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    A Pair of Silk Stockings and Other Short Stories
    A Pair of Silk Stockings and Other Short Stories
    A Pair of Silk Stockings and Other Short Stories
    Ebook107 pages2 hours

    A Pair of Silk Stockings and Other Short Stories

    By Kate Chopin

    3.5/5

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    About this ebook

    Known for her vivid portrayals of Creole life in Louisiana, Kate Chopin (1851–1904) wrote, during her brief literary career, poignant and perceptive stories about the emotional lives of women. Bypassing many of the conventions of 19th-century realism, she won praise for her realistic portraits of the inhabitants of bayou and urban areas.
    This collection of nine stories contains one of her most famous works, "Désirée's Baby" — a haunting and ironic tale of miscegenation. Additional stories include "Madame Célestin's Divorce," "A Gentleman of Bayou Téche" and "At the 'Cadian Ball," from Bayou Folk; "A Respectable Woman," "A Night in Acadie" and Azélie" from A Night in Acadie; "The Dream of an Hour" and the title story. Written with grace, delicate humor and a keen understanding of the human — especially the female — psyche, these stories are a superb introduction to an important American writer whose literary career was cut short by the harsh criticism directed at her novel The Awakening (1899).

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDover Publications
    Release dateFeb 29, 2012
    ISBN9780486110875
    A Pair of Silk Stockings and Other Short Stories
    Author

    Kate Chopin

    Kate Chopin was born in St. Louis, Missouri,In 1851. She began writing shortly after herHusband's death and, from 1889 until her ownDeath, her stories and other miscellaneousWritings appeared in Vogue, Youth's companion,Atlantic Monthly, Century, Saturday EveningPost, and other publications. In addition to The Awakening, Mrs. Chopin published another novel, At Fault, and two collections of short stories and sketches, Bayou Folk and A Night at Acadie. The publication of The Awakening in 1899 occasioned shocked and angry response from reviewers all over the country. The book was taken off the shelves of the St. Louis mercantile library and its author was barred from the fine arts club. Kate Chopin died in 1904.

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    Reviews for A Pair of Silk Stockings and Other Short Stories

    3.5/5

    56 ratings7 reviews

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    • 3/5
      Not the ending I expected if you can even call it an ending, however, Chopin's use of perfectly matched descriptions of everyday items makes this story worth reading. If this serves as an example of Chopin's talent, I am all too willing to delve further into her works.
    • 2/5
      Didn't hate it but didn't love it either. I have a feeling it would really appeal to lovers of pure literature.
    • 4/5
      If the title makes you think this is about something sexual, you'd be wrong.When I tell you it's a short story about a woman who has more money than usual, so she goes shopping and to see a play, you might think it sounds boring. If so, you'd be wrong again.A pleasant little tale, this one.
    • 4/5
      This s slim volume of selected stories by Kate Chopin, an author from Louisiana who wrote during the turn of the century, generally stories set in before civil war. All of these stories a good. A few them are outstanding. The first story in the book "Desiree's Baby", is quite heartbreaking and shows just how deep slavery and a fear of miscegenation goes.The last story in the book, A Pair of Silk Stockings - is deceptively simple. It starts with a poor lady who has extra money - as she decides what to do with it (get things the family needs), we find out a bit of this lady's past. A few of the stories featured a culture that I wasn't familiar with. The story was very understandable, but I missed the cues that a more knowledgeable reader would use to deepen the setting. My copy is a Dover Thrift Edition - while unabridged, generally doesn't have a long forward, and citation that would have explained some of the cultural cues.Over all, a good book to read in an interesting time period.
    • 4/5
      This is a kind of prototype to What Not To Wear: self-esteem increases when the poor, badly-dressed person is transformed into yet another secretary-clone. Or in this case 'fitting in with the quality'. Excellent story, if you are a woman you will identify with this. Do men?
    • 4/5
      Deceptively simple, sometimes moody, sometimes straight shocking short stories about the time of american slavery.
    • 4/5
      An interesting book to read, and that first story, oh wow. I first read Kate Chopin in the early 70’s when I was struggling to understand all the issues with women’s rights and equality. Now, in the light of my struggles to understand issues of racism, especially trying to find a way forward from racialized trauma, and breaking out of white safety to understand what impacts my black sisters and brothers, and extend an honest, understanding, and helpful hand forward, I find this narrative of a previous slice of life extremely timely.

    Book preview

    A Pair of Silk Stockings and Other Short Stories - Kate Chopin

    Désirée’s Baby

    AS THE DAY was pleasant, Madame Valmondé drove over to L’Abri to see Désirée and the baby.

    It made her laugh to think of Désirée with a baby. Why, it seemed but yesterday that Désirée was little more than a baby herself; when Monsieur in riding through the gateway of Valmondé had found her lying asleep in the shadow of the big stone pillar.

    The little one awoke in his arms and began to cry for Dada. That was as much as she could do or say. Some people thought she might have strayed there of her own accord, for she was of the toddling age. The prevailing belief was that she had been purposely left by a party of Texans, whose canvas-covered wagon, late in the day, had crossed the ferry that Coton Maïs kept, just below the plantation. In time Madame Valmondé abandoned every speculation but the one that Désirée had been sent to her by a beneficent Providence to be the child of her affection, seeing that she was without child of the flesh. For the girl grew to be beautiful and gentle, affectionate and sincere,—the idol of Valmondé.

