Transformation

This video is broken into two parts. Sorry for the nervousness, it's first time!

Sleepy!!

Someone seems to feel drowsy and troubled in the middle of church service. And no, it's not Mr. Bean!:

''A feeling of oppression and drowsiness overcame Edna during the service. Her head began to ache, and the lights on the altar swayed before her eyes. Another time she might have made an effort to regain her composure ; but her one thought was to quit the stifling atmosphere of the church and reach the open air.'' (Chapter XIII, Pg 74)

We see in this passage, how something as simple as having the feeling of sleepiness or drowsiness in church, which can happen to anyone really, is turned into a very detailed and complex imagery situation. At the moment she feels that she has to do something she would not normally do, and that is exit the church to get open air.

The way that Kate Chopin manages to describe this very simple scenes into very complex and detailed, is something that I am kind of used to seeing, particularly with all the stories my grandma tells. I'm not sure why my grandmother became a writer, but well, apparently, Kate Chopin did take her talents to some use.

Going the wrong way?

We see, further on, in the story how Adele (not the singer, the character) takes upon a much more serious role, and decides to confront Robert, primarily by warning him that he must leave Edna alone, before she takes him seriously. Robert feels insulted and hopes that Edna takes him seriously, partly I guess because he is also interested in Edna. He also says that partly because of the little or no success he has had with Creole women in the past. He is then reminded by Adele, that if he were to court Edna, he would loose his reputation as a gentleman, due to the fact that Edna is a married woman.

We can see clearly here, more than ever, that as the characters undergo changes, they don't neccesarily go for the better good. Some of these changes, sometimes occur, and they are not the best role of development for the character, but quite the contrary, it makes them look more degenerate, and in some ways more Human. Ventress in the Clone Wars goes in fact the opposite way around, and appears to go from worse to better and not from better to worse.

Awakening to discover yourself.

Well, the story of Asajj Ventress will have to come later.

For now we must focus on The Awakening.

Starting from chapter 6 of The Awakening, we start to see how the main character, Edna starts to undergo various changes. She starts to have somewhat of a crush for Robert, even though she is married to Leonce Pontellier. One of them, has to do with the very title of the novel, suggesting that she is beginning to ''realize her position in the universe as a human being, and to recognize her relations as an individual to the world within and about her.''

She begins to see herself as so much more than just simply a house wife mother or a woman, but sees herself as so much more than that. In a way she starts to discover various personalities of herself, just like our character here, Asajj Ventress, does in the Clone Wars.

Ventress, how now works as a bounty hunter, as of the last installment of the series, appears to have finally realized that after being a Jedi, a Sith apprentice, and a Nightsister, none of those rankings ever gave her a future to look up to. We discover in the episode Bounty, that Ventress now sees a future in herself, and has somehow ''Awakened'' to her own being. Somehow, Edna, is coming to a similar realization, but obviously in a different context.

So, what do I know about feminism?

With the story of The Awakening, written by Kate Chopin, we get introduced to this concept of Feminism, which according to Mr. Tangen, is not about women trying to be tomboys. Starting with the first pages of the book, we get introduced with something related to the topic with the main characters, Mr and Mrs Pontellier:

''You are blunt beyond recognition'', he added , looking at his wife as one looks at a valuable piece of personal property which has suffered some damage.'' Pg. 15

We see here, clearly that Edna's husband tends to see his wife from a sexual-objective point of view, which is something that we see commonly in the attitude of various men around the world. Feminism tends to criticize heavily those type of superficial men, which have been common since the dawn of times.

I guess that Feminist women tend to find men that look for women more for their moral values and personality and not their physical appearance. One could argue that most women tend to go for those kinds of guys, but end up falling in love with the opposite-superficial one, as my best friend argues, concluding that all women are ''bitches''. I always tell him that he has to be more patient, and that the girls he likes are ''bitches'' to him, and not everyone follows that path.

Another passage from Chapter 4 goes to see another side of women, one that is criticized apparently by the main character. Edna considers herself not as a mother-women, since probably she has never seen herself as that particular stereotype which her husband wants her to be.

In short, Mrs. Pontellier was not a mother-woman. The mother-women seemed to prevail that summer at Grand Isle. It was easy to know them , fluttering abut with extended , protecting wings when any harm, real or imaginary, threatened their precious brood. They were women who idolized children, worshiped their husbands, and esteemed it a holy privilege to efface themselves as individuals and grow wings as mysterious angels. Pg. 26

Ok, has anybody asked himself what the hell does the picture above have to do with anything? Well, it's somewhat related to the Feminist ideals, but probably taken to extreme. The Nightsisters, as pictured above, are a group of witches how use the dark side of the force to forge magic, which are never mentioned or appear in the Star Wars movies. They take place mostly in the Star Wars Expanded Universe comic books and novels, but have become very important in the Star Wars The Clone Wars TV series that will end its Fourth Season this Friday.

The Nightsisters are known for having lived in the red planet Dathomir, in which they controlled a group of men known as the Nightbrothers, and are treated as their slaves. We see here, how this society tends to portray them as a highly feminist society, in which they used them only for labor and sexual purposes. Once one of the Nightbrothers had a child, he would usually get killed. And one of them, turned out to be a child known as Maul. His mother wanted his son Maul, to have a different life from the one of the Nightbrothers clan, and made probably an even worse decision: give him to the evil Sith Lord Darth Sidious aka Palpatine. Darth Maul would then come to become a brutal Sith warrior, who got cut in half by Obi-Wan in Naboo. He somehow survived and made it to the junk world Lotho Minor, but that's another story.

Throughout the book, we will see how The Nightsisters and The Awakening portray their views of Feminism in similar or different ways.