The Storm

Kate Chopin’s “The Storm”: A Plot-Based Analysis by Dr. Randy Laist
-“The Storm” has a fractured plot. Which you can see and it has a sense of discontinuity.

Chapter I: The Male Perspective
Itconsists of: objectivity, meteorology (As if we are watching a forecast in the Weather Channel, it gives a storm prediction by describing the clouds, etc.), detachment, masculinity (male initiation,Bobinot is teaching his son how to see like an adult male), capitalism (represented by the store).

Chapter II: Female Sexuality, Blame it on the Rain, Narrative and Sex and “Quivering Ecstasy”
Acontrast between:
Men and Woman
Community and Solitude, male companion of Bobinot an Bibi in a marketplace transaction is replaced by Calixta’s solitude as she does the home chores
Public Space andPrivate Space, the grocery store and the home
Objectivity and Intuition
Observation and Experience
Mind and Body, Calixta’s feels the storm in her body or you can see she is participating in thestorm
Science and Sex, the sexual arousal
-Like step by step manor.
-Her own ability to withstand the erotic storm of memories, memory and desire
-This chapter is different than other chapters; ithas a rhythm, intensity and completeness. It can be a complete story itself compared to the other chapters which are fragments.
-This is the climax.
-Has an independent light.
-Chapter two comesalive with sad memories, with religious and poetic language and a movement towards the climax
-The passion of language, and a sexual energy that defies time and space. (natural urges)
-The encounterbetween Calixta and Alcee reinforces a detachment from their lives (free of guilt and consequences) and defy social expectations.

Chapter III: Sex and Love and Two Calixtas
-The striking contrast.-Shows a sweet domestic scene of home sweet home.
-The reader is called upon to resolve what may seem to be a contradiction between the bad wife in chapter two and the good wife in this chapter....