck her with that tremendous blow, the wings that once held such possibilities for her were shattered and “a bird with a broken wing was beating the air above, reeling, fluttering, circling, disabled down, down to the water.” (P. 152).

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