Christian Alson P.

Banda ELT 314

“The story of an hour: Literary Analysis”

The Story of an Hour is a short story written by Kate Chopin as the American life
was also changing. It is about a character where you can question why she is behaving
like that. Motivated by the repressed desires that takes surface when the chance came,
the protagonist’s behavior becomes questionable. With that, in this thesis, we will
analyze the motivation of why the character acts in that particular way.

Mrs. Mallard is the protagonist with a heart trouble and it seems like she loves his
husband. “She wept at once, with sudden, wild abandonment, in her sister's arms.
When the storm of grief had spent itself, she went away to her room alone. She would
have no one follow her.” This line is proof that she loved her husband, however, it
contrasted when this line, “When she abandoned herself a little whispered word
escaped her slightly parted lips. She said it over and over under her breath: "free, free,
free!”,” was stated. Moreover, as you read throughout the story you can see that after
Mrs. Mallard is devastated by what happened to her husband, she concludes that she is
now free and can do whatever she wants. Thus, as a reader, we might think that she is
insane for being happy when her husband died, which is described as monstrous joy,
but the motivation for that happiness will answer our questions about why she is acting
like that.
Further, this line, “There would be no one to live for her during those coming
years; she would live for herself. There would be no powerful will bending hers in that
blind persistence with which men and women believe they have a right to impose a
private will upon a fellow-creature. ” tells us that Mrs. Mallard was not happy in her
marriage and she is suffocated by it, thus, she wants freedom. To solidify the claim,
"Free! Body and soul free!" she kept whispering,” was stated in the story and it claims
the struggle of Mrs. Mallard in her marriage. Hence, the action that was portrayed by
Mrs. Mallard can be anchored to the Basic Freudian Concepts wherein her actions were
just a product of her own desires that were suppressed, and she was acting like that
unconsciously.

To summarize all the statements that have been stated, The Story of an Hour
emphasizes how our repressed desires can influence our actions. Just like in the story
that Mrs. Mallard acts in a very unethical way, however, her action was just a reflection
of her longing that made her act that way. Therefore, we may not understand at first
about why Mrs. Mallard act that way but as we read the story we will know what
motivates her actions to be like that.