Kate Chopin \"Free! Body and Soul Free!\'

Kate Chopin

"Free! Body and soul free!' she kept whispering." Mrs. Louise Mallard dealt with the death of her husband in an unusual and ambiguous way. At first she wept, "at once, with sudden, wild abandonment." The narrator of Kate Chopin's "The Story of an Hour" notes that Mrs. Mallard did not react with paralyzed shock as many others would have but rather, with a "storm of grief." Mallard's initial response shows that she is a passionate woman, unafraid of intense emotions or expressing them in public. Moreover, the way Mallard deals with the death of her husband exhibits her inner strength and self-sufficiency. It is precisely her inner strength and self-sufficiency that cause her to feel excited at the prospect of living her life alone. As she notices the "new spring life" outside her bedroom window, Mrs. Mallard anticipates her new life as a single woman, beholden to no one. Mrs. Mallard's choice in dealing with her husband's death in a constructive and proactive manner indicates that she has suppressed her innate strength and self-reliance throughout the course of her marriage.

The death of her husband caused Mrs. Mallard to experience a "clear and exalted perception." For perhaps the first time, she is able to plan and envision doing exactly what she wants: "There would be no powerful will bending hers in that blind persistence with which men and women believe they have a right to impose a private will upon a fellow-creature." Her state of mind offers Mrs. Mallard insight into her marriage. Although the narrator notes that Mrs. Mallard loved her husband, whose face "had never looked save with love upon her," Mallard had clearly been resenting her being tied down, which is evident in the way she dealt with her husband's death. Dealing with her husband's death with a sense of freedom and anticipation rather than clear-cut grief shows that she looks forward to independent living.

However, Mrs. Mallard is a dualistic, conflicted character. At the beginning of the short story, she seems old. Not only had she been recently widowed, but she is "afflicted with heart trouble." Her heart trouble indicates physical and psychological weakness and her sister Josephine treats her as if she is a fragile person. Yet as the story progresses, Mrs. Mallard emerges as a strong woman capable of transforming her grief into the "self-assertion which she suddenly recognized as the strongest impulse of her being." The narrator notes later in the story that Mrs. Mallard was in fact "young, with a fair calm face, whose lines bespoke repression and a certain strength." The narrator's use of the word "repression" indicates that Mallard, while strong and independent, was nevertheless not courageous enough to express herself fully within her marriage. Her repression of her natural instincts conflicts with the "sudden, wild abandonment" with which she initially reacted to the news of her husband's death.

Essentially, the death of her husband put Mrs. Mallard in touch with herself and with her greatest longings. Without her husband, Mrs. Mallard is "free, free, free." She eagerly awaits the "long procession of years to come that would belong to her absolutely," and therefore the ending of Kate Chopin's short story is tragic. As the title suggests, Mrs. Mallard's revelation took place within the course of an hour. That one hour was enough to transform the way Mallard viewed her life and the world in which she lived. Realizing that her husband is actually still alive means that she is no longer "free, free, free."