I read this book about a year ago. The stark feminism in it hardly shocked me, because even Anne of Green Gables is written from a somewhat feminist viewpoint. Yes, feminism has been around since the fall of man.
Kate Chopin is an excellent writer, of course, and she paints a complete picture without an excess of words in The Awakening. Besides these assets, however, I found myself greatly disliking the book, simply because it represents principles absolutely opposite to my own, to those that are rooted in the Bible. However, my opinion of the book changed when I reached the end. Edna was so controlled by her emotions and so vainly searching for satisfaction outside of right standards that she ended up absently committing suicide. What a profound ending this is: the path of feminism seems bright and colourful, dashing and daring, until the end, when one realises that all one's life has been spent on nothing but feeling good. Feelings may be nice, but what is left when the feelings are gone? Without mentioning the fact that Edna betrayed her husband and abandoned her precious children, the fact that Edna ruined and cut short her own life is a harsh enough lesson for any woman to read.
The truth is that if one is not content where one is at, one will not be content anywhere else.
And then there is this to consider: maybe Edna deemed it worth her while to fritter her life away doing whatsoever she pleased, and die before she could really reap the consequences. If so, she forgot that death is not the end, for humans have eternal souls, and hers must go someplace. If she spent her life defying God, then where must hers necessarily go to?Get more detail about The Awakening.
No comments:
Post a Comment