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Damned upon publication for engaging with the taboo issues of female sexuality and infidelity, Kate Chopin's The Awakening (1899) is now hailed as a key early feminist text and an important work of American literature.
This sourcebook combines accessible commentary with reprinted documents to provide the ideal introduction to this widely debated novel. The editors offer:

* extensive coverage of the contexts to the work, including biographical information on Chopin and the social and historical backgrounds to her writing
* an outline of the critical reception of the novel from the early reviews to contemporary debates, and extracts from influential essays
* selected chapters of the original text, reproduced with extensive commentary on key issues and suggestions on links with contextual and critical materials
* a guide to further reading, ideal for extended independent study.

Providing all the tools for engaged, informed individual analysis of the text, this sourcebook will greatly enrich any reading of The Awakening. It is an essential starting point for students of American literature and women's writing, or for anyone fascinated by Chopin's controversial work.

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"Bonner . . . provides a compendium of information, helpful to the undergraduate as well as to the scholar; a chronology of Chopin's life; nine translations by Chopin herself of French short stories, eight of which are by Guy de Maupassant, a major literary influence (five of these published here for the first time); period maps of Missouri, Louisiana, and New Orleans, and a 13-page bibliographic essay on primary and secondary sources, which is thorough and organized for easy reference. The bulk of the book is devoted to a `Dictionary of Characters, Places, Titles, Terms, and People from the Life and Works of Kate Chopin.' The `Dictionary' will be especially helpful to those readers . . . who are unfamiliar with the Cajun and Creole terms--e.g., lagniappe, jambalaya--appearing in Chopin's fiction, or with the many references to French Catholicism made by her characters. . . . Overall, this volume is a valuable tool for both the novice and experienced Chopin reader, and is highly recommended." Choice ... Read more

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Although the representation of suicide is commonplace in literature, few studies have explicitly dealt with the meaning of suicide in the works of women writers. The Art of Dying applies theories concerning the division of women literary figures into angels or monsters to representative literary suicides of the nineteenth century, including the suicides of women characters in works by Kate Chopin and Sylvia Plath.

The Awakening by Kate Chopin is often misunderstood by critics who read it using the Romantic paradigm. Chopin breaks that paradigm by presenting the suicide of Edna Pontellier as heroic. Suicide is a prevalent motif and theme in two works by Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar and Ariel. An extensive analysis of Plath’s last poem "Edge" portrays the suicide of the speaker as a calm and heroic act in keeping with the tone set by Chopin in The Awakening.

The Art of Dying concludes by exploring women’s need for self-actualization within the framework of love, marriage, and motherhood—institutions that have always demanded from women an unnatural and harmful degree of unselfishness. The inherent message in the works of artists such as Chopin and Plath is that women should not have to die in order to live. ... Read more

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While neither Kate Chopin nor Edith Wharton can be called feminist writers, each did produce "female moral art," writings that focus relentlessly on the dialectics of social relations and the position of women therein. Mary Papke analyzes their disintegrative visions through detailed readings of virtually all of their novels and several of their shorter works. Unlike comparable writers of their time, she argues, theirs was a nonpolemical but nonetheless political art in which disruption of the rules of masculine/feminine discourse and the hegemonic world view is deeply but obviously embedded within character, plot, and theme. ... Read more

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This digital document is an article from Women and Language, published by George Mason University on September 22, 1995. The length of the article is 4720 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

From the supplier: Men demonstrate their dominance over women by generally confining them to the devalued registers of the home and the kitchen. Women are not oppressed by language, but by the available registers. In 'The Awakening' by Chopin, Edna Pontellier is not able to express her dissatisfactions due to the limited and inappropriate registers. Women are limited here by both language and by their subordinate role in society.

