Week 3: Reflection

We did not meet for a face-to-face class this week because it was Labor Day, so we got the day off! Week 3 was mainly an online class, were I watched Bolduc-Simpson's Thinking About Theme. In the short presentation I learned a little about Theme. In order to be prepared for the online discussion forum I had to read a few passages in the literature book. The two short stories we read were The Story of an Hour Kate Chopin and The Red Convertible Lymes LaMartine. The Red Convertible was a story about a guy whom struck rich and bought himself a nice car, which was later vandalized because he was showing it off at the wrong place. Ever since he won the money his life went downhill, ultimately leading to his demise. The Story of an Hour, was a story about a lady who thinks her husband died in an accident but later finds out that he didn’t when he walks through the door but she dies at the sight of seeing him again.

The main part of week 3 was our discussion forum posts. We each had to choose from one of the following questions:

“1. Research Post Traumatic Syndrome Disorder (PTSD) and relate it to the character in Lyman Lamartine's short story, The Red Convertible. Use information in the short story to analyze Henry's character and his post-war experience coming home from Vietnam. Be sure and cite at least one secondary source using MLA format in addition to the primary source (the short story). Include in-text citations in your post (minimum 200 words). If you are unsure of how to do the citations and Works Cited, go to the Resource tab and click on the MLA links or the citation links. Use http://www.easybib.com/ or http://citationmachine.net/ .

2. Choose three of the following discussion questions on Kate Chopin's The Story of an Hour to respond to (Indicate in your response which question you are responding to):
 The story says Mrs. Mallard “had loved him [her husband]–sometimes. Often she did not.” If she was “often” not in love with him, why did she marry him?
 What was life like for Mrs. Mallard in the home of Brently Mallard?
 In the report of the train accident, Brently Mallard's name was at the top of the list of fatalities (Paragraph Does this information mean that Mallard was an important citizen in his community? Does it also suggest that perhaps Louise married him, in part, because of his standing in the community?
 Do you believe Brently Mallard mistreated his wife? In answering this question, keep in mind the following: (1) In Paragraph 13 (p. 73), Louise Mallard recalls that Brently was kind and that "he had never looked save with love upon her." (2) However, Paragraph 8 (p. 72) had previously informed the reader that Mrs. Mallard's face "bespoke repression," and Paragraph 14 (p. 73) says Brently had a "powerful will bending her."
 How much of Mrs. Mallard's apparent unhappiness in her marriage was her own fault?
 After Mrs. Mallard receives news that her husband died in a train accident, she goes to “her room.” Do these two words mean that she slept separately from her husband? Does the fact that no children are named in the story indeed indicate that she and her husband slept apart? Explain.
 Write a paragraph about what society expected of the typical 19th Century American woman.
 Research the life of Kate Chopin (1851-1904). Then decide whether the death of her husband in 1882 influenced her when she wrote “The Story of an Hour,” published in 1894 in Vogue magazine.
 Did author Chopin herself face problems similar to those of Mrs. Mallard? Explain.”

I ended up choosing the second choice and the three questions that I went off to answer where, How much of Mrs. Mallard's apparent unhappiness in her marriage was her own fault?, Research the life of Kate Chopin (1851-1904). Then decide whether the death of her husband in 1882 influenced her when she wrote “The Story of an Hour,” published in 1894 in Vogue magazine, and The story says Mrs. Mallard “had loved him [her husband]–sometimes. Often she did not.” If she was “often” not in love with him, why did she marry him?

The first time I read the story I really didn’t have a full understanding of the main point and theme that the story was trying to give off. But by answering those 3 questions it gave me a much better understanding of the story. Reading up on the authors life made me realize a lot more that was probably behind the writing of the story itself.