She wanted something to happen - something, anything; she did not know what.

 The Awakening by Kate Chopin

Spoiler Alert: Plot Summary

The Awakening is a story of love lost, regained, and lost again. But more than that, it is a story of self-exploration, an examination of the female experience, and a warrior's battle cry. It chronicles a brief period of time in the life of Edna Pontellier, a relatively young woman and mother of two, first at Grand Isle, Louisiana, and later in New Orleans, in the early 20th century. As the novel begins, we're joining a group of wealthy families (self-designated as Creole, but in a sense that mostly refers to them having been descended from French folk and living in the American South, which I found a bit confusing, thinking that Creole had a racial aspect/designation) as they summer by the Gulf of Mexico. Edna is followed at every turn by Robert Lebrun, a young single man and son of another family staying there. The summer is full of lightness and affection, but when they return for the season to New Orleans, Robert announces his intention to move to Mexico to seek job prospects. Edna is dismayed, but can't convince Robert to stay. 

After Robert leaves, Edna begins to 'awaken', so to speak. She sends her children to be with her mother-in-law, she decides she does not wish to be tethered to anyone, and she tells her husband she intends to close their large home (he is away for work) and move into a small house adjacent to live by herself. Her husband is confused and displeased, but manages to smooth things over socially by claiming they are doing 'major repairs' on their home, and assumes/hopes she will eventually return to 'normal'. Edna develops a new friendship with another single man, Alcée Arobin, who falls completely in love with Edna. She enjoys his affections, but her heart is still longing for Robert, so poor Arobin slots into a sort of sad second place. Robert unexpectedly returns, but he spurns Edna, and she is bereft. She accidentally stumbles upon him and tries to rekindle their flame. It seems like they might be getting back together, but Robert leaves in the night and says he can't accept this limited version of Edna's affection (she would stay married, be his mistress but not his wife, etc.). Edna travels back to Grand Isle to "see the sights" in the off-season, and goes for a solo swim in the Gulf from which she does not return.

Spoiler Over: Continue Here

Dear blobbies, 

Do you like my new name for you? Blobbies? Ah well, I like it, so that's all that matters. ;) Anyway, I thought I'd continue my latest phase of actually reading books in a timely fashion and so I've already finished The Awakening and I'm ready to blob on it. 

General reflections: I liked this novel a lot. I remember that I once had the opportunity to read it in high school - I think it was a choice between this book and Portrait of a Lady and I kind of wish I'd read this book instead (sorry, Henry James). This book had tons of flavor and nuance to it, and I always LOVE reading books by women or female-identifying authors, especially when they're from a time when almost no women were getting published. Apparently this book was not well received when she wrote it, and lots of folks were like, "ladies don't/shouldn't act this way" which makes me feel like they really missed the point. So anyway, just want it to go down in the record that I see you, Kate Chopin, and I loved this book. I think it's gotten a fair amount of acclaim in later years post-publication, but I'm sure it's frustrating to not have your work feel seen when you're alive and there to stand by it. 

My thoughts!

On sunshades (and how we should bring them back)

Mr. Pontellier uses a sunshade and several people reference them, and I was like, UM hello can we please bring these back? I walked around the bird refuge with an open umbrella in the middle of the summer to protect my oh-so-pale skin from the sun and everyone looked at me like I was a nutbar.

Connection points

As I've mentioned in many of my last posts, I'm always amazed at how connected I feel to books, regardless of when they're written or by whom. This book was no exception. Here are a few of those links I saw in this one. 

• Am I reading a book or taking a French exam? Amusingly, the copy of the book I bought was an inexpensive version from Amazon, and there is a ton of French in the novel, but it was all missing accents. So as I was reading, I kept trying to add in accents where I thought they were missing (an accent aigu here, accent grave there, circonflexe there) but it ultimately felt like I was taking a French exam. This reminded me of the fact that my mother used to write letters to her grandmother in French, but instead of responding in French, my great-grandmother would return the letters or notes with corrections. I must say that I was, on the whole, quite glad that I was a French speaker as I read this book, as it had a ton of untranslated French in it.

• Perhaps a bit of bouillon? At one point, Mrs. Pontellier is looking tired, and someone offers her a cup of bouillon, and I just about dropped my book. My grandmother when she wasn't feeling well used to ask for 'just a bit of bouillon', and I legitimately thought this was just one of her things. Turns out, the whole world used to ask for bouillon!

• Old Madame Pontellier - I loved this line below about Edna's children and their grandmother, because it made me think of my mom and G, and I think she shares the same sentiments.

She was hungry for them - even a little fierce in her attachment. She did not want them to be wholly 'children of the pavement', she always said when begging to have them for a space. She wished them to know the country, with its streams, its fields, its woods, its freedom, so delicious to the young. She wished them to taste something of the life their father had lived and known and loved when he, too, was a little child.

