Search for Freedom in The Story of an HourIn the early 1900s, marriage was comparable to a master-slave relationship. The woman's role in marriage was minimal. A woman's place was in the house, where she took care of the children, cleaned the house, and performed other "feminine" tasks. Chained to their husbands, marriage has become a prison for many women; the only way to free oneself from these bonds being the death of the husband. In Kate Chopin's "The Story of an Hour," Mrs. Mallard lives for an hour, experiencing rebirth into freedom and death when that freedom is lost. As she sits downstairs, Mrs. Mallard mourns the loss of her husband and her new-found freedom. His death snatches everything from under his own feet. Dependent and heartbroken, everything she relies on her husband for has now become her responsibility. Crying "with sudden and wild abandon...", Mrs. Mallard lets her emotions over her husband's death flow freely, thus...