Symbolism in The Awakening
Symbolism in The Awakening
Kate Chopin decides to end The Awakening very tragically and symbolically. The entire novel is about Edna’s “awakening.” Chopin employs the use of imagery to emphasize both her rebellious nature and her innocence and feelings of entrapment. The novel begins by introducing a bird that embodies somewhat annoying characteristics, causing the husband to move to another location. Moreover, the first few chapters delineate Edna’s aspirations and the reality that she feels compelled to face. Edna wants to learn how to swim and to be a woman like no other; she hopes for autonomy and freedom.
During Edna’s search, she is constantly lured into life’s taboos of adultery, gambling, and defying rules of society. Thus, one would associate her character with an antagonist. However, Chopin ads much symbolic imagery to give Edna’s character a more ambiguous representation and fitting ending. Edna is continuously compared to a young child, a “new-born creature”(108), and a “bird with a broken wing”(108). She is like a young child who is seduced by the freedom of the ocean and the beauty of nature.
The novel ends as Edna swims fiercely with a determined mind and powerful body. She swims consciously and resolves many conflicts introduced in the novel. The ending is “perfect;” it is inevitable that Edna will kill herself because her soul has been dead for so long. Chopin argues that “the voice of the sea speaks to the soul”(14). The only physical way for Edna to be happy is to be with Robert. Since she knows that Robert can not be with her, the only other way for Edna to find pleasure is to reunite with her soul, with her innocence, and with nature—return to the sea. Chopin writes with a religious tone; Edna is reborn several times when she appears wet (Baptism). She returns to conquer the sea with her naked, natural, religious body. She no longer feels trapped in the existing world; her death frees her.
I believe that the novel opens and closes on the same note because Edna’s dreams do not change. While she has an “awakening” it is not a climax that changes her outlook on life, but rather a new strategy for living—or for ceasing to live. The way she swims at the end fearlessly and nakedly, while being compared to a creature, illustrates her connection to the ocean. She is innocent...