Questioning of Gender Roles in Feminist Stories
Many of the stories written in the 19th century that were questioning the traditional gendered roles turned out to be both controversial and successful. Playing her part in the feminism wave, Kate Chopin gives her reflection on the challenge of conventional functions and questions the social conventions in the story, “The Story of an Hour.” In the story, Lois Mallard(the main character) tells of her different phases of reactions when she learns of the death of her husband. On the one hand, the widow is sad, but she also bears a feeling of relief through her using of the demise to unravel the positioning of women in the societal set up of the 90s. Comparing and contrasting representation of the same issues is “The Yellow Paper,”by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. In the story, the narrator tells of the gender division that allows her husband to remain in a superior state of maturityand has to patronize and protect her as she is deemed to be naïve. Therefore, superimposing of the two stories creates a reexamination of the marriage inequality, restrictive gender roles and double standards among men and women.
Marriage inequality is especially well-told in the story, “The Yellow Paper,” but it is also hinted on in, “The Story of an Hour.” Gilman uses the conventions of the psychological horror tale to critique the position of women in the institution of marriage. In the respectable classes of the 19th century, there is the maintenance of the status quo that allows for there to be a rigid distinction between the domestic functions of women and active work for men. Additionally, the narrator is treated condescendingly and encouraged to remain fragile by the men around her. “He is very careful and loving, and hardly lets me stir without special direction” (Gilman). That way, women in the story are depicted to only second class citizens. Women in Kate Chopin’s were dependent on their husbands and other male figures. Also, Louis Mallard has a heart condition that rendered her physically weak, thus creating an impression of women as inherently passive, unexcited, and feeble.. Don't use plagiarised sources.Get your custom essay just from $11/page
What’s more, there are double standards among men and women due to restrictive gender roles. Kate Chopin discusses how the sudden death of Louise’s husband allows her to have true independence because she can now remarry and gain her station in life. “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”(Chopin). Also, the story implies that perhaps the society resists of the woman having such freedom. In “The Yellow Paper,” the oppressive nature of gender roles is pictured through the narrator’s madness that comes from the inability to assert her full identity. The narrator describes her writing as work and how she is expected to look pretty and take care of her chilled. Outside the domestic sphere, there is virtually nothing related to women; for instance, the men are wealthy and are physicians.
Therefore, there is a common theme of female repression in a patriarchal society. In both narratives, the main characters centre their stories centre in the differentiating innate thoughts and the reality of life. According to the femme convert laws that confine the women in the stories create situations, where property belongs to the husband and women, are subservient.
Works Cited
Chopin, Kate. The Story of an Hour. Joe Books, 2018.
Gilman, Charlotte P. The Yellow Wall Paper. Small, Maynard, 1899.