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A Pair of Silk Stockings Quotes
It seemed to her a very large amount of money, and the way in which it stuffed and bulged her worn old porte-monnaie gave her a feeling of importance such as she had not enjoyed for years.
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At the opening of “A Pair of Silk Stockings,” Mrs. Sommers acquires fifteen dollars. No explanation is given as to how she earned or received the small windfall, but it is apparent that for impoverished Mrs. Sommers, the money is a pleasant surprise. Fifteen dollars was not a huge sum, even in the 1890s, but for humble Mrs. Sommers, it becomes a source of pride and self-worth. The juxtaposition between the fifteen dollars and her shabby coin purse presents the money as a shining treasure, completely out of place in the poor woman’s bag. The fact that Mrs. Sommers had Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui aut a. Rerum voluptas debitis. Voluptatem accusantium est. Mollitia eaque ipsa. Perferendis consectetur et. Dicta impedit ut. Ducimus possimus quo. Non inventore in. Eligendi atque p
For a day or two she walked about apparently in a dreamy state, but really absorbed in speculation and calculation. She did not wish to act hastily, to do anything she might afterward regret.
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Upon acquiring the fifteen dollars, Mrs. Sommers is immediately consumed with the task of deciding how to spend the money. Curiously, despite her careful planning, she never reflects on the possibility of saving the money. This quote reveals the extent to which Mrs. Sommers is misunderstood, a notion that is reflected throughout the rest of the story. She appears to walk around in a dream-like state—a romantic and fanciful woman preoccupied with shopping—but in reality, she is deliberate and meticulous. This undermines nineteenth-century gender stereotypes that assumed men were rational and reasonable, while women were silly, frivolous, and emotional. Chopin Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Acc
The neighbors sometimes talked of certain “better days” that little Mrs. Sommers had known before she had ever thought of being Mrs. Sommers. She herself indulged in no such morbid retrospection. She had no time—no second of time to devote to the past.
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This quote, near the beginning of the story, suggests that Mrs. Sommers had experienced wealth and a higher-class status before her marriage, probably in her childhood. Despite her neighbors’ rumoring and gossip, Mrs. Sommers stoically faces her present challenges without dwelling on the past. For Mrs. Sommers, to do so would be to indulge in “morbid retrospection.” That is, to acknowledge the realities of her present situation would be unproductive, but also a dreadful reminder of what she has lost. Mrs. Sommers cannot afford frivolous distractions because is wholly consumed by her domestic duties.
A vision of the future like some dim, gaunt monster sometimes appalled her, but luckily to-morrow never comes.
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Following the description of her gossiping neighbors, readers learn briefly of Mrs. Sommers’s innermost fears. Mrs. Sommers’s future is bleak; she is poor, exhausted, and destined for a difficult life serving her family. In this simile, the future takes the form of an appalling and haggard monster, perhaps representing a life of hunger or starvation for her and her destitute family. For this reason, Mrs. Sommers tries to suppress her worries about the future instead focusing her energy on getting through each day. Usually the phrase “to-morrow never comes” conveys a message about harnessing the present, because if tasks are Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliqu
She went on feeling the soft, sheeny luxurious things—with both hands now, holding them up to see them glisten, and to feel them glide serpent-like through her fingers.
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This moment is the climax of Chopin’s short story; exhausted, hungry and depleted, Mrs. Sommers happens upon an expensive and luxurious par of silk stockings. Unleashing her long-buried desires, the fortuitous encounter is the catalyst for Mrs. Sommers’s afternoon of consumption and indulgence. The imagery here compares the stockings to a serpent. Like Satan in the Bible’s creation story, which too takes the form of a serpent, the stockings represent a sinful temptation placed in Mrs. Sommers’s path in order to test her loyalty and devotion. Rather than betraying God, however, Mrs. Sommers’s disloyalty is to those patriarchal expectations that Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti so
She was not thinking at all. She seemed for the time to be taking a rest from that laborious and fatiguing function and to have abandoned herself to some mechanical impulse that directed her actions and freed her of responsibility.
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After purchasing the stockings, Mrs. Sommers feels another rush of longing and a desperate need to sustain the feeling of pleasure that she is experiencing. The stockings have not only aroused her desires, but have also awakened the old Mrs. Sommers—an identity that perished with her marriage to Mr. Sommers. The “mechanical impulse” that guides her is presented as a natural process, one that is usually superseded by her meticulous reasoning faculties but is now able to function freely. This places Mrs. Sommers in a position safe from blame because it is not her rational, thinking brain that is controlling Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui aut a. Rerum voluptas de
Her foot and ankle looked very pretty. She could not realize that they belonged to her and were a part of herself.
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Mrs. Sommers finds a quiet spot in the store to put on her new stockings, just minutes after buying them. She moves towards the shoe department, where the combination of her expensive stockings and her shabby clothes confuses the clerk working there. When she looks down at her foot, freshly clad in leather boots and the silk stockings, she is unable to recognize her own body. Mrs. Sommers, normally depleted in both energy and femininity, has such low self-worth that she cannot believe that she is capable of looking “pretty.” She experiences dissociation with her body, admiring her foot and Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui aut a. Rerum voluptas debitis. Voluptatem accusantium est. Mollitia eaque ipsa. Perferendis consectetur et. Dicta impedit ut. Ducimus possimus quo. Non inventore in.
She was hungry.
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Mrs. Sommers realizes that she is hungry when she eventually leaves the department store. Indeed, she began her shopping trip faint and famished and has still not eaten. However, her hunger here also refers to her newly awakened and insatiable appetite for more—more spending, more indulgence, more consumption. Chopin illustrates the dissatisfying nature of American consumer culture when revealing how Mrs. Sommers’s “cravings” grow, rather than lessen, as her shopping spree unfolds. Each delightful purchase is followed by a feeling of emptiness or dissatisfaction that can only be replaced by yet more purchases. Mrs. Sommers will never find happiness through Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores
The play was over, the music ceased, the crowd filed out. It was like a dream ended.
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Mrs. Sommers’s final purchase is a trip to the theater. The play becomes a microcosm for Mrs. Sommers’s life and her place in society because she is subject to the scrutiny of the shallow women in the audience, who ultimately accept her into their social set just because she is well dressed, but maintain the power to reject Mrs. Sommers, should her performance not be convincing enough. The end of the play symbolizes the end of Mrs. Sommers’s adventure. It becomes obvious that through the course of the day, not just the duration of the play, disbelief has been suspended Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Vo
[…] a poignant wish, a powerful longing that the cable car would never stop anywhere, but go on and on with her forever.
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During her journey home, Mrs. Sommers is observed by a man “with keen eyes” who tries to determine what kind of woman she is. The narrator reveals that he is unable to decipher anything about Mrs. Sommers—who wears a peculiar combination of extravagant and shabby clothing—a woman preoccupied with a secret wish to avoid her return home. Mrs. Sommers longs for her journey in the cable car to “go on and on with her forever” because she desperately wants her day of luxury and self-fulfillment to continue. She fears the return to her domestic chores, and perhaps the repercussions she Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus
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