Marriage: Institution or Contract?

Marriage is a significant theme both in Kate Chopin's "The Story of an Hour" and in Henrik Ibsen's A Doll's House. Both of these pieces revolve around marriage as told from the female main character's point of view. These pieces were written during the same general time period, and seem to reflect marriage in the same light. Ibsen and Chopin both treat marriage as a social institution that limits women's freedom and rights, and not as a mutually desired contract of love entered into by choice. This contrasts highly with the typical portrayal of marriage.

In "The Story of an Hour", Chopin focuses primarily by the sense of liberation felt by Mrs. Mallard when she believes her marriage to be over. With the death of her husband, she is granted a freedom that she is unable to experience through any other means. She is exhilarated by the thought of living only for herself and without obligation to her husband. She feels that "there would be no powerful will bending her in that blind persistence with which men and women believe they have a right to impose a private will upon a fellow creature" (553). This is the view she holds of her marriage, and thinks that love does not matter in the light of this dilemma.

While Mrs. Mallard recognizes these thoughts and feelings as inappropriate, she does not seem to be able to control them. She acknowledges that "she would weep again when she saw the kind, tender hands folded in death" and that her husband had loved her, yet she feels as if a great burden has now been lifted from her (553). She does not feel guilty at the thought, and indeed considers herself lucky to have a long life still in front of her.