American Literature Web Resources: Kate Chopin

compiled by Jay Schleppenbach

American writer Kate Chopin (1850-1904) is undoubtedly better known and revered by readers and critics today than she ever was in her own lifetime. Known for her gift for elegant, clear prose as well as her vivid local-color depictions of culture in New Orleans, Louisiana and the oppressive nature of the era's treatment of women, Chopin has since her death and the rediscovery (if it could even be called that) of her works in the 1960s been hailed as a woman and author well ahead of her time. While living and working as a devoted wife and mother, Chopin managed to maintain her own literary salon and begin a writing career. For more than a decade following her first published story in 1889, she carefully depicted the manners, customs, speech, and surroundings of Louisiana's Creole and Cajun residents. Her attention to detail and careful storytelling (as well as her interesting body of poetry and criticism work) began to catch critical eyes and receive praise, but her later turns to more controversial subjects (like the oppression of women) soon led her into trouble.

As Chopin's later stories, such as "The Story of an Hour," began to emphasize women's need for independence and frankly (although by no means explicitly) address their sexual passion, editors became less receptive to her work. Chopin was forced to publish a novel, At Fault, in 1890 at her own expense. After several publishers rejected her second novel, she destroyed the manuscript, feeling deepening alienation and rejection from society. The Awakening (1899), the novel many now consider to be her masterpiece, attracted a storm of negative criticism for its dead-on depiction of Edna Pontellier's rejection of motherhood and traditional social values and interest in social and sexual freedom. Publication of her third collection of stories, A Vocation and a Voice, was suspended, and the collection was not published in any form until 1991. As a result of the negative criticism and social ostracism that followed The Awakening, Chopin produced few additional writings, and over the next half-century her work became obscure.