On Edna Pontellier's Quest For Self In Kate Chopin's The Awakening

Along with the rise of feminist criticism in the 1970s, women's literature has become the focus of literary criticism. Famous critics such as Sandra Gilbert, Susan Gubar, and so on have made significant contributions to the revival of women's literature. Scholars such as Per Syersted, Emily Toth and Nancy Walker have been the main contributors to the rediscovery and the reevaluation of Kate Chopin as well as her masterpiece The Awakening and other works.This paper analyzes Edna Pontellier's quest for self in a tripartite structure of her self-consciousness and existential status. The introduction traces the interpretive history of The Awakening since its first publication in 1899, dividing it into nine critical approaches. Chapter One is devoted to a discussion of Edna's role as the passive, sijlenced "Other" in light of Jacque Lacan's psychoanalysis, with consideration of the social and contextual background of The Awakening. At the incipient stage, simjilar to Lancan's "mirror stage", Edna is shocked by the Creole and their culture and awakened by an inner voiceless chaos. However, she only feels vague pains, which originate from female subordination in a marital relationship. However, she has not found a way to change her existential status at this stage.Chapter Two analyzes the dilemma of Edna's androgynous identity at the self-oriented stage. Based upon the concept of "androgyny" put forward by Virginia Woolf, the fundamental reasons for her androgynous status are discussed. From the...