Re-interpreting Kate Chopin's The Awakening From The Perspective Of Transcendentalism

The Awakening written by Kate Chopin (1851-1904) has now stepped into the canon of the American literature. This novel is becoming one of the most widely read in colleges. This complex and subtle novel is one which can be read from many different perspectives such as romanticism, realism, naturalism, and modern feminism.This thesis is intended to re-interpret it from the perspective of Transcendentalism and to spade out the transcendentalist ideas reflected in it so as to broaden the horizon of reading this novel. Transcendentalism lays emphasis on spirit, individual, self-reliance and divine revelation from nature. The transcendentalists see nature as a great and holy teacher of the self-reliant man. They believe that man can transcend the material world by being himself and experiencing nature and that an individual can depend upon himself for spiritual perfection either by directly communing with nature or by intuition. They also argue against any social conventions, inherited rituals or institutions which act to interfere with the spiritual growth of the individual. According to the Transcendentalist ideas, the protagonist Edna in The Awakening can be interpreted as a female transcendentalist who pursues her individuality, her self-reliance and her spiritual perfection by continuously communing with nature.