Reviews with content warning for Sexism - The Awakening

Overall I liked the book, it was very interesting from a feminist literary perspective. I personally did not like the main character edna, at least after finishing the book and sitting on it for a day. I thought she was rash, oblivious, and ignorant. She thought she was freeing herself at the end, but

Spoiler

her death was not freeing, she could have gone on living a life she wanted to and achieving things, she could have taught her children and other people what she learned, and most of all, she is perpetuating the cycle she grew up in, without a mother, by leaving her children motherless.

I admire Adele and I think edna took much of her advice the wrong way. I think Adele was a feminist in her own way, and that Edna did not and could not see that. To me Edna is not this enlightened feminist who finds herself, she is a troubled woman who does not know where she is in her life and does not know where she would like to go. She seems to appreciate the things she has and the things she has learned about herself, but she lets it all go at the end very suddenly. I think I would need to read the novel again to understand Edna and her actions.

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actuallythesun's review against another edition

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dark emotional reflective sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

THE ultimate middle finger to 1899 society. When she has her hands tied in the oppressive, misogynistic society; when she can't perform womanhood like everyone around her seems to; when the only option open to her other than what seems like utter servitude is the dumbest sh*t imaginable, Edna can do nothing but resist. In this way we are more alike than unalike.

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finnft4's review against another edition

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challenging emotional reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

I didn't exactly mind this book, though I didn't have a great time reading it. I think that the message is crucial, especially for its time period, but it suffers from being too dense and prolonging short scenes across multiple pages. I feel like there are a lot of unnecessary moments and events that happen - all of which never exactly serve Edna's character development. The prose is also incredibly bulky (again, this was written in 1899, so it's expected). It mostly lost me about halfway through.

I think that the ending moments of the novel sort of cemented it as more so a depressing tale of a woman living in the 19th century who is a victim of her time rather than hopeful. This is fine, as long as that sort of storyline is your thing. For me, it felt a bit odd and ill-fitting - leaving a pretty bad taste in my mouth.

I guess my biggest criticism is that I simply just found it boring, but maybe I'm being influenced by this being an assigned reading.

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reid23's review against another edition

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emotional reflective medium-paced

4.0

i love this book. really gives insight into women’s roles and perspectives in 19th century america. you become really invested in the characters and plot

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elerireads's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

This sort of crept up on me - took me a while to get into the writing and weirdly I think something about the setting was a bit off-putting for me, but then as the second half went on I had this creeping realisation that it was absolutely brilliant. I'm tempted to reread it immediately and pay more attention to some of the details, because I suspect the knowledge of what's to come would make for a substantially different reading experience.

Honestly it's a book that begs to be studied and I'm not sure how to do it justice without writing a full-on essay. The title is perfect - Edna is basically sleepwalking through her life but then awakens to her own personhood and agency and starts making decisions for herself. The incomprehension and confrontation that this change evokes is a beautiful illustration of just how narrow the constraints were on 'acceptable' womanhood. It's heartbreaking because for a very short period of time she starts to experience the pure joy of being properly 'awake' and then almost immediately has to come to terms with the fact that no one else understands, and if everyone else is still beholden to the societal rules (she now sees through) and tries to enforce them on her then her newfound freedom is just an illusion anyway. At least, that's my take on it. Pretty sure I need to read some other reviews of this and then re-read it.

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betweentheshelves's review against another edition

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emotional reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

I appreciate this for what it represents in American Literature because it really was ahead of its time. There's a lot in here that moves feminist literature forward because a lot of the literature at the time didn't depict women in this way. Is the ending unfortunate? Yes, but it is expected, again because of the time it was written. But it will definitely make for interesting discussion at book club!

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