The story of an hour 英文鉴赏.doc

A?Feminist?Perspective? The story The Story of an Hour, written by Kate Chopin is a short but powerful story. The ending of the story of an hour halts sharply, without much space between the climax and the ending. The ending reveals the themes of the short story, epitomizes the writing techniques the writer used, reinforces the plot and the ironic relationship between characters, makes the element—heart disease a clue throughout the whole story, and leaves us readers much margin to think about such as the nature of the protagonist. The story begins with two nonperson subject sentences. “Knowing that Mrs. Mallard was afflicted with a heart trouble, great care was taken to break to her as gentle as possible the news of her husband’s death.” This tells us the situation with Mrs. Mallard: troubled with heart disease, fragile, unable to bear any shock and carefully protected. The protection is restriction as well. In the first sentence the narrator revealed Mrs. Mallard’s heart trouble. And there are several repetitions of the disease in whole story. The second place is “Josephine was kneeling before the closed door with her lips to the keyhole, imploring for admission. ‘Louise, open the door! I beg; open the door---you will make yourself ill. What are you doing, Louise? For heaven’s sake open the door.’” The third place is “‘Go away. I am not making myself ill.’ No; she was drinking in a very elixir of life through that open door.” The fourth is “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.” The fifth is in the ending “when the doctor came they said she had died of heart disease----of joy that kills.” The first revelation is at the very beginning of the story. The last one is at the end. Mrs. Mallard’s heart trouble is an important clue that goes though the whole article. It’s the center of the story. But these are not simply repetition. The point of view and the way of presenting ar