In Kate Chopin’s The Maid of Saint Phillippe the main character, Marianne, struggles to maintain her independence in a time period that, although valued freedom, was a tempestuous time in the history of colonial America. She repeats the excuse that she is just submitting to her father’s will as justification for her nonconformity to the expectations of her peers. It is only once her father dies that her true reason for staying with Picoté is apparent: the maintenance of her independence.
Marianne detests the idea of living subservient to another. She even spurns the idea of living in France in the lap of luxury. She goes so far as to reject French rule. This shows that the will of her father was only an excuse to protect her own independence, because in his absence she still chooses her freedom over the pleas of her friends. Most notable of the temptations given to Marianne is marriage to Captain Vaudry and the luxuries of bourgeois life in France. Her response echoes her resolve, “’I have sometimes thought I should like to know what it is men call luxury… The English shall never be masters of Marianne. Over the river is no better’” (Chopin 162). This passage shows that Marianne has a way to become a subject of France again, to live in luxury, but she refuses because she was “’not born to be the mother of slaves.’”
She also chooses to go off on her own in the face of offers by the Curé and Jacques. The Curé offers a life of simplicity among friends of her father, to once again resume her role as a daughter. Jacques’ offer is representative of a life of simplicity as his wife, raising a family under French rule. She has the gamut of options at her disposal and runs off to the Cherokee rather than be subservient to another. In both of these cases she would either be subservient to the English, the French, or a man. This is best illustrated in her response to Vaudy’s question “’[y]ou deny allegiance to England and Spain; you spurn France with contempt; what is left for you?’ ‘Freedom is left for me!’ exclaimed [Marianne]… ‘Hardships may await me, but let it be death rather than bondage.’” Rather than be subservient, Marianne would rather accept death. Her refusal to live bound shows that in no way was she bound to her father by anything more than her free will and an escape from committing herself to a life of matriarchal duties.
Chopin does this to challenge the conventions of her time, although gender inequality was not as pronounced in frontier communities, Marianne’s peculiar choice is a rebellion in the eyes of Chopin’s contemporaries In allowing her character, Marianne, to self-actualize Chopin provides contrast to the conventions of her contemporary culture. Marianne challenges the notion that a woman’s role is either of wife or daughter, rather than as an individual.
Chopin, Kate, and Pamela Knights. The Awakening, and Other Stories. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2000. Print