Kate Chopin- Reading Journal

Kate Chopin, from what I have read, loves to write about sensitive subjects. Her two stories “Lilacs” and “A Pair of Silk Stockings” are both about a nice, not your “average” woman. “Lilacs” is about a woman who is friends with nuns and “A Pair of Silk Stockings” is about a poor woman. Chopin definitely is a sensitive woman, I can tell from these two pieces.
There is definitely no comparison between writes of the American Romanticism and the American Realism periods. Romanticism focuses on revolting against politics and displaying the beauty of nature. Realism is just straight up modern day stories about random subjects of the modern world. These include stories about money, sadness, happiness, drama between people etc.
From what I have read, Kate likes to focus on happiness and friendship between people. She doesn’t focus at all on politics in her writing. This can tell us that she is big on being happy and enjoying the little things such as the smell of lilacs as in one of her stories. Also, I am sure she had a lot of friends because in her story “Lilacs” the main character Adrienne is very friendly with her fellow nuns. Overall, Chopin is the kind of girl that can be sitting in Starbucks; you can join her, and have a full on conversation.
I think Chopin focuses her stories to either an elderly woman or a teenage girl, I am sorry to say, with no social life. Her stories are just way to boring for your everyday teenage girl. Teens want to read about drama and love, not friendships with nuns and poor middle-aged women finding money on the ground.
As a reader of Chopin’s stories, I am not entertained at all. Her stories bore me to death. I am not much of a reader in general, but if these were the only type of stories out there, I would erase the word reading from my mind. These two stories sent me no message except that a poor woman can have a short time of fun if she finds fifteen bucks on the ground and that being friends with nuns can be fun.
I am going to be honest; the only thing that drew me to this author was the fact that her short story in the textbook was very short indeed. This appealed to me big time. It is only until I found out that the other story I would be receiving from her was very long and boring, that I regretted picking her.
“After a short while, a lay sister came out of the door with a broom, and swept away the lilac blossoms which Adrienne had let fall upon the portico.”
Whoa…that quote up there is the only sad aspect of her two short stories. This is why this particular quote appealed to me. This upset me because the character Adrienne did not deserve to be let down like she was. Oh well, what are you going to do; Kate had to throw a negative aspect in there at some point.
In conclusion, Kate is just a happy woman. I think she does a good job entertaining the non-social teens and the elderly women.