The Awakening Ch 3 - 9

Chopin is famous for her strength in writing characters.  You may not like them, you may not agree with them, but they are beautifully drawn through well-chosen actions and spot-on dialogue.  Although many assume Chopin had a feminist agenda in writing The Awakening, she always denied any such ideas.  She said that all of these characters existed in her head, and she just wrote what happened when she put them all together.

Look at the character of Edna.  How would you describe her in these early chapters?  What details did Chopin provide that lead you to describe Edna this way?  (List at least three details.)  How is her primary foil, Mrs. Ratignolle, different or similar?

After you post the answers to the above questions, please respond to another student, expanding on a point they made.  (Do not just compliment them on their ideas-- add something to the conversation.)

Letter Written One Year Later

Imagine that you are either Nora or Torvald, and a year has passed since the close of the play.  Write a letter to the other, telling what you wish you had both done differently.

Post your letter in a reply to this prompt.  Also reply to another student's letter.

What Men Say About Women

Directions:  Read through statements and write a reaction in your post to one quote in particular.  In your reaction, write the following: the original quote, paraphrased version of quote, your response to the quote.  Respond to one other student's post thoughtfully.

1.  A man likes his wife to be just clever enough to comprehend his cleverness, and just stupid enough to admire.  –Israel Zangwill

2.  Nature has given woman so much power that the law cannot afford to give her more.  –Samuel Johnson

3.  No trust is to be placed in women.  -Homer

4.  In childhood a woman must be subject to her father; in youth to her husband; when her husband is dead, to her sons.  A woman must never be free of subjugation.  –The Code of Manu

5.  Whoever trusts women plows the winds, sows the deserts of the sea, and writes his memoirs in the snow.  –Paul Flemming

6.  A very little wit is valued in a woman, as we are pleased with a few words spoken plain by a parrot.  –Jonathan Swift

7.  A woman, a spaniel, and a walnut tree, the more they’re beaten, the better they be.  –Thomas Fuller

8.  Women are to be talked to as below men and above children.  –Lord Chesterfield

9.  Women, destined to be obedient, ought to be disciplined early to bear wrongs without murmuring.  –H.H. Karnes

10.  Women are nothing but machines for producing children.  –Napoleon I

11.  Can you recall a woman who ever showed you with pride her library?  -Benjamin Decasseres

12.  A learned woman is twice a fool.  –Italian proverb

13.  Girls begin to talk and to stand on their feet sooner than boys because weeds always grow up more quickly than good crops.  –Martin Luther

14.  The wife ought not to have any feelings of her own but join with her husband.  -Plutarch

15.  Nature intended women to be our slaves…What a mad idea to demand equality for women!  -Napoleon I