    It was no wonder, when she stood one day against the stone pillar in whose shadow she had lain asleep, eighteen years before, that Armand Aubigny riding by and seeing her there, had fallen in love with her. That was the way all the Aubignys fell in love, as if struck by a pistol shot. The wonder was that he had not loved her before; for he had known her since his father brought him home from Paris, a boy of eight, after his mother died there. The passion that awoke in him that day, when he saw her at the gate, swept along like an avalanche, or like a prairie fire, or like anything that drives headlong over all obstacles.

    Monsieur Valmondé grew practical and wanted things well considered: that is, the girl’s obscure origin. Armand looked into her eyes and did not care. He was reminded that she was nameless. What did it matter about a name when he could give her one of the oldest and proudest in Louisiana? He ordered the corbeille¹ from Paris, and contained himself with what patience he could until it arrived; then they were married.

    Madame Valmondé had not seen Désirée and the baby for four weeks. When she reached L’Abri she shuddered at the first sight of it, as she always did. It was a sad looking place, which for many years had not known the gentle presence of a mistress, old Monsieur Aubigny having married and buried his wife in France, and she having loved her own land too well ever to leave it. The roof came down steep and black like a cowl, reaching out beyond the wide galleries that encircled the yellow stuccoed house. Big, solemn oaks grew close to it, and their thick-leaved, far-reaching branches shadowed it like a pall. Young Aubigny’s rule was a strict one, too, and under it his negroes had forgotten how to be gay, as they had been during the old master’s easy-going and indulgent lifetime.

    The young mother was recovering slowly, and lay full length, in her soft white muslins and laces, upon a couch. The baby was beside her, upon her arm, where he had fallen asleep, at her breast. The yellow nurse woman sat beside a window fanning herself.

    Madame Valmondé bent her portly figure over Désirée and kissed her, holding her an instant tenderly in her arms. Then she turned to the child.

    This is not the baby! she exclaimed, in startled tones. French was the language spoken at Valmondé in those days.

    I knew you would be astonished, laughed Désirée, "at the way he has grown. The little cochon de lait!² Look at his legs, mamma, and his hands and finger-nails,—real finger-nails. Zandrine had to cut them this morning. Is n’t it true, Zandrine?"

    The woman bowed her turbaned head majestically, Mais si, Madame.

    And the way he cries, went on Désirée, is deafening. Armand heard him the other day as far away as La Blanche’s cabin.

    Madame Valmondé had never removed her eyes from the child. She lifted it and walked with it over to the window that was lightest. She scanned the baby narrowly, then looked as searchingly at Zandrine, whose face was turned to gaze across the fields.

    Yes, the child has grown, has changed, said Madame Valmondé, slowly, as she replaced it beside its mother. What does Armand say?

    Désirée’s face became suffused with a glow that was happiness itself.

    Oh, Armand is the proudest father in the parish, I believe, chiefly because it is a boy, to bear his name; though he says not,—that he would have loved a girl as well. But I know it is n’t true. I know he says that to please me. And mamma, she added, drawing Madame Valmondé’s head down to her, and speaking in a whisper, he hasn’t punished one of them—not one of them—since baby is born. Even Négrillon, who pretended to have burnt his leg that he might rest from work—he only laughed, and said Négrillon was a great scamp. Oh, mamma, I ’m so happy; it frightens me.

    What Désirée said was true. Marriage, and later the birth of his son had softened Armand Aubigny’s imperious and exacting nature greatly. This was what made the gentle Désirée so happy, for she loved him desperately. When he frowned she trembled, but loved him. When he smiled, she asked no greater blessing of God. But Armand’s dark, handsome face had not often been disfigured by frowns since the day he fell in love with her.

    When the baby was about three months old, Désirée awoke one day to the conviction that there was something in the air menacing her peace. It was at first too subtle to grasp. It had only been a disquieting suggestion; an air of mystery among the blacks; unexpected visits from far-off neighbors who could hardly account for their coming. Then a strange, an awful change in her husband’s manner, which she dared not ask him to explain. When he spoke to her, it was with averted eyes, from which the old love-light seemed to have gone out. He absented himself from home; and when there, avoided her presence and that of her child, without excuse. And the very spirit of Satan seemed suddenly to take hold of him in his dealings with the slaves. Désirée was miserable enough to die.

    She sat in her room, one hot afternoon, in her peignoir, listlessly drawing through her fingers the strands of her long, silky brown hair that hung about her shoulders. The baby, half naked, lay asleep upon her own great mahogany bed, that was like a sumptuous throne, with its satin-lined half-canopy. One of La Blanche’s little quadroon boys—half naked too—stood fanning the child slowly with a fan of peacock feathers. Désirée’s eyes had been fixed absently and sadly upon the baby, while she was striving to penetrate the threatening mist that she felt closing about her. She looked from her child to the boy who stood beside him, and back again; over and over. Ah! It was a cry that she could not help; which she was not conscious of having uttered. The blood turned like ice in her veins, and a clammy moisture gathered upon her face.

    She tried to speak to the little

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