Citation Details
Title: Charting the nebula: gender, language and power in Kate Chopin's 'The Awakening.'
Author: Gerri Brightwell
Publication: Women and Language (Refereed)
Date: September 22, 1995
Publisher: George Mason University
Volume: v18Issue: n2Page: p37(5)

Distributed by Thomson Gale ... Read more

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Pupils will meet the literature requirements of the National Curriculum by studying these collections of short stories by pre-twentieth century authors. Readers of all abilities will gain increased comprehension of the stories from the integrated support material on every page. Pupils' interest is maintained by the large format and simple layout. A more complete picture of the authors is provided through completion of a number of 'compare and contrast' exercises, reinforcement activities and ovwerview sections at the end of each story. The National Curriculum requirement to read stories from other cultures and traditions is also covered by books in the series. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Kate Chopin's Short Fiction; a critical companion by Robert C. Evans ed.
The title really sounded hopeful and we purchased it.However the arrangement of the material in the book leaves a lot to be desired.There are 432 pages and no index to the material.The arrangement is very segmented. The book starts off with 14 pages of works cited.Following are 320 pages of an alphabetical arrangement of commentaries on Chopin's short stories.There is not much "meat" to those criticisms which range in length form 1 to 4 pages.But those criticisms are more of a listing in paragraph form of where the story was analyzed before, thus the beginning pages of works cited.There are 6 appendices, again sort of disjointed.This book will be confusing to students who are looking for particular criticism on a short story.It may be useful to someone looking for an exhaustive listing of criticisms on Chopin's short stories.But who has time or the resources to hunt down those cited works.I would not recommend it for purchase for student use in a Comp class.I am a librarian and often assist students with their literary research and this book will not provide much help in analyzing a story. ... Read more

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A feminist before such a term was created and most famous for The Awakening, the controversial Kate Chopin was also the author of a second novel, At Fault, as well as numerous short stories. This reference book begins with a brief introduction to Kate Chopin's varied background and her fictional work. A chronology traces the main events of her private and professional lives. Hundreds of alphabetically arranged entries follow, summarizing the plots of her novels and short stories, identifying her fictional characters, and relating them to her own experiences, to her family members and to her friends. Many entries include bibliographical citations. ... Read more

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Women and Autonomy in Kate Chopin's Short Fiction offers close readings of some thirty stories-Chopin's most significant short works-the majority of which have never received analytical scrutiny. These works, predominantly grim, portray the difficulties women confront as they seek autonomy in a social framework that typically constrains them whether they are married, in the midst of courtship, or seeking to live independently. This groundbreaking book makes it apparent that Chopin's short fiction is no less significant than her famous novel, The Awakening, and that her stories also provide a valuable context for that work. ... Read more

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Kate Chopin has emerged as one of the most significant American writers of the nineteenth century. Though her works typically reflect the language and customs of Louisiana, they also make universal comments about women, men, and human relationships. The last thirty years have witnessed heightened scholarly interest in her writings. This bibliography surveys the vast amount of scholarship published on Chopin between 1976 and 1998, with some coverage of 1999. Included are annotated entries for books, articles, and dissertations, along with extensive indexes. The volume also provides a biographical sketch, a review of the evolution of trends in Chopin scholarship, and a textual history. ... Read more

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Chopin's 1899 classic features a New Orleans location. "Interesting and Timely . . . Chopin's oracular feminism and prophetic psychology almost outweigh her estimable literary talents." -- --Newsweek ... Read more

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SAT Words from Literature presents a new approach to scoring high on the Scholastic Aptitude Test. Rather than taking words directly from a dictionary and studying them, SAT Words from Literature presents vocabulary words that are found in classic literature in their original context. In this way, you will get aclear understanding of what the word can do in a sentence, what it might mean, and how it is used. Each vocabulary word is highlightedin the text and also reproduced in bold on the facing page, followed by the part of speech as it is used in the book, the pronunciation, anappropriate definition, and a synonym or antonym if applicable.Exercises that test your understanding of the vocabulary words are included at the end of the book. To make the exercises more manageable, words are arranged by chapters, or sections, so that there are not too many words in any one group. With this painless approach to learningvocabulary, you can boost your chances ofacing the SAT. ... Read more