• There was the whistle of a railway train somewhere in the distance, and the midnight bells were ringing. This one is just a personal note - I love hearing trains at night, and I love that I can hear them at home in the country and here in the city, depending on the level of overall city noise. I think my afterlife would always have a midnight bell and train in the distance.

Mrs. Edna Pontellier

Since she is really the center of this work, I wanted to give you a few lines to give you a sense of her. 

In appearance...

• She was rather handsome than beautiful. I don't know if this is a compliment or a dig?

As a parent...

• In short, Mrs. Pontellier was not a mother-woman.

• She was fond of her children in an uneven, impulsive way. She would sometimes gather them passionately to her heart; she would sometimes forget them...Their absence was a sort of relief, though she did not admit this, even to herself. It seemed to free her of a responsibility which she had blindly assumed and for which Fate had not fitted her. I loved the exploration of this. I mean, certainly has dark ramifications for the children concerned, but I think it's under-explored to see mothers who didn't really intend to be, or don't feel it fits them completely.

As a wife...

• The acme of bliss, which would have been a marriage with the tragedian, was not for her in this world. As the devoted wife of a man who worshiped her, she felt she would take her place with a certain dignity in the world of reality, closing the portals forever behind her upon the realm of romance and dreams. There was such sadness in this line.

• When Madame Ratignolle says it's a pity Mr. Pontellier doesn't stay at home in the evening, and Edna replies: "Oh! dear no!,' said Edna, with a blank look in her eyes. 'What should I do if he stayed home? We wouldn't have anything to say to each other.' !! 

As a music enthusiast...

• It was not the first time she had heard an artist at the piano. Perhaps it was the first time she was ready, perhaps the first time her being was tempered to take an impress of the abiding truth. Ooh, I loved this line, it gave me chills. Totally reminded me of the way Proust talks about music and music appreciation.

As a lover...

• It was so much more natural to have him stay when he was not absolutely required to leave her. There was such poignancy in the relationship with Robert, which was really quite chaste on the whole, but also deeply intimate.

• Robert's going had some way taken the brightness, the color, the meaning out of everything. The conditions of her life were in no way changed, but her whole existence was dulled, like a faded garment which seems to be no longer worth wearing.

As an individual...

• She was becoming herself and daily casting aside that fictitious self which we assume like a garment with which to appear before the world. 

• Whatever came, she had resolved never again to belong to another than herself. I loved this.

A doctor's opinion

Some people in this novel were less thrilled about Edna's awakening. For example, Mr. Pontellier. I really enjoyed this moment when he consulted the family doctor about Edna's "strange behavior" which included things like taking the streetcar and arriving home late at night, and paying no attention to household chores. 

• Woman, my dear friend, is a very peculiar and delicate organism... And when ordinary fellows like you and me attempt to cope with their idiosyncrasies the result is bungling. Most women are moody and whimsical. OH YES, you know us women and how whimsical and moody we are. 

On ennui

Part of the beauty in this novel for me is this fine line between female independence, existential exploration, losing or finding oneself in love, and depression, and the uncertainty of where or what is driving this 'awakening'. Here are some of the lines that capture this feeling:

• An indescribable oppression, which seemed to generate in some unfamiliar part of her consciousness, filled her whole being with a vague anguish. It was like a shadow, like a mist passing across her soul's summer day. It was strange and unfamiliar; it was a mood.

• The beginning of things, of a world especially, is necessarily vague, tangled, chaotic, and exceedingly disturbing. How few of us ever emerge from such a beginning! How many souls perish in its tumult!

• She had all her life long been accustomed to harbor thoughts and emotions which never voiced themselves.

• There were days when she was unhappy, she did not know why, -when it did not seem worth while to be glad or sorry, to be alive or dead; when life appeared to her like a grotesque pandemonium and humanity like worms struggling blindly toward inevitable annihilation. This is admittedly a very dark line, but I liked the visceral nature of it, and how it reminded me of The Bell Jar, but also when Proust says things like, 'I was only unhappy for a day at a time.' 

• 'The years that are gone seem like dreams - if one might go on sleeping and dreaming - but to wake up and find - oh! well! perhaps it is better to wake up after all, even to suffer, rather than to remain a dupe to illusions all one's life.' This is one of the central questions of the novel. Is it better to wake and find oneself in a sort of nightmare, or to stay sleeping and dreaming? 

On the sea

The way that Chopin writes about the water is so lovely. Here are some lines I loved.

• The voice of the sea is seductive; never ceasing, whispering, clamoring, murmuring, inviting the soul to wander for a spell in abysses of solitude; to lose itself in mazes of inward contemplation.

• She turned her face seaward to gather in an impression of space and solitude, which the vast expanse of water, meeting and melting with the moonlit sky, conveyed to her excited fancy. As she swam she seemed to be reaching out for the unlimited in which to lose herself.

Things I did not enjoy

While I really enjoyed this book on the whole, I'd like to take a moment to tell you about the bits I did not like. 

