While reading The Awakening by Kate Chopin, one recurring theme that stood out to me is how Mr. Pontellier regularly sees and treats Edna and their children as one of his prized possessions. Léonce is a businessman who is always deeply preoccupied with his work, often away from home. Even at the beginning of the novel, when the family is at Grand Isle, Léonce would often leave for business or to the club. When he returned from the club one night to find one of his sons with a fever, he wakes Edna to ask her about it, concerned in a way I read more as a child with a damaged toy than a concerned father. Back in New Orleans, when Edna first begins to neglect her duties as a housewife, he begins to worry about the societal expectations and repercussions of her actions, not why she left. Overall, while Mr. Pontellier is not an unkind man to his wife and children, he views them as possessions or trophies to display.
Hi Chloe,
I definitely agree that it seems like Mr. Pontellier views his family and wife as trophies and possessions to show off to his community, but do you think that it is a reflection of the time, or his own overbearing personality? Do you think the weight of the societal expectations is forcing him to act this way, or that the way their (not so distant) society is structured in undervaluing women allows for such expectations to begin with?
Mr. Pontellier seems to also have solely materialistic views but he is also highly oblivious, Yes he realizes something is wrong with Edna but he cannot even fathom what could possibly be wrong with Edna and why she is pushing societal standards away. He just cannot fathom that Edna is an individual and not a trophy and when she inevitably moves away he just has no clue that anything is going on with her, it is genuinely like a boss and an employee relationship. I truly wonder what Leonce’s reaction would have been towards Edna’s death whether it would be him thinking about it because she abandoned her motherly duties and her housewife status or would he actually feel emotional?