Revived again.

Allen Ng
Brackenhoff
English 68
May 10, 2010
C & C
Michael de Montaigne once said, "Marriage is like a cage, one sees the birds outside desperate to get in, and those inside equally desperate to get out." Someone should have explained this to Louise and Calixta before they decided to put on that steel band. In Kate Chopin's two stories, "The Storm" and "The Story of an Hour,” married life is reflected through the eyes of two stay-at-home wives. Louise and Calixta, who both have loving husbands; yet, imagery and irony reveal the theme that marriage leads to unhappiness.
Imagery is vividly used to development the theme of both stories. In “The Story of an Hour”, Louise, a bed-ridden wife is told the tragic news of her husband’s death. After the tears subsided, she peers out the “open square before her house and sees the tops of trees that were all aquiver with the new spring life” (1 Chopin). Naturally, after a loved one’s death, people’s minds would be mournful and fixated on the dark side of life. Louise, on the other hand, sees a fresh new start. The sensual imagery that Kate uses to describe Louise’s feelings loud and clear, “The delicious breath of rain was in the air,”(1 Chopin). Louise was in an unhappy marriage and even on this gloomy day, her spirit is high and “monstrous” (2 Chopin) because of her husband’s passing
Imagery is once again used as an illuminate an unhappy marriage in “The Storm”. The story begins with a “sinister” (1 Chopin) storm rolling into the town of New Orleans, as neighbor, Alee Laballiere, visits Calixta while her husband and son are away. At the peak of the storm, lighting hits a nearby tree and startles Calixta into Alcee’s arms, rekindling the old flame between them, “The contact of her warm palpitating body… arouses all the old-time inflation and desire for her flesh,” (3 Chopin). Temptation triumphs within the eye of the storm as Calixta experiences passion for her first time, “Her firm, elastic flesh that was knowing for the first time its birthright,” (3 Chopin). Because of the dissatisfaction Calixta faced with her marriage, she feels no hesitation or remorse during the sex with Alcee. In fact Alcee made her happier than Bobinot ever did, “They seemed to soon together at the very borderland of life’s mystery,” (3 Chopin).
Irony is the main bridge that connects these two pieces of writings by Kate Chopin. In “The Story of an Hour”, irony strikes at the very end of the story, “When the doctors came they said she had died of heart disease—of joy that kills,” (2 Chopin). Louise is caught by the throat and thrown back into the cage of marriage as her husband enters the house unscratched and unharmed. Being overly joyful about her husband’s death, the sight of him alive ironically kills Louise.
Kate Chopin once again uses the tool of irony throughout the “The Storm” with the positioning of her text. At the beginning of every scene, the story picks up with an ironic lead-in. After Calixta and Alcee’s dirty sex scandal, the scene changes to Bobinot and Bibi worrying about being presentable to mom, which is a small smug on an already soiled situation. “My! Bibi, ... How you got that mud on yo’ collar, Bibi? I never saw such a boy! W’at will yo’ mama say!” (4 Chopin). Kate uses adultery ironically. While, most stories that involve adultery end with unhappy endings; conversely in “The Storm” everyone was happy at the end. Both story used an array of imagery and irony very similarly to progress theme.