• References to 'the quadroon' - there were no meaningful Black characters in this novel, and they were frequently referred to like this, by the 'proportion of their blackness'. I know this is representative of the time that Chopin inhabited, but it felt awful.

• I couldn't help but reflect that there was not a huge gap between this novel and Black Boy in terms of timeline, so when I read the scenes of Edna's party and the Black folks working it, I thought of Richard going hungry behind the smiling white faces. 

• The few times that Black people were mentioned, it was for things like this: A little black girl sat on the floor, and with her hands worked the treadle of the machine. Madame Lebrun is sewing and a little Black girl is literally on the floor pushing the machine. 

• Comments about 'the Mexican people' as treacherous, their women as promiscuous - this came up as a theme several times. Obviously racist and ignorant.

Words that were new to me (many of which are actually French but a bit obscure)

befurbelowed - ornamented with frills

friandises - candies, sweet things

houri - a beautiful young woman, especially one of the virgin companions of the faithful in the Muslim Paradise

lateen - a triangular sail on a long yard at an angle of 45° to the mast

peignoir - a woman's light dressing gown or negligee

pirogue - a long, narrow canoe made from a single tree trunk, especially in Central America and the Caribbean

tabouret - a low stool or small table

Referents and Reverberations

• I don't know if it was a particular scene as much as it was an overall feeling, but I got real echoes and reverberations of The Age of Innocence as I read this. I suppose The Age of Innocence is actually the echo, since it was published about 20 years later. ;)

• There's a parrot in the opening scene, which reminded me of Dr. Urbino's parrot in Love in the Time of Cholera. It also reminded me of some ridiculous TikToks I've been watching that feature a yellow parrot that keeps saying to itself "Good Girl!" when it's obviously misbehaving. :)

• This exchange:

Edna: How long will you be gone? 
Robert: Forever, perhaps. I don't know. It depends upon a good many things.
Edna: Well, in case it shouldn't be forever, how long will it be?
Robert: I don't know.

reminded me of A Farewell to Arms, and this scene: (I'm not sure why.)

 "What is it, darling?"
"It's all right, Cat. Would you like to get dressed right away and go in a boat to Switzerland?"
"Would you?"
"No. I'd like to go back to bed."
"What is it about?"
"The barman says they are going to arrest me in the morning."
"Is the barman crazy?"
"No."
"Then please hurry, darling, and get dressed so we can start."

• The Ratignolles' soirées musicales reminded me of Proust, and the parties at the Verdurins and the musical accompaniments.

Lines I Particularly Liked

• The sun was low in the west, and the breeze soft and languorous that came up from the south, charged with the seductive odor of the sea.

• Her glance wandered from his face away toward the Gulf, whose sonorous murmur reached her like a loving but imperative entreaty.

• She was flushed and felt intoxicated with the sound of her own voice and the unaccustomed taste of candor. It muddled her like wine, or like a first breath of freedom. This was one of my favorite lines.

• The night sat lightly upon the sea and the land. There was no weight of darkness; there were no shadows. The white light of the moon had fallen upon the world like the mystery and the softness of sleep.

• It was very pleasant to stay there under the orange trees, while the sun dipped lower and lower, turning the western sky to flaming copper and gold. The shadows lengthened and crept out like stealthy, grotesque monsters across the grass.

• All the mystery and witchery of the night seemed to have gathered there amid the perfumes and the dusky and tortuous outlines of flowers and foliage. She was seeking herself and finding herself in just such sweet, half-darkness which met her moods. God, I love this line.

• The future was a mystery which she never attempted to penetrate.

Well, my dear blobbies, I must away to another fictional experience, this time I'll look for sanctuary in Faulkner, I think (hagh). I'll leave you with a few lines I enjoyed. 

(1) The children were sent to bed. Some went submissively; others with shrieks and protests as they were dragged away. They had been permitted to sit up till after the ice-cream, which naturally marked the limit of human indulgence. Naturally. ;)

(2) The stillest hour of the night had come, the hour before dawn, when the world seems to hold its breath. My favorite time of day.

and (3) this exchange between Edna and Arobin about Mademoiselle Reisz, a quirky and talented pianist and friend: 

     

"'She says queer things sometimes in a bantering way that you don't notice at the time and you find yourself thinking about afterward.'  

 

'For instance?' 

 

'Well, for instance, when I left her to-day, she put her arms around me and felt my shoulder blades, to see if my wings were strong, she said. 'The bird that would soar above the level plain of tradition and prejudice must have strong wings. It is a sad spectacle to see the weaklings bruised, exhausted, fluttering back to earth.' Whither would you soar?'"

Perhaps our dear Edna did not remember to check on the strength of her wings in the end. So blobbies, if you plan on soaring above the plain of tradition and prejudice, don't forget to check your wings! And of course - don't let your arms get tired! ;)

Keep each other safe, keep faith, and have a wonderful evening, dear blobbies!