Alienation in Different Works of Literature Alienation

¶ … Alienation in Different Works of Literature

Alienation is a common theme in many works of literature -- in many genres, across many periods, and of many different forms. The idea that one individual cannot truly know or understand another, or that the rules of society necessarily force those that question those rules to somehow be outside of that society, has been around since the time of Homer and certain of his characters. It can also be seen in more modern works of poetry, short stories, and dramatic texts, from a variety of authors writing in different times and with very different perspectives.

William Blake's poem late eighteenth century poem "The Tyger" does not deal with humanity's alienation from itself, or individuals' alienation from each other, but rather addresses the alienation of humanity from the divine. Describing the tiger as "fearful" and asking what "distant deeps or skies" the tiger's maker could reside in makes it clear that the this tiger is awe-inspiring, in the old sense of the word "awe" -- a feeling somewhat akin to terror due to the magnitude of its presence and its impact Blake, lines 4-5). The tiger itself is something that could never be approached or truly understood by human beings, much less the tiger's creator, and thus there is an unbridgeable gap between humanity and humanity's own creator.

In a sense, it is also a form of creator that establishes a sense of alienation in Kate Chopin's short story, "The Story of an Hour." Writing exactly a century after Blake's poem was composed, Chopin's story is that of a woman just before the dawn of the twentieth century who learns that her husband has been killed in a train accident. Secluded in her room while the household thinks she is despairing, Mrs. Mallard slowly begins to come to life, realizing that she is actually free now for the first time in her life, in the only way that a female of her class can be free -- as a widow with a tidy sum of money. There is no malice in Mrs. Mallard's reflections and in what is ultimately a joyous though very private reaction to her husband's death, but there is a definite sense that society as a creator of specific roles did not leave a place for a woman with any mind of her own, such as Mrs. Mallard has. As she grows aware of the implications of her husband's death, she feels that she will finally have a way to overcome her alienation and carve her own space in the world. The ultimate irony and sign of alienation comes when here husband strides through the door, having been on an earlier train, and Mrs. Mallard sees him. The last line of the story demonstrates how deeply misunderstood she is: "When the doctors came they said she had died of heart disease -- of the joy that kills" (Chopin, par. 20).