------
February 24, 2014
ENG 102/Prof. ------

Two Women, Great Differences The story “Girl” written by Jamaica Kincaid and “The Story of an Hour” written by Kate Chopin are both about women. The tone of both stories are cold and there is a minimal amount of other characters in them but most of the comparisons end there. “Girl” was written by Elaine Potter Richardson who was raised in poverty by her mother and stepfather in Antigua. She was sent to the United States to take care of herself at 17 and worked as an au pair and receptionist. She took the name of Jamaica Kincaid from a character in a George Bernard Shaw Play which was an act in part out of resentment toward her mother who did not agree with her career choice. She states that her stories written are part in truth and we can see some proof of that in the story. The story “Girl” is about a girl whose Mother is giving her daughter advice. The point of view is from that of the daughter. The tone is very pessimistic and semicolons are used but no periods. Her Mother is very specific and condescending in her tone. She repeatedly refers to her daughter as a slut. An example of this is her telling her daughter not to “walk like a slut” on Sunday even though she is “bent on becoming” one. Her Mother tells her how to hem a skirt so he doesn’t “look like the slut”. And a third time, when telling her how to behave around men she doesn’t really know. The daughter only interrupts twice during the whole spiel. When her daughter asks her a question at the end of the story about the baker and the bread her Mom mocks her rather than answering her question. Kate Chopin rather than poverty, grew up in a wealthy Creole-Irish family in St. Louis, Missouri. Her father died when she was 5, so she grew up around majority women.

This story is about a woman named Louise Mallard who has a heart problem. She is told by her sister that her husband, Brently, is dead. One of his friends, Richard, said that he saw Brently’s name on the list of dead people from a railroad accident. At Louise is overcome with grief, but after some reflection she actually begins to feel happy because now that her husband is dead she is free to live only for herself and no one else and do whatever it is she would like. She looks forward to the future that awaits her. Her sister begs her to come out and she finally does. But when they walk down the stairs, the front door opens and she sees Brently. He had not in fact died and did not even know that a train accident had occurred. Louise is shocked and dies of a heart attack. The doctors pronounce that she died of a heart attack brought on by happiness. I took this to mean that Louise had already become so happy at the thought of her life alone that she got too excited and that caused her death along with all the shock of seeing her husband who she thought was dead.

The whole story consists of only one big sentence separated by semicolons. The mother is ordering the daughter how to behave.

The tone of “Girl” is aggressive and defensive, the mother being aggressive and the girl being defensive by arguing that she “never sings benna on Sundays at all and never in Sunday school”, while the tone of “The Story of an Hour” is subtle yet cruel. Subtle because the other characters don’t know the true reason for Louise’s death and cruel because the reader who does realizes that she died rather from disappointment.