Freedom In Kate Chopin's The Awakening

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Awakening Essay Freedom In The Awakening by Kate Chopin, Edna Pontellier is bound to a life of perfection and social status. Her husband, Leonce Pontellier controls her life and expects her to do everything he asks. Leonce’s expectations aren’t unreasonable because in that era wives were suppose to make their husbands look good, which meant tending to everything and doing whatever their husbands requested. Edna has an “awakening” and realizes that the strict social life is not what she wants. Being free and in control of her own life is what Edna craves. She wants satisfaction, depth, and meaning in her life, which leads her to seek freedom from her marriage. Leonce Pontellier is a controlling man who expects Edna to help him look good in society. He takes it for granted that she will obey social standards, and she accepts this. Leonce and…show more content…
Alcee Arobin is a lady’s man who has many affairs with different women and intends to make Edna another one of his affairs. But Edna doesn’t let Alcee take control of the relationship; she writes him when she wants and decides when they should go out. Being in control is a reverse role for Edna, but she knows it is really who she is, and it is what she wants. Alcee plays along and lets Edna take control, and Edna discovers the satisfaction of using a man the way men usually use women. Although Edna has taken control of her own life, she is still not happy with her life because of the many different types of love she has experienced. Alcee loves her but she only uses him as an affair while her husband is doing business. Robert truly loves her, and she felt the same way about him, but he can’t have her, because her husband already owns her. Edna doesn’t want to be owned by anyone, but no matter how many times she rebels and takes control of things, men still think of her as a possession. Edna ends her life in search for herself, and her

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