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"The Story of an Hour"

 

             In the short story, "The Story of an Hour," by Kate Chopin the primary interest of the story is in the character of Mrs. Mallard. The main focus of the plot reveals how Mrs. Mallard comes to find out about her husband, Brently Mallard's alleged death and her ability to overcome this emotionally. When initially reading the short story "The Story of an Hour," I believed the thesis above to be accurate. I still believe the thesis to be true by means of class discussion with other students and the professor, but I realized that there are much more possibilities and different interpretations of the short story's irony, characters, and symbolism. .
             When first reading the short story, I could only recognize very few occurrences of irony. On the other hand throughout the class discussion I learned that there were many more occurrences of irony. For instance, Josephine and Richards were very careful when trying to notify Mrs. Mallard of her husband's alleged death. Mrs. Mallard is said to suffer from heart trouble or heart disease. Mrs. Mallard immediately became emotional at the realization of her husband's death. After awhile she went to her room to be alone. It was then that Mrs. Mallard suddenly became filled with somewhat joy and repeated the words, "free, free, free!" Ultimately, another example of irony is when Josephine finally got Mrs. Mallard to come out of the room and not be alone anymore. They both started to walk down the stairs of the house to the first floor while the front door was opening with a latchkey. It was Brently Mallard entering and Richards try to screen him from the view of his wife, Mrs. Mallard. The last line of the story states, "When the doctors came they said she had died of heart disease---of joy that kills." Mrs. Mallard had died at the sight of seeing her husband alive after believing that she was free from him to live her life for her. .
             During the class discussion, I learned more about certain characters of the short story by the interpretations and views of other students.


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