Essay about Time: Conflict and Story Mrs. Mallard

Submitted By TaraDoman7
Words: 599
Pages: 3

The Story of an Hour In the story, The Story of an Hour, the author portrays a story with both many internal and external conflicts. During the 1890’s women were fighting for their rights in all ways. This was a time where women were tired of men over powering them and letting them own them almost like property. During this story you see an overview of the matter and how the main character, Mrs. Mallard, goes through stages of emotions from the death of her husband. Mrs. Mallard comes through many internal and external conflicts throughout the beginning, middle and end of the story. At the beginning of the story Mrs. Mallard learns of startling news that her husband has passed away. This becomes the external conflict because she must act like she is devastated for her husband’s death but secretly does not feel this way. We also learn of her heart troubles, this shows us the internal conflict because her sister had to break it to her slowly and gently of the news of her husband’s death. The audience waits to see if she will live through it because she became so depressed and almost too heart broken it seemed to bear to live on. The story soon changes when her family leaves and she is alone to think truly of her husband’s death. When her family is gone and only she remains, Mrs. Mallard soon thinks of all her emotions and how she truly feels. She does not know how to feel about her emotions of her husband’s death and this becomes one of her major internal conflicts. She is sad and curled up like a child but as the she thinks about everything she soon becomes lifted up in spirit and can not believe how she feels so, “Free, free, free!” On the other hand she also does not know how to express herself with these feelings and this becomes and external conflict with all of her different emotions mixing in. She than overcomes this though when she feels free and, “But she saw beyond the biter moment a long procession of years to come that would belong to her absolutely. And she opened and spread her arms out to them in welcome.” Towards the end of the story Mrs. Mallard comes by one more internal