In this "Sequel to the 'Cadian Ball," as the subtitle to Kate Chopin's story reads, the storm that "burst" is used in a metaphoric sense as well as a realistic one. The metaphor of the storm represents the whirlwind of unsatisfied passion stored within Calixta and Alcée after their parting from one another, a whirlwind which is briefly regenerated during their first personal encounter in years.

When Alcée Laballière unexpectedly rides up on his horse to the gate of Calixta's home, he asks if he may wait on her gallery until the raging storm subsides. Politely, Calixta replies that he may. Soon, however, his intention to remain outside becomes impractical, as the rain beats down in torrents. So, he joins Calixta inside ,where she looks out the window in concern for her husband and son, who departed some time ago for Freidheimer's store.

The playing of the lightning was incessant. A bolt struck a tall chinaberry tree at the edge of the field. It filled all visible space with a blinding glare and the crash seemed to invade the very boards they stood upon.

In this stormy atmosphere of unleashed natural energy, the frightened Calixta covers her eyes and cries out as the lightning flashes. She staggers backward into Alcée, who encircles her in his arm. For a moment, he draws her close to him in a spasm of emotional energy. This brief contact with Calixta awakens his "old-time...desire for her flesh." When he asks her if she remembers Assumption, where he had kissed her passionately a few years ago, her emotions also are again aroused, and they engage in lovemaking. As the storm subsides, so, too, do their feelings, and Alcée departs.

Like the thunderstorm, the atmosphere of heightened emotion in which Calixta and Alcée find expression brings them emotional release and refreshment. When her husband and son return, Calixta is overjoyed to see them and does not scold her husband, Bobinôt. Likewise, the reinvigorated Alcée writes to his wife, who is named Clarisse, and with leniency and consideration, he gives her permission to stay on in Biloxi with her old friends and enjoy herself.

The storm is a metaphor for the rising passion between Calixta and Alcée. In literary terms, this is also called the "pathetic fallacy." The "pathetic" term refers to "pathos" which means to evoke emotion or sympathy. Note the "path" in the words sympathy and empathy as well. The pathetic fallacy, in this case, suggests that nature (the storm) is mirroring or showing empathy for the characters, Calixta and Alcée. As the energy of the storm rises, so does the sexual tension between these two characters.

Being in the house, with doors and windows closed, the temperature in the house increases. This parallels the rising "heat" and tension between Calixta and Alcée.

A bolt of lightning strikes a tree and this dramatic moment signals the moment when Alcée moves to embrace Calixta:

Calixta put her hands to her eyes, and with a cry, staggered backward. Alcée's arm encircled her, and for an instant he drew her close and spasmodically to him.

Their brief encounter ends when the storm ends. Their passion parallels the energy of the storm. When the storm is over, Alcée rides off.

In Kate Chopin's "The Storm," how does the setting serve to reinforce the plot?

Kate Chopin's "The Storm" is a sequel to "At the 'Cadian Ball" in which Calixta and Alcee had gone to Assumption in another storm of passion, having planned another meeting in New Orleans for the following year, but Alcee's wife Clarisse intervened by arranging for Alcee to marry her.

In the aftermath of their intensely passionate relationship, Calixta has also married.  However, with her husband and son waiting at Friedheimer's store for the turbulence to end before returning home, Alcee appears at Calixta's house seeking shelter. When a bolt of lightning strikes the ever-symbolic chinaberry tree, their passion for one another is reignited.  In this naturalistic story in which the characters behave in accord with their natural, animalistic drives and impulses, the parallels between the setting of the storm and the emotions of the characters becomes apparent.

The pomegranate color of her lips and her dove-like appearance awaken the sensuous nature of Alcee,

The generous abundance of her passion, without guile or trickery, was like a white flame which penetrated and found response in depths of his own sensuous nature that had never yet been reached.

In a maelstrom of sexual desire, Calixta and Alcee satisfy their natural impulses that wax and wane with the storm.  And, once the storm has abated, so, too, does their passion:

The growl of the thunder was distant and passing away. The rain beat softly upon the shingles, inviting them to drowsiness and sleep. But they dared not yield.

