'In the early stages of 'The Awakening', show how Kate Chopin reveals to us Edna's growing consciousness.': An explanation of the first few chapters of Chopin's take on Madame Bovary!

Kate Chopin's story, 'The Awakening', throws echoes back on a time when women were imprisoned by societal expectations as in a glass cage. Often women would be unaware of the fact that they were not free in the true sense of the word, or if they were aware, they were not sufficiently conscious enough to wish to break free and risk disapproval. This was the time that Chopin lived in, and her work can only …

…'I never was so exhausted in my life. But it isn't unpleasant. A thousand emotions have swept through me tonight.' The emotions, the exhaustion are all evidence of Edna's growing understanding of herself as a real person, a being with feelings and needs beyond that which society has allocated to her. Fighting against the concepts with which she has been brought up has and will prove as exhausting for her as fighting the tide.