the story of an hour文体分析
山西传媒学院-秋天的怀念读后感
The Stylistic Analysis of
the Story of an Hour
I. Introduction:
1.
Brief account of the author
Kate Chop in was
born Kate O'Flaherty in St. Louis, Missouri in
1850 to Eliza and Thomas
O'Flaherty. She was
the only child to live past the age of twenty-five
in her family. She married
Oscar Chopin at the
age of twenty in 1870 and then settled in New
Orleans where she had five
boys and two girls
before she was 28. Her husband died of swamp fever
there in 1882. Chopin
found herself in a state
of depression after the death of her husband. He
started writing.
She was well known as a woman
writer. She had published over one hundred
stories, essays,
and sketches in literary
magazines. Because of her pursuit of women’s
freedom and independence
in the USA, Kate
Chopin is considered as a forerunner of feminist
author of the 20th century. The
Story of an
Hour was written in 1894. It is one of Kate’s
works of feminism. In 1915, Fred Lewis
Pattee
[1] wrote,
even in America. [She displayed]
what may be described as a native aptitude for
narration
amounting almost to genius.
2.
Brief account of the essay
In the story of an
hour, Brently Mallard has died in a roadway
disaster. His sister told this
to Mallard’s
wife, Louise who was young, with a fair, calm
face. When she heard this news, “she
wept at
once, with sudden, wild abandonment, in her
sister's arms.” She went upstairs to a room
and stayed alone for an hour because of the
storm of grief. In the room, she sat in the chair
and
shook with a sob. She gazed out of a
window. It was spring. Birds were singing. Every
thing was
so beautiful. Suddenly, an
extraordinary thought occurs to Mrs. Mallard. “She
saw beyond that
bitter moment a long
procession of years to come that would belong to
her absolutely.” She was
free! She just made
her mind to go out from this tragedy. She found
her husband still alive so that
she was
shocked and died!
3. Major theme of the essay
The theme about this story: a woman in the
society at that time who must be responsibly for
the family without husband. She was weak in
appearance but strong in heart. She was different
from other women that she pursued the freedom
of herself. However, she could not realize her
dream because of powerlessness at last.
II. Linguistic presentation of the
theme
In the short story of The Story of an
Hour, the author told us this story as a third
person. It
showed her pursuit of freedom and
independence. In her narration, there are more
than one
thousand words. Most of them are easy
to understand. The sentences in this story are
concise and
fluent.
1. Phonological
features
In this story, the author used
onomatopoeia, elision, and alliteration. First, in
the paragraph
five, the “twittering” can
create vividness and vitality and it can produce a
sound imagine. It
can express the beauty of
the spring outside the window. Second, I think the
elision is best
used in the 17th paragraph
that Josephine asked Louise to open the door. It
can reflect her
worry and the emergency. At
last, the alliteration is also used, such as
“sound” and “scents” in
paragraph 9; “opened”
and “spread” in paragraph 13 and so on.
2.
Graphological features
There are four
special punctuations are used in this story. First
of all, exclamation marks are
used in
paragraph 11, 15, 16 to reveal her happiness and
willingness to pursue freedom. Then,
dashes
are seemed in paragraph 17 and the last paragraph.
In paragraph 17, dash is used to explain
the
reason. The last paragraph is used to represent
the effect of irony. The third, comma are used
between sentence. In this way, the situation
can be expressed clearly and lively. Such as: “Her
husband's friend Richards was there, too, near
her.” In addition, quotation marks are also used
in
the second paragraph. “Killed” refers to
the people who were killed in the accident.
2.
Lexical features
Almost words in this story
are common words. At the same time, not only
general words
but also specific words do exist
in this story. The specific words tend to give
color and tang,
tend to appeal to the
imagination. We can understand better about the
context emotions. Such
as: “paralyzed”, “weep”
in paragraph 3. We can realize her great grief
about her husband’s
death. Then, in paragraph
7, the word “sob” and in paragraph 9, the word
“creeping” gives us
a real scene through our
imagination. In addition, many general words are
also used like
“crying” “delicious”
“comfortable” in paragraph 5. Good writing or
speaking has both general
and specific
information. Then, the immediate repetition in
this story “free, free, free!” is
obvious. It
can let the readers understand the eager of the
freedom of the author. But it can’t
be a
formal sentence. At last, the author used some
emotive words. Such as “a litter whispered
word” in paragraph 11 to show her attitude to
freedom.