Alcee returns home, and Calixta cheerfully welcomes her son and husband; further, having had her emotions spent in the storm, the fastitidious housekeeper does not scold her family for being muddy. Similarly, having his desires and emotions released in the passionate storm of his lovemaking, Alcee writes to his wife, encouraging her to enjoy herself and remain away longer.  As a storm often benefits nature, so, too, the "storm" of passion serve to ease both Alcee and Calixta. For, with their liberating experience during the storm, the man and woman are provided a liberty that saves them from the confinement and tensions of their marriages. Certainly, the storm is a metaphor for the importance of natural releases of emotion that provide people the freedom they need as creatures of the natural order.

In the story "The Storm" by Kate Chopin, explain how the setting causes the plot to happen, forces the characters to discover and reveal hidden aspects of themselves, and influences the theme.

The storm provides the reason for Bobinôt's not returning home, just as it allows for Alcée's stopping for shelter. In its charged energy, the storm also acts as a catalyst for the maelstrom of emotions that arise in Calixta and Alcée. 

Kate Chopin's short story "The Storm" is a sequel to a story entitled "At the 'Cadian Ball." In this story, Alcée Laballière, a Creole planter, loses a crop of rice when a cyclone rips through his nine hundred acres on which he has toiled for months. One night, in his frustration, he secretly leaves home and attends a Cajun ball where Acadian girls seek their future husbands. At this ball, Alcée sees Calixta, a beautiful Cajun from a lower social class. They are strongly attracted to each other. However, their class differences forbid their marriage, and Alcée is not willing to risk his class standing or potentially bring shame to his family by having a relationship with her. Calixta then settles for Bobinôt, who is also Cajun. 

When Alcée rides up to Calixta's house, she sees him for the first time since the ball five years ago. Then, as a particularly brilliant flash of lightning strikes a chinaberry tree at the edge of Bobinôt's field, Calixta is so frightened that she covers her eyes, cries out in fear, and staggers backward. Alcée catches her, and she cries out in her anxiety about the safety of her little son. 

Alcée clasped her shoulders and looked into her face. The contact of her warm, palpitating body when he unthinkingly had drawn her into his arms, had aroused all the old-time infautation and desire for her flesh.

The storm has acted as a catalyst, igniting their old passion for one another. It also creates a milieu charged with electricity which, along with the elements of wind and rain, transforms the appearance of the environment. Alone with each other after all these years in a disguised setting that removes them from their usual thoughts, Alcée and Calixta feel this charged air between themselves; instantly, their old passion is rekindled. The fire of this passion, like the fire of the strike of lightning, ignites all the old feelings that they have tried to bury. Under the cover of a turbulent environment that seems to be in sympathy with them, Calixta and Alcée surrender to their passion for one another.

The generous abundance of her passion, without guile or trickery, was like a white flame which penetrated and found response in the depth of his own sensuous nature that had never yet been reached.

When the storm is over, Alcée rides away, but not before he turns and smiles at her. She lifts "her pretty chin in the air" and laughs aloud. Their storm of passion is at its end, and Calixta happily embraces her family when they return, expressing her satisfaction that they have returned safely. Also content, Alcée writes to his wife in a loving tone. He generously extends his permission for her to prolong her stay with old friends and acquaintances.

The manner in which both Calixta and Alcée appear to be happier and satisfied illustrates Chopin's controversial theme that some liberty is a necessary part of a happy marriage.

In the story "The Storm" by Kate Chopin, explain how the setting causes the plot to happen, forces the characters to discover and reveal hidden aspects of themselves, and influences the theme.

"The Storm" takes place in a village in coastal Louisiana, with the most prominent setting being the home of Calixta and Bobinôt. Aside from the house, however, the time, place, and circumstances related to the setting also play a lot of importance in who the characters are in society. 

The home, described as a small house whose salient trait is the "white, monumental bed," is of great importance because it is in that bed that Calixta and Alcée, her former flame, end up passing the storm.  

The house, where Calixta spends a lot of her time alone even though she is married with children, ends up housing her former boyfriend, who was passing by and whom she had not seen for a while after her marriage. What this means is that the house seems to have called the lovers back together to fulfill their wishes of intimacy in the bedroom, while keeping everyone away due to the huge storm that came over the town. 

