Tag Archives: “A Jury of Her Peers”

Homework, Week 1

My Thoughts on “The Story of an Hour” and “A Jury of Her Peers”

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In “The Story of an Hour,” when Mrs. Mallard hears the tragic news of her husband getting “killed” in the railroad disaster, she is devastated (p.2). She realizes that she is a widow and her husband is no longer with her. She also sees that she has “no one to live for during the coming years and that she would live for herself’ (p.10). Mrs. Mallard was living for her husband. Every moment of her life was a reflection of Mr. Mallard because she put her hope, trust, faith, and life in Mr. Mallard. And when I state “reflection,” I mean Mrs. Mallard represented her husband. When a man marries a woman, their soul, mind, and body are glued together, representing them as one person. So, when she heard that husband passed away, it was as if her life crumbled apart. She no longer had no reason to live when the person that was her everything or her life was dead. “There would be no powerful will bending hers in that blind persistence with which men and women believe they have a right to impose a private will upon a fellow-creature,” meaning that there would be no motivation for Mrs. Mallard to cook, eat, or etc. when all those things were being done for her husband (p.10). So, I believe this led her to having heart problems. Also, she could have mourned for her husband and make the decision to continue living her life. However, Mrs. Mallard had her identity as a wife to Mr. Mallard. When his death came, she lost her identity, making her lose her will to live, which ultimately led her to dying of “heart disease” (p.20).

In “A Jury of Her Peers,” Mrs. Wright (Minnie Foster) the once “lively choirgirl that sang in the choir and wore pretty clothes,” was no longer lively (Page 268, p.1). Mrs. Wright marriage to her husband made her bound or chained to not doing the things she loved to do, which was singing. Although, Mr. Wright was seen as a “good man in town” (Page 274 p.6), “he was a hard man” (Page 274 p.8). “Just to spend the time of day with him was like a raw wind that got to the bone” (Page 274 p.8). Also, their home “never seemed a very cheerful place” (Page 265 p.7). Therefore, Mrs. Wright was living under constant anxiety. Her “nervousness” was exhibited by the strange way of her sewing her quilt (Page 272) and her untidy kitchen (Page 266). Also, Mrs. Wright probably was living in fear of what her husband was going to do or say to her, so she lived in silence, except for her pet bird that sang to her (Page 277 p.8). However, Mr. Wright silenced the bird by killing it. After the bird’s death, I think Mrs. Wright had enough of being silent and wanted to be free. So, Mrs. Wright killed her husband in order to gain freedom from the 20 years of being oppressed by her husband.

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Week 1

Story of an Hour/Jury of her Peers

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In Jury of Her Peers, the conversations of Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters provide us with a picture of Mrs. Wright in her younger years. We see a beautiful young women with a wonderful voice.  That women is in stark contrast to the women Mr. Hale walked in on that morning, a women living with worn out clothing, in a lonesome house, with no children, and once again, no pets. After all those years, when she finally had something that gave her joy, only to see her husband take that away from her as well, it is very easy to validate her actions. In a way, her husband took her life before she took his.

The Story of An Hour begins with a frail woman receiving terrible news.  As the story progresses we see what this news meant to her, a chance to be free, a chance to live. After living for someone she didn’t love for so long, and to be given another chance at freedom, I would say her thoughts toward her “late” husband are completely acceptable.

Both stories are set in the same time period, a time when women were seen as housekeepers, and are there to serve their husbands, and raise children. I think the attorney saying  “But would the women know a clue if they did come upon it?” is a great example of the general attitude toward women at the time. Although in today’s day and age the attitude toward women has changed, both stories are still very relevant. There are many people trapped in loveless and abusive relationships, and it would be easy enough to adapt the story to present day.

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Homework Instructions, Week 1

Blogging on “The Story of an Hour” and “A Jury of Her Peers”

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Now that you have had the opportunity to read Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour” and Susan Glaspell’s “A Jury of Her Peers” and to discuss them with classmates via our course blog, your homework is to think further about them in your own blog post. This post should follow our course’s blogging guidelines, and should draw on one or two quotations as the main focus of your post to convey an argument about some aspect of the texts. The post can touch on points that you or others made in the discussion, provided you cite them AND that you take any of those ideas further. Your goal is to provide analysis of the specific passage or passages you have chosen to focus on, and to show how it exemplifies a larger argument about the text or texts.

This is going to be the format for our homework blog posts for the next few weeks, so you will begin developing these skills here.

Some things you might want to think about:

  • How do you judge the protagonists for their thoughts about/actions against their husbands? Do you judge them differently?
  • How do other characters and the narrators influence our understanding of the protagonists?
  • To what extent does setting play a role in the women’s stories?
  • To what extent are these stories dated, or are they as relevant as if they were written today? What difference does that make for you reading them now, in 2015?

Remember to categorize your post with Week 1, and to use any tags you think are relevant (except Homework Assignment, which I’m using for these weekly instruction posts)–or add your own tags. If you neglect to categorize your post, I will not find it and will not be able to count it.

These posts will guide our discussion on Wednesday. Please post them by the end of Tuesday night so we have the chance to read them and come to class prepared.

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Glossary

Ungainly

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Ungainly (adjective): 1. a. lacking in smoothness or dexterity:  clumsy b. hard to handle: unwieldy 2. having an awkward appearance (Merriam-Webster)

Found on Paragraph 10, Page 263 of “A Jury of Her Peers”–>“The county attorney was looking at the cupboard — a peculiar, ungainly structure, half closet and half cupboard, the upper part of it being built in the wall, and the lower part just the old-fashioned kitchen cupboard.”

I believe the word in this quote means that Mr. Hale (the attorney) found that the Wrights cupboards were crafted poorly, making them fragile looking and awkward in shape and appearance.

 

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Discussion

Discussing “The Story of an Hour” and “A Jury of Her Peers”

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“The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin is a great story to discuss for many reasons. It’s especially convenient because it packs so much into just two pages. After you read “The Elements of Fiction” and “The Story of an Hour,” re-read “The Story of an Hour” with pen or pencil in hand. Mark it up by identifying different elements of fiction you find in it, as well as anything else that stands out to you. When you take notes on a reading, what techniques do you use? Underlining, circling, bracketing, writing summaries, questions, observations, drawing arrows connecting similar ideas, defining words you didn’t know, among other techniques are great ways to get into a text. Try a combination of these techniques.

For our discussion, consider how we as readers think about Mrs. Mallard and the death of Mr. Mallard in comparison to how we think about Mrs. Wright and the death of Mr. Wright. Use the elements of fiction to support your ideas, and be specific with examples from the readings (including quotations is a great way to support your claims).

Since comments should be roughly 150-250 words, you might find that you can’t say everything you want to say. There are many of us to contribute ideas, so no one commenter needs to say everything. That said, come back to contribute more by engaging in a discussion with your classmates. You can either respond to my post by adding a comment, or you can reply to someone who has left a comment. Reading other classmates’ ideas can help shape your ideas, so be sure to read carefully to best engage in the discussion. We might not have the same ideas, but we can learn from each other and expand our understanding of these texts through our discussion.

If you have questions about the texts, feel free to ask those, too. When I stated that comments need to be 150-250 words, that doesn’t mean you can’t also write additional shorter comments, especially if they are questions. And everyone should feel free to answer questions as well–that will contribute to our discussion as well.

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