Sources

Arner, Robert D. ‘‘Pride and Prejudice: Kate Chopin's ‘Désirée's Baby,’’’ in Mississippi Quarterly, Vol. 25, No. 2, Spring 1972, pp. 131-40.

Ewell, Barbara. Kate Chopin. Ungar Publishing, 1986.

Pattee, Fred Lewis. ‘‘The Revolt of the ‘Nineties,’’’ in The Development of the American Short Story: A Historical Survey. Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1923, pp. 309-36.

Rankin, Daniel. Kate Chopin and Her Creole Stories. University of Pennsylvania Press, 1932.

Review in Nation, June 28, 1894, p. 488.

Review of Bayou Folk, by Kate Chopin, in Atlantic Monthly, April 1894, pp. 558-59.

Skaggs, Peggy. Kate Chopin. Twayne Publishers, 1985.

Toth, Emily. Kate Chopin, A Life of the Author of ‘The Awakening.’ William Morrow and Company, 1990.

Wolff, Cynthia Griffin. ‘‘Kate Chopin and the Fiction of Limits: ‘Désirée's Baby,’’’ in Southern Literary Journal, Vol. 10, No. 2, 1978, pp. 123-33.

Further Reading

Bannon, Lois Elmer. Magnolia Mound: A Louisiana River Plantation. Firebird Press, 1984. This book examines plantation life and the economic system of slavery in the old South.

Bloom, Harold, ed. Kate Chopin, Modern Critical Views. Chelsea House, 1987. This volume is a collection of critical essays on Chopin.

Jones, Anne Goodwyn. Tomorrow Is Another Day: The Woman Writer in the South, 1859-1936. Louisiana State University Press, 1981. This work features a discussion of important southern women writers.

Saxon, Lyle. Old Louisiana. Pelican Publishing Company. The main emphasis of this work is life in the old South.

Seyersted, Per. Kate Chopin: A Critical Biography. Louisiana State University Press, 1969. This book is one of the earliest full-length critical works on Chopin, which helped lead to her ‘‘rediscovery.’’

Some of the short stories that portray a woman's sexual nature and her situation in marriage include "La Belle Zoraide," "A Respectable Woman," "The Story of an Hour," "The Kiss," "Her Letters," "An Egyptian Cigarette," and "The White Eagle." These stories appear in the collection entitled Bayou Folk, set in Louisiana, and they highlight similar problems and concerns. "La Belle Zoraide," for instance, deals not only with the theme of passion but with the theme of miscegenation; it focuses on the plight of a young mulatto girl who falls in love with a Black man and the tragic effects it has on her life. Reading these other stories can lead to a better understanding of Chopin's fiction and help readers appreciate the complexities of cross-racial sexual connection.

Bloom, Harold, ed. Kate Chopin. Modern Critical Views series. Chelsea House Publishers, 1987. Gives critical information of Chopin's work. Includes analysis of the themes and styles in Chopin's short stories.

Boren, Lynda S., and Sara de Saussure Davis, eds. Kate Chopin Reconsidered: Beyond the Bayou. Southern Literary Studies series. Louisiana State University Press, 1999. Includes fourteen essays analyzing Chopin's work. Includes detailed biographical information in addition to offering a range of perspectives on the historical and social significance of Chopin's fiction.

Jones, Anne Goodwyn. Tomorrow Is Another Day: The Woman Writer in the South, 1859-1936. Louisiana State University Press, 1981. A discussion of Southern women writers who lived and produced fiction during the same era as Chopin. Can be used as a source for comparisons of themes and styles with those of Chopin's.

McSherry, Frank D., et. al., eds. Civil War Women: The Civil War Seen through Women's Eyes in Stories by Louisa May Alcott, Kate Chopin, Eudora Welty, and Other Great Women Writers. 1990. Provides insight into works by Chopin and other women who write on similar themes and offer insights into women's social problems during the Civil War years.

Sollors, Werner. Neither Black nor White Yet Both: Thematic Explorations of Interracial Literature. Oxford University Press, 1997. Sollors discusses the theme of miscegenation in literature and discusses the problems presented by interracial unions in the Civil War era.

Toth, Emily. Unveiling Kate Chopin. University Press of Mississippi, 1999. A biography of Chopin written by a professor of English and Women's Studies at Louisiana State University. Draws parallels between Chopin's life and the lives of her characters. Discusses Chopin's success in exposing women's problems and presenting them realistically.