The Nature of Solitude in Chopins Novel, The Awakening Essay -- Chopi

The nature of Solitude in Chopins Novel, The AwakeningThe name of the piece was something else, but she called it Solitude. When she hear it at that place came in the lead her imagination the figure of a man rest beside a desolate rock on the seashore. He was naked. His strength was whiz of hopeless resignation as he looked toward a distant razz winging its flight away from him.(47) All along the white beach, up and down, in that location was no living thing in sight. A bird with a broken wing was thrashing the air above, reeling, fluttering, circling disabled down, down to the water...when she was there beside the sea, absolutely alone, she cast the unpleasant, pricking garments from her, and for the prototypal time in her sprightliness 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 sexually attractive She felt like some new-born creat ure, opening its eyes in a familiar world that it had never known.(138) These two line of achievements from Kate Chopins novel, The Awakening, both utilize overmuch of the same imagery in conveying the nature of solitude, yet they do so towards creating somewhat oppositional representations. The instance of the first passage occurs on the dark when Ednas own awakening begins, describing her fondness for music and the pictorial effects that it has upon her before she is then moved to tears by Mademoiselle Reiszs performance. The second passage is taken from the last pages of the novel wherein Edna swims out to sea, presumably towards her death. In feel back through the novel for this assignment I was struck by the similarity of these two passages and by the way that the imagery in them seems t... ... attitude of hopeless resignation, she portrays an attitude of amazed excitement as she describes the scene as delicious and her place in it as that of a new-born creature come in i nto a new world and existence. The male figure in the first passage stands passive and resigned on the shore, but Edna in her state of wonder acts, defiantly choosing her own fate in the face of the same social pressures. Tragically, her choice means death and conveys the novels sentiment that in a repressively sexist society the only option for an awakened woman may be oblivion. Through these shared images and the ideas that they represent, the two passages link and reflect upon one some other and the characters situations. This linkage enhances the palpable visual and sensual nature of the novel, thus beautifully presenting Chopins multi-layered vision of solitude.