Unit 8.1: Analyzing Characters' Decisions English as a ..., Slides of English

Download Unit 8.1: Analyzing Characters' Decisions English as a ... and more Slides English in PDF only on Docsity!       Unit  8.1:  Analyzing  Characters’  Decisions   English  as  a  Second  Language   Text  –  The  Story  of  An  Hour     Source:  “The  Story  of  an  Hour”  by  Kate  Chopin     1   The  Story  of  An  Hour   By  Kate  Chopin  (1894)   Knowing  that  Mrs.  Mallard  was  afflicted  with  a  heart  trouble,  great  care  was  taken  to  break  to   her  as  gently  as  possible  the  news  of  her  husband's  death.     It  was  her  sister  Josephine  who  told  her,  in  broken  sentences;  veiled  hints  that  revealed  in  half   concealing.  Her  husband's  friend  Richards  was  there,  too,  near  her.  It  was  he  who  had  been  in   the  newspaper  office  when  intelligence  of  the  railroad  disaster  was  received,  with  Brently   Mallard's  name  leading  the  list  of  "killed."  He  had  only  taken  the  time  to  assure  himself  of  its   truth  by  a  second  telegram,  and  had  hastened  to  forestall  any  less  careful,  less  tender  friend  in   bearing  the  sad  message.     She  did  not  hear  the  story  as  many  women  have  heard  the  same,  with  a  paralyzed  inability  to   accept  its  significance.  She  wept  at  once,  with  sudden,  wild  abandonment,  in  her  sister's  arms.   When  the  storm  of  grief  had  spent  itself  she  went  away  to  her  room  alone.  She  would  have  no   one  follow  her.     There  stood,  facing  the  open  window,  a  comfortable,  roomy  armchair.  Into  this  she  sank,   pressed  down  by  a  physical  exhaustion  that  haunted  her  body  and  seemed  to  reach  into  her   soul.     She  could  see  in  the  open  square  before  her  house  the  tops  of  trees  that  were  all  aquiver  with   the  new  spring  life.  The  delicious  breath  of  rain  was  in  the  air.  In  the  street  below  a  peddler  was   crying  his  wares.  The  notes  of  a  distant  song  which  some  one  was  singing  reached  her  faintly,   and  countless  sparrows  were  twittering  in  the  eaves.     There  were  patches  of  blue  sky  showing  here  and  there  through  the  clouds  that  had  met  and   piled  one  above  the  other  in  the  west  facing  her  window.     She  sat  with  her  head  thrown  back  upon  the  cushion  of  the  chair,  quite  motionless,  except  when   a  sob  came  up  into  her  throat  and  shook  her,  as  a  child  who  has  cried  itself  to  sleep  continues  to   sob  in  its  dreams.     She  was  young,  with  a  fair,  calm  face,  whose  lines  bespoke  repression  and  even  a  certain   strength.  But  now  there  was  a  dull  stare  in  her  eyes,  whose  gaze  was  fixed  away  off  yonder  on   one  of  those  patches  of  blue  sky.  It  was  not  a  glance  of  reflection,  but  rather  indicated  a   suspension  of  intelligent  thought.           Unit  8.1:  Analyzing  Characters’  Decisions   English  as  a  Second  Language   Text  –  The  Story  of  An  Hour     Source:  “The  Story  of  an  Hour”  by  Kate  Chopin     2   There  was  something  coming  to  her  and  she  was  waiting  for  it,  fearfully.  What  was  it?  She  did   not  know;  it  was  too  subtle  and  elusive  to  name.  But  she  felt  it,  creeping  out  of  the  sky,  reaching   toward  her  through  the  sounds,  the  scents,  the  color  that  filled  the  air.     Now  her  bosom  rose  and  fell  tumultuously.  She  was  beginning  to  recognize  this  thing  that  was   approaching  to  possess  her,  and  she  was  striving  to  beat  it  back  with  her  will-­‐-­‐as  powerless  as   her  two  white  slender  hands  would  have  been.  When  she  abandoned  herself  a  little  whispered   word  escaped  her  slightly  parted  lips.  She  said  it  over  and  over  under  the  breath:  "free,  free,   free!"  The  vacant  stare  and  the  look  of  terror  that  had  followed  it  went  from  her  eyes.  They   stayed  keen  and  bright.  Her  pulses  beat  fast,  and  the  coursing  blood  warmed  and  relaxed  every   inch  of  her  body.     She  did  not  stop  to  ask  if  it  were  or  were  not  a  monstrous  joy  that  held  her.  A  clear  and  exalted   perception  enabled  her  to  dismiss  the  suggestion  as  trivial.  She  knew  that  she  would  weep  again   when  she  saw  the  kind,  tender  hands  folded  in  death;  the  face  that  had  never  looked  save  with   love  upon  her,  fixed  and  gray  and  dead.  But  she  saw  beyond  that  bitter  moment  a  long   procession  of  years  to  come  that  would  belong  to  her  absolutely.  And  she  opened  and  spread   her  arms  out  to  them  in  welcome.     There  would  be  no  one  to  live  for  during  those  coming  years;  she  would  live  for  herself.  There   would  be  no  powerful  will  bending  hers  in  that  blind  persistence  with  which  men  and  women   believe  they  ahve  a  right  to  impose  a  private  will  upon  a  fellow-­‐creature.  A  kind  intention  or  a   cruel  intention  made  the  act  seem  no  less  a  crime  as  she  looked  upon  it  in  that  brief  moment  of   illumination.     And  yet  she  had  loved  him-­‐-­‐sometimes.  Often  she  had  not.  What  did  it  matter!  What  could  love,   the  unsolved  mystery,  count  for  in  the  face  of  this  possession  of  self-­‐assertion  which  she   suddenly  recognized  as  the  strongest  impulse  of  her  being!     "Free!  Body  and  soul  free!"  she  kept  whispering.    Josephine  was  kneeling  before  the  closed  door  with  her  lips  to  the  keyhold,  imploring  for   admission.  "Louise,  open  the  door!  I  beg;  open  the  door-­‐-­‐you  will  make  yourself  ill.  What  are   you  doing,  Louise?  For  heaven's  sake  open  the  door."     "Go  away.  I  am  not  making  myself  ill."  No;  she  was  drinking  in  a  very  elixir  of  life  through  that   open  window.   Her  fancy  was  running  riot  along  those  days  ahead  of  her.  Spring  days,  and  summer  days,  and  all   sorts  of  days  that  would  be  her  own.  She  breathed  a  quick  prayer  that  life  might  be  long.  It  was   only  yesterday  she  had  thought  with  a  shudder  that  life  might  be  long.