CHAPTER 1

Summary

Grand Isle has a summer resort where the wealthy French Creoles of New Orleans like to spend their summer vacation.

Madame Lebrun rents cottages and L'once and Edna, a wealthy New Orlean's couple, are spending their first vacation there. Mme. Lebrun has two pet birds, a parrot and a mockingbird. The latter sings persistently, while the parrot talks in three languages, English, French and a third unknown language.

L'once, sitting on the porch of his cottage and trying to read the paper, is annoyed at the noise from the birds and leaves the veranda to go inside for some peace.

In one of the adjacent cottages, a lady dressed in black walks to and fro with her rosary beads. Close by, L'once's two sons who are aged 4 and 5, play with their colored nurse.

Edna Pontellier, L'once's wife, is coming back from the beach in the company of Robert Lebrun, the guesthouse proprietor's son.

L'once notices that his wife's skin looks very red and he comments that she showed poor judgement for swimming during the heat of the day.

After a while, Leonce decides to go to the Hotel to play billiards. He invies Robert to join him but he declines the invitation. Leonce leaves alone.

Interpretation

Throughout the novel, Kate Chopin uses a lot of symbolism to express her points. Bearing in mind that this novel deals with the oppression of women in the Victorian era, much of the symbolism will relate to this topic and our heroine's awakening.

The most effective symbolism is that of the birds at the beginning of the story. Looking at the description of the birds, that are caged, we can assume that they symbolize the caged women in society. The handsome parrot represents Edna, and we note that this bird speaks two languages, French and English, that everyone understands, but the third language is obscure. This symbolizes L'once's lack of understanding of his wife's needs.

The mockingbird represents Mlle. Reisz whom we will meet later on in the novel. She is a pianist of some renown, prefers to remain single and defies society with her self-sufficiency. She attracts criticism and envy from both men and women.

The first words that are uttered in Chapter 1 come from the parrot when it says, "Allez-vous en! Allez-vous en! Sapristi!" which means, "Get out! Get out! Damn it!" This is a forshadowing of what is to come later on in the story.

In this Chapter there is also the first appearance of the woman in black, a widow, depicted as a solitary person, fingering her rosary beads in order to obtain some comfort from her solitude. She is now precluded from all forms of pleasure, since becoming a widow.

We are already aware of L'once's attitude towards his wife. He is not concerned about Robert's attentive behavior. This is acceptable in the Creole society. He is more concerned about the fact that Edna has a sunburn and may be "damaged" like any other piece of his property.