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Desiree's Baby And The Awakening

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Unsuccessful Marriages Ultimately Leading to Death in Kate Chopin’s Stories
In Kate Chopin’s novel The Awakening and her short story Desiree’s Baby, they are both led by female characters in the nineteenth century. In both works, it creates an interesting setting considering the fact of societal roles and the way women were treated in this time period. Although in different locations, both women: Edna from The Awakening and Desiree from Desiree’s Baby can relate their struggles in their marriage. In both novels, it is evident to the audience that both couples lack a strong connection and at least one partner has a detachment from the other. In The Awakening and in Desiree’s Baby, Edna and Desiree’s relationship with their husbands negatively …show more content…
Throughout the short story, the couple lacks deep connection that hold relationships together. Although Desiree was passionately devoted to her husband, the feelings were not mutual. This is evident on page 191, where it states, “Then a strange, an awful change in her husband’s manner, which she dared not ask him to explain. When he spoke to her, it was with averted eyes, from which the old love-light seemed to have gone out.” Their relationship does not have that spark anymore, which explains why Armand is so distant towards Desiree. He does not love her as before, which is due to the fact that he discovered something that would be considered treacherous in the nineteenth century, which is that she’s not white. In the short story it describes a scene where Desiree is asking Armand what the child means to him. “He coldly, but gently loosened her fingers from about his arm and thrust the hand away from him. ‘Tell me what it means!’ she cried despairingly. ‘It means,’ he answered lightly, ‘that the child is not white; it means that you are not white.’” Armand learns that Desiree is not white and that information is too much for him to bear. He decides he cannot be with Desiree any longer which leaves Desiree absolutely hopeless. Her husband’s bitterness leads a complete act of despair which is the death of her and her baby at the end of the

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