3. Syntactic features
In
this story, there are long sentences and short
sentences. Long sentences are used in
paragraph 6, 7 to represent her
complicated and sad emotion. Most of the sentences
are short
sentences. Such as paragraph 5,
short sentences are used to represent a happy,
simple and peaceful
life. Also, in paragraph
17, the short sentences and simple sentences are
used to present an
emergency and great
concern. Many short sentences make the story
become frequent and easy.
And three stressed
sentences like “it was” in this story which can
emphasize the important points
and persons.
This can also reveal the author’s writing skills.
The tense of this story are different.
Most
sentences of this passage are past tense. In
addition, there are three sentences in past
perfective tense, eight sentences in past
continuous tense, three in past future tense. Many
sentences are ellipsis. Such as: paragraph
4,15,16,18. They can achieve emphasis and brevity.
Many conjunctions are consisted in this story
like” and” in paragraph 19 “Spring days, and
summer days, and all sorts of days that would
be her own.” These words are used to link up a
series of things.
4. Semantic
featuresfigures of speech
There are many
figures of speech are used in this story. Such as:
simile, overstatement,
personification and
irony. Simile exists in paragraph 7 “as a child”,
paragraph10 “powerless as her
two white
slender hands” and paragraph 20 “like a goddess of
victory”. Overstatement is also used
such as
paragraph 5, 11. Then take paragraph 9 and 14 as
examples: the word “creeping” and
“blind” are
used to modify something. This belongs to
personification to give us vivid image.
Finally, irony is the most obvious rhetoric.
For instance: her attitude about her husband’s
death.
She felt relaxed but sad. This is a
great irony. And the end also belongs to irony.
The doctor said
that she died of “heart
disease-of joy.” They can’t understand the real
reason of her death. In fact,
the readers know
that her death is due to the extremely
disappointment and the hopeless future in
her
heart.
III. Conclusion
This passage uses a
simple story to represent a complicated society.
From it, we can feel the
great eager of
freedom of women. Also, it reflects that freedom
for women is impossible in this
society
because of the powerless of women. At the same
time, just from the phonological,
Graphological, Lexical, Syntactic and figures
of speech, readers can feel the perfect writing
skills
of the writer.
IV. Reference
[1]. A History of American Literature since
1870, Harvard University Press, p. 364
[2]钱瑗，实用文体学—北京：外语教学与研究出版社,2006,2(2011.4重印)
[3].冯翠华，英语修辞大全：外语教学与研究出版社，2004,9（2011.10重印）
[4] Chopin, Kate: The Story of an Hour;
from the Selected English Short Stories, Compiled
by Du
Lixia; Xi’an Jiaotong University Press,
December 2001.
The Story of an Hour
Kate Chopin
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 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 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.
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 her breath:
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
her during those coming years; she would live for
herself.
There would be no powerful will
bending her in that blind persistence with which
men and women
believe they have 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 face of this
possession of self-assertion, which she
suddenly recognized as the strongest impulse
of her being!
Josephine was kneeling
before the closed door with her lips to the
keyhole,imploring for
admission.
doing,
Louise? For heaven's sake open the door.
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.
She arose at length and opened the door
to her sister's importunities. There was a
feverish
triumph in her eyes, and she carried
herself unwittingly like a goddess of Victory. She
clasped her
sister's waist, and together they
descended the stairs. Richards stood waiting for
them at the
bottom.
Someone was opening
the front door with a latchkey. It was Brently
Mallard who entered, a
little travel-stained,
composedly carrying his gripsack and umbrella. He
had been far from the
scene of accident, and
did not even know there had been one. He stood
amazed at Josephine's
piercing cry; at
Richards' quick motion to screen him from the view
of his wife.
But Richards was too late.
When the doctors came they said she had died
of heart disease-of joy that kills.