The Awakening (Bantam Classics)

The Awakening (Bantam Classics)

<b>The Awakening<br></b>by Kate Chopin<br><br><br>First published in 1899, this beautiful, brief novel so disturbed critics and the public that it was banished for decades afterward. Now widely read and admired, <b>The Awakening</b> has been hailed as an early vision of woman’s emancipation. This sensuous book tells of a woman’s abandonment of her family, her seduction, and her awakening to desires and passions that threaten to consume her. <br><br>Originally entitled <b>A Solitary Soul</b>, this portrait of twenty-eight-year-old Edna Pontellier is a landmark in American fiction, rooted firmly in the Romantic tradition of Herman Melville and Emily Dickinson. Here a woman engaged in self-discovery turns away from convention and society and toward the primal, irresistibly attracted to nature and the senses. <b>The Awakening</b>, Kate Chopin’s last novel, has been praised by Edmund Wilson as “beautifully written.” And Willa Cather described its style as “exquisite,” “sensitive,” and “iridescent.” <br><br>This edition of <b>The Awakening</b> also includes a selection of short stories by Kate Chopin.