However, Leonce mainly worries about the financial consequence of Edna`s behaviour as he tells her not to ignore Mrs. By abandoning the Reception Day, Edna dishonors Leonce because her duty as a middle-class wife is to show her husband`s wealth and status to her visitors (Martin 19). He informs Edna that they have to keep to certain social conventions “if ever expect to get on and keep up with the procession” (the same page). As Leonce learns this from his wife he becomes very angry with her. Despite this tradition, Edna goes out on Reception Day without having a proper excuse, but “simply felt like going out” (Culley 49). Furthermore, it is regarded as very rude to be out when guests call (Culley 123).
At this particular day, the wife has to be prepared for callers and visitors permanently. Abandoning the Reception DayĪccording to “An Etiquette/Advice Book Sampler” the Reception Days are among the most important duties of a wife at the time of the turn to the twentieth century.
By means of two specific examples from the text, I will show that Greenblatt`s thesis corresponds to the function of culture at the time in which the novel takes place. In the following essay I will prove that cultural boundaries and social conventions play a very important role in “The Awakening”. This controlling function of culture is a central issue in Kate Chopin`s novel “The Awakening”. In his essay “Culture”, Steven Greenblatt makes the assertion that culture functions “as a pervasive technology of control, a set of limits within which social behaviour must be contained” (Greenblatt 225). The controlling function of culture as an important theme in Kate Chopin`s novel “The Awakening”