The hidden aspects revealed by the storm are evident in Alcée and Calixta more than any other characters. Calixta resents her lonely life after marriage, and she is certainly not fulfilled. She is so unfulfilled that it takes just a few touches from Alcée for the two to become immediately engaged in a sexual act. Alcée has always loved Calixta but he is also married. Yet he also seems shocked at the fact that they have finally become intimate even when they had opportunities in the past but never took them. 

One more important fact about the setting is that the story takes place in 19th century Louisiana. There were social differences among the French descendants of the first French generation that lived in the area. Calixta and Bobinôt speak like what the novel calls "Cadians." These are the Acadians, or the inhabitants of Acadia in Nova Scotia, who are descendants of French-Americans that then took exile in Louisiana.

As such, they speak differently, are not considered sophisticated in their insistence on using French, and are generally regarded as inferior to the Creoles, who descend from the original French settlers. Alcée and his wife are Creoles, and it is evident in how Alcée's wife is away traveling while he is here. They seem to come from a higher class, and their English is spoken more clearly than that of Calixta and her family. 

Hence, the time and place of the setting reveal that there are differences among the inhabitants of the area. These differences are mainly found in the way they speak, which reveals who they are in society and what their lineage is. 

Additionally, the setting of the small house with the huge bed under a massive storm creates the opportunity for the two main characters to become isolated and answer to their inner desires once they are alone in the right place and in the right time. 

How do the elements of setting affect Kate Chopin's "The Storm"?

What also makes the storm setting so significant is how it is an example of pathetic fallacy, a literary device that attributes human feelings to nature. That is, the violent storm reflects the intense carnal and emotional feelings of the characters of Alcée Laballiere and Calixta, feelings initiated in the first story of the paired narratives by Kate Chopin. In "At the 'Cadian Ball" the young Creole gentleman planter stands in the doorway of the ballroom with a "feverish glance" directed toward Calixta, a lower-class Cajun, whom literary critics refer to as "interstitial" in her placement in a social class as she is also described as having hair "that kinked worse than a mulatto's." 

This intense forbidden carnal attraction that Alcée feels goes unrequited and he marries Clarisse Laballière of a prestigious family, a woman whose sexual urges do not match her husband's. So in the sequel story, "The Storm," the turbulence of the weather imitates the storm of emotion within Alcée, who finds himself stopping for shelter at the home of Calixta, whose senses were left "reeling" at the ball when Alcée's lips brushed her ear "like the touch of a rose." When she is alone with the man who has ignited passion in her and she is already in an emotional state from her fright at the turbulent weather, their reactions are as spontaneous as the lightning:

The generous abundance of her passion, without guile or trickery, was like a white flame which penetrated and found response in depths of his own sensuous nature that had never yet been reached. 

In "The Storm" by Kate Chopin, how does the setting propel the plot and trigger character development?

In this story, Kate Chopin uses a summer storm to dramatize and mirror the turbulent emotional and physical affair between her two main characters, Alcée and Calixta. The story's title itself points to the significance of the setting in driving the plot. As titles are typically meant to be somewhat descriptive, Chopin's choice to title this piece "The Storm" implies that the events of the storm metaphorically stand in for the events that occur between the characters.

You can chart the plot development of this story onto the progression of the storm itself. The storm provides the inciting incident: it strands Alcée outside in the rain and forces him to seek shelter with Calixta. In the exposition, Chopin offers an ominous personification of the storm, saying that "sombre clouds were rolling with sinister intention from the west." As the drama between Alcée and Calixta rises, so do the elements outside their window, turning into lightning and "torrents." The storm mirrors the passion of their reunion, and accordingly subsides as they lie in each other's arms.

The final line of the story, "So the storm passed and everyone was happy," continues Chopin's metaphor (potentially verging on euphemism here) as she uses "the storm" to signify the affair. By analyzing the way the titular storm operates in this story, in terms of creating the plot and conveying the characters' roiling emotions through pathetic fallacy, you can explore how Chopin uses setting as an integral part of her narrative.