"The Story of an Hour"

When I started reading “The Story of an Hour” I got the impression that Mrs. and Mr. Mallard had a very good relationship and the whole story would be about how Mrs. Mallard handled the death of her husband. Mrs. Mallard’s initial reaction to the news of her husband’s death was that “she wept at once, with sudden abandonment.” The text continued to say that “when the storm of grief had spent itself she went away to her room alone. She would have no one follow her.” I felt that this backed up my initial impression of the plot of the story. I think that the external images expressed in paragraph 5 were written to give the reader an image of the scene. “There were patches of blue sky showing here and there through the clouds.” This sentence gave me the idea that it was a perfect day where nothing could go wrong. In paragraph 7, Chopin uses the phrase, “suspension of intelligent though.” This quote gave me the impression that Mrs. Mallard was going into shock from the news of her husband’s death. The text also states that her “gaze was fixed away off yonder on one of those patches of blue sky.” I believe this is another example of Mrs. Mallard’s stunned disbelief of her husband’s death. Despite these initial feelings of grief, in paragraph 11 and 12, Mrs. Mallard threw me a curveball. According to the text she “did not stop to ask if it were not a monstrous joy that held her,” and “she saw beyond that bitter moment a long procession of years to come that would belong to her absolutely.” This told me that Mrs. Mallard was happy that her husband had died! As I read on I found more evidence that their marriage struggled. This completely changed my initial impression of the story. It was changed from what I thought was a loving wife that would have to endure the death of her husband to a joyful wife who was looking forward to the years ahead. It also made me question Mrs. Mallard’s loyalty to Mr. Mallard because the text stated, “And yet she had loved him – sometimes.” I believe that the most important passage in this short story is the last one. Mrs. Mallard was happy that her husband died only to die herself. I believe that it is the most important because it shows that you can’t go through life pretending to be happy when you’re really not.