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Title: Awakening by Kate Chopin ISBN: 0-380-00245-0 Publisher: Avon Pub. Date: 10 February, 1982 Format: Mass Market Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $4.50 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.9 (278 reviews)
Rating: 2
Summary: The Awakening [ABRIDGED]
Comment: Although Chopin's masterpiece can be life altering when the complete text is read, I found the abridgement on audio to be quite disappointing. Liza Ross's affectation of Edna Pontellier's journey through her awakening makes Edna seem whimsical and weak. The abridgement makes too many cuts which are essential to understanding Edna's break from her husband and from society's standards at the time of the novella's occurrence. Other characters also seem trite and their actions come across as incomprehensible.
Robert Lebrun is certainly not worthy of Edna's affections throughout the course of the abridgement. He is much more seductive and enticing in the complete story. The same holds true for Madomoiselle Reisz. The two characters are essential to internalizing Edna's plight and understanding her ultimate fate.
I have listened to many audio abridgements. In this case, the lack of story does a disservice to the listener's understanding of Napoleonic Law in Louisiana at the turn of the century. It is easy to listen to this rendering not realizing that Edna and all of her personal effects are actually Leonce's property.
My advice, read the book if you truly want to appreciate the mastery of the work that made Chopin give up writing.
Rating: 4
Summary: Chronicle of a lonely and disturbed woman
Comment: The Awakening is one of my more-read classic books--it allows the reader to slip into the identity of another human being who is totally unlike them.
Edna is an average, middle-class mother married to a respectable yet dull man with a pair of fairly nice children. Yet she realizes that her life is stifled--she is expected to fall into a mold of behavior and thinking that a thousand other women fall into. In addition, she is attracted to a young man working with her husband.
Edna soon breaks free of all ties, living as she wishes and doing as she wishes, but her newfound freedom comes with a price...
I think that Edna may have had a mood disorder--her sometimes random swings of emotion and her interactions with her husband and children point that even if there were no physiological reason for her dissatisfaction, I think that she may have been disturbed in some way. Even after finding her "satisfaction," she still doesn't seem happy.
A book that was originally condemned for being scandalously immoral, "Awakening" is a fairly tame tale with an un-Hollywoodish ending that leaves the reader feeling sad, yet not regretting their choice to read it.
I don't think this is a feminist tale-more the tale of a human being pinballing into unknown waters.
Rating: 2
Summary: Dispensable
Comment: In this brief novel, Kate Chopin tries to depict the spiritual awakening of a privileged young woman. Unfortunately, the book doesn't make much sense. When Edna, the protagonist, casts away her public self to become her true self, we might suppose that her quality of life would improve. Instead she exercises poorer and poorer judgment, ultimately destroying herself. Edna is not a likeable or even an authentic character, and the supporting cast is almost as unattractive. In this novel, even New Orleans seems to have no attractions. The Awakening is not terrible; it just has little to offer.
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Title: Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston ISBN: 0060931418 Publisher: Perennial Pub. Date: 01 December, 1998 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald ISBN: 0684801523 Publisher: Scribner Pub. Date: 01 June, 1995 List Price(USD): $12.95 |
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Title: The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne ISBN: 0553210092 Publisher: Bantam Pub. Date: 01 April, 1965 List Price(USD): $3.95 |
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Title: Death of A Salesman by Arthur Miller ISBN: 0140481346 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: 06 October, 1998 List Price(USD): $10.00 |
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Title: Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison ISBN: 0679732764 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 14 March, 1995 List Price(USD): $12.95 |
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