In Virginia Ross’s criticism, “Kate
Chopin’s Motherless Heroine”, the author tries to prove that the main reason
behind Edna Pontellier’s actions was a yearning for a mother. The author points out the many instances in
which Edna is drawn to Adele Ratignolle.
Edna is in admiration of Adele’s physical beauty throughout the
novel. Ross explains that “Edna is drawn
to Adele because of Adele is the embodiment of maternity defined by her current
pregnancy and her ministrations to her children.”(Ross 254). Edna seems to be jealous of the special bond
that Monsieur Ratignolle and Adele Ratignolle share such as a child feeling
excluded from their parents’ intimacy. Adele
is compared to the Madonna by Edna. With
this act, Edna is comparing Adele to a symbol of unconditional maternal comfort
that is absent from her Protestant background. Ross also points out the way in which Edna
describes the sea with a shift from prose style to more alliterative language. Before she met Robert, Edna had only admired
men from a distance and did not use the same type of language to describe them
as she did with the sea. Throughout this
criticism there are a few psychological terms that are mentioned that help to
explain Edna’s actions. These refer to
stages in child development proving how childlike Edna was. Ross makes a point that “Sadly, the woman [Mr.
Pontellier] expected always to carry out the maternal role turns out to have an
urgent need for a mother herself. “ I believe that the argument was presented very
strongly. Ross writes that “…Edna’s
choice to go to Adele instead of inventing a pretext and staying with her
lover, who has seemed to be her sole preoccupation for many months, is more
convincingly explained by the supposition that her tie to Adele is actually the
stronger attachment.” This statement
convinced me to agree with Ross on Edna’s yearning for a mother. I was very confused throughout the novel as
to why Edna did the things that she did.
Many of her actions and thoughts seem to contradict each other. Ross’s theory seems to be consistently
supported throughout the entire novel and helped me to make better sense of the
protagonists’ motives.
No comments:
Post a Comment