What constitutes love?

 

    "Desiree's Baby" by Kate Chopin is a short story fiction piece written in 1893. This story catalyzes emotional response, creative imagination and the reader's evaluation of human consciousness and awareness through the semiotic symbolism, the phenomenological analysis and a horizon of expectations. In the reader-response critical approach the reader connects with gaps and symbols in the story and fills them with pre-notions of how the social structure of their interpretative communities have trained them to see them filled.

 

    To begin this approach the reader begins to look at the semiotic usage of certain symbols that give rise to an emotional response that the reader continues throughout the story. This is not to persuade an overall theme, however illustrates how the symbols ignite a similar emotion in the reader that is coherent throughout. For example, in the first four paragraphs of the story the symbol of the stone pillar is indicated twice to relay two significant times that Desiree is "discovered" in the story. The first time she is discovered at the stone pillar is when she is an abandoned toddler. She is found "lying asleep in the shadow of the big stone pillar." A stone pillar is a stern and unemotional figure. The purpose of this stone pillar was to act as a gateway to the home of Madame Valmonde. There is a contradiction to the gentle affection that a baby creates within a human being and the cold lack of affection that a stone pillar creates. However both enact as gateways for Madame Valmonde, the stone pillar to her home, and Desiree to her heart. The stone pillar is utilized again with a contradicting emotional reaction of sternness and admiration. The reader, apart of an interpretative community that socializes us to relate the image of the stone pillar with a prestigious class, connects Desiree to the indifference of emotion that is associated with this class status. She becomes one with the image of the stone pillar, but this is contradicted with the strong emotions of love and her character. Earlier indicated the reader brings with her a sense of Desiree's gentleness and sincerity which we have been socialized to see as ideal features of woman-ness. The uniting image of prestige and beauty "struck" Armand into a state of admiration for her.

 

    To go further into more apparent gaps in the story the reader is forced to question the character of Armand. "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 narrator does not indicate why there is a contradiction of character between the generation of the father and the generation of his son. This contradiction is especially apparent in the matter of the dealings with the slaves. Armand's fretful mannerisms are also indicated later in the story as well, "when he frowned she trembled, but loved him." The reader is left with a gap in the story with the character of Armand. The only information we have of his upbringing is that he grew up without a mother in the latter part of his childhood because his mother dies when he is eight. The interpretative community that the reader arises from is socially conditioned to relate the lack of affection towards his slaves, and his stern demeanor, as the result of a lack of maternal affection growing up. However, the ending of the story, as well as a reference to this skin color, negates this conclusion. Desiree mentions, "…seizing his wrist. 'Look at my hand; whiter than yours, Armand,' she laughed hysterically." The ultimate conclusion of his mother being part Black indicates that the hate might arise with a realization of similar subtle physical features to his slaves. Armand does not understand this connection and despises himself and the slaves for it. The obvious reasons Armand would despise a connection is poetically constructed when the mother mentions in the letter that he "…belongs to the race cursed with the brand of slavery." He, therefore, might act more cruelly due to the fact that there is a discontent and ambiguity within himself, and this he might scapegoat with anger towards his slaves. In reevaluating how the reader is to fill this gap, one might wonder what other incidents might have stirred a hate towards his slaves. Creatively inventing an episode, I thought the skin tone might have played a larger role then the reader might first interpret because the lack of centralization on this factor. During the summertime, when skin tone is prone to darken, this might have caused some taunting from his fellow playmates. Physical features that we are teased about when we are young develop into insecurities. When we rise to adulthood, these insecurities carry along with us and we are prone to despise them in others because we have trained ourselves to despise them within ourselves. This might indicate that he might have despised the slaves to such a degree due to the fact that they carried the same features he had grown to hate of himself.

    To conclude, as a reader, I am given only a handful of information about the characters and the settings. This lack of full perception and ambiguous detail antagonized my own creativity of understanding the human consciousness. What started off as a story that might have strived at relaying a theme of karma, went further to analyze what social constructs my own consciousness lies in.