Male World And Female Quests

However, the equality has not been found yet, but women are still questing& Edna, the main character of The Awakening, was also trying to find equality in male--female relationships, but failed like many other women of her society. Used to being treated like a thoughtless child by her husband, Edna imagines her relations with her lover in an entirely different way. She must have thought that he would treat her like equal; however, leaving Edna, the only thing Robert mentions about her in a letter to his mother is the book he had been reading to her. When Richard leaves his mistress for Mexico, not having warned her in advance, and says that perhaps he will never come back, Ednas reaction is easy to foresee: she blames him of leaving so unexpectedly, very gently though she reproaches him without shouting or scandals) and is obviously very indignant at his indecent behavior. So, according to Robert, Edna is supposed to bear everything silently. Ednas tragedy is that, striving to free herself from one relationship with her husband, trying to obtain freedom, she eventually finds herself in the same situation, treated like a thing and being the same attached to the object of her passion. Believing in a better quality of relations, where she and her partner would love each other and treat each other with dignity. Ednas behavior is a demonstration of her desire to find something else--freedom, happiness, ability to master her own life. It is not exactly an affair that she is seeking, it is the feeling of being treated as equal by men. However, as she fails to gain such a sensation, she feels completely broken.