How Is Mrs Mallard Presented In The Story Of An Hour

In the “Story of An Hour”, the main character, introduced as Mrs. Mallard, is traditional good girl that gets her first taste of freedom leading her diverging into the path that allows her to be free of the subjection she feels, however, these feelings are not lasting as society tries to make her return to her previous status before this experience. From the very beginning, Mrs. Mallard is illustrated as a faint hearted woman that needs to be protected from shocking events, in fear of her health. In account of this, in a slow way, her sister and her brother in law explains that her husband is in fact dead. Mrs. Mallard listens to this, “She did not hear the story as many women have heard the same, with a paralyzed inability to accept its
The would be no powerful will bending her in that blind persistence… Spring days, summer, and all sorts of days that would be her own. She breathed a quick prayer for life might be long. It was only yesterday she had thought with a shudder that life might be long” (2). Mrs. Mallard isn’t being cryptic when she thinks this about her husband’s death, and how this impacts her life. She is completely and adultery glad that he is not in her life anymore. She enjoys the idea of not having a responsibly to anyone else, like what society demands her to focus on, rather than herself. She isn’t vague about how she plans to enjoy her life to the fullest without the chains that connect her to her husband called marriage. This is explicitly shown through her “quick prayer for life might be long”, which is compared to how she is thinking before with her husband still present in her life, where she “shudder that life might be long.” This taste of freedom is exciting and accepted fully by her, and nothing seems to make her want to want her previous life back even despite the idea that she did have some feels for her husband. However, this doesn’t last for very
He had been far from the scene of the accident… when the doctors came they said she had died of heartache --of the joy that kills” (2). Shortly after Mrs. Mallard decides that everything is going to be good without her husband, everything crashes down on her. She finally got to feel free from the oppression that she felt within her marriage, which at the time is expected of a woman to be in one, however, with the appearance of her husband, she is forced to return back to what she was before the false news of Mr. Mallard’s death. But, unfortunately for her, she already tasted the sensation of freedom,and because she refuses the return about to reality, it ultimately leads to her death via heart disease that is mentioned in the beginning of the story. This can be a reference to how society tries to force upon women their social norms, their gender roles where women are suppose to be weak, and dependent on the men in their lives like their father, brother or husband. The fact that Mrs. Mallard dies because of the shock she felt when she didn’t get the freedom that she first feels at last shows how much the powerful the oppression is from society and moreover, the lack of notice towards this problem showing how ingrained the expectations are in 1800s