While weeping over the news of her husband, Brently’s, death, Louise collapses in an armchair and gazes out her bedroom window. The story uses multiple types of imagery to describe Louise’s view:
She could see in the open square before her house the tops of trees that were all aquiver with the new spring life. The delicious breath of rain was in the air. In the street below a peddler was crying his wares. The notes of a distant song which some one was singing reached her faintly, and countless sparrows were twittering in the eaves.
Three different senses are engaged here: Louise sees the town square and blooming trees, smells the rain in the air, and hears people and birds. The purpose of this imagery is to highlight the difference between Louise’s domestic life and the outside world that she, as a 19th-century housewife, is cut off from. The nature and the town near Louise’s house are associated with liveliness, beauty, and even rebirth: the trees are “aquiver with the new spring life,” the smell of rain is “delicious,” and the sounds that Louise hears are signs of bustling life. Louise, in contrast, is stuck inside, living a deadening and unfulfilling life.
Looking out at this scenery causes Louise to recognize a feeling that’s welling up inside her—one that she wants to resist but that is “reaching toward her through the sounds, the scents, the color that filled the air.” Through this sensory experience, she reluctantly realizes that she’s actually happy, because Brently’s death means that she can now freely experience the world outside the domestic sphere in which marriage has imprisoned her. In this way, the imagery in this passage reflects Louise’s rebirth as she comes to terms with her newfound independence.
Importantly, there’s no equivalent imagery used to describe the bedroom where Louise is sitting or the rest of the Mallards’ house; the reader isn’t given any indication about what these spaces look, smell, or sound like. This implies that the place where Louise spends most of her time—and, by extension, Louise’s life itself—isn’t interesting, whereas the outside world is. In contrast to the outdoors, then, the Mallards’ home is associated with the stagnation, confinement, and monotony of Louise’s married life.
After Louise finds out that her husband, Brently, was killed in a railroad accident, she locks herself in her bedroom and looks out the window. As she does so, the story uses imagery to describe her face:
She was young, with a fair, calm face, whose lines bespoke repression and even a certain strength. But now there was a dull stare in her eyes, whose gaze was fixed away off yonder on one of those patches of blue sky. It was not a glance of reflection, but rather indicated a suspension of intelligent thought.
This visual imagery paints a picture of Louise’s physical appearance, but it also provides insight about her character. First, the descriptors of her face as “young,” “fair,” and “calm” suggest that she’s both physically attractive and emotionally reserved, qualities that women at this time (the late 19th century) were pressured to embody. But the lines on her skin tell a different story: that she’s consciously repressing something, and that she has an inner “strength” that perhaps isn’t obvious at first glance. From this, the reader can infer that there’s more to Louise than meets the eye—that she perhaps isn’t the passive, delicate woman people assume she is.
Furthermore, the story describes the look in Louise’s eyes as “a dull stare” that reflects “a suspension of intelligent thought.” The dullness in her expression contrasts with the vibrant springtime view outside her window, which the story describes just before this. This suggests that Louise’s mental state is the opposite of the liveliness of the outdoors—her role as a housewife has mentally and emotionally deadened her. And, importantly, her “dull stare” doesn’t betray unintelligence, but a willful “suspension” of deep thought. On the whole, this imagery characterizes Louise as someone who has consciously worked to stifle her emotions and intelligence in order to fit society’s mold of what a married woman is supposed to be.
As Louise begins to feel overjoyed in reaction to her husband, Brently’s death, she initially resists this feeling out of guilt and fear. But soon, she gives herself over to her emotions, and her internal transformation is conveyed through imagery:
The vacant stare and the look of terror that had followed it went from her eyes. They stayed keen and bright. Her pulses beat fast, and the coursing blood warmed and relaxed every inch of her body.
This passage uses two senses, sight and touch, to convey how Louise is feeling. The visual description of her eyes parallels the bright springtime scene outside her bedroom window that the story describes just before this—in fact, her emotions seem to directly stem from the sights, smells, and sounds outside. Both the view of spring outside and her changing expression—from “vacant” to “keen and bright”—represent rebirth and optimism. As Louise realizes her newfound independence, then, this imagery suggests that her future is full of new potential.
Furthermore, the tactile descriptions of Louise’s quickening heart rate and “blood warm[ing] and relax[ing] every inch of her body” convey a sense of renewal and vitality. Together, this imagery vividly illustrates Louise’s excitement and reinvigoration as her reaction to Brently’s death shifts from grieved to joyous.
When Louise realizes that her husband, Brently’s, death means that she’s no longer dependent on him, she’s thrilled to imagine living the rest of her life freely. She tempers her excitement, however, by evoking imagery of his dead body:
She would weep again when she saw the kind, tender hands folded in death; the face that had never looked save with love upon her, fixed and gray and dead.
This description of Brently’s body contrasts with the description of Louise that comes right before this—her eyes are “keen and bright,” and “her blood warmed and relaxed every inch of her body.” The contrast between Louise’s liveliness and Brently’s lifelessness subtly implies that Brently’s death is a kind of sacrifice that’s necessary for Louise’s happiness. His face may be “fixed and gray and dead,” but losing him creates a rebirth for Louise, who looks forward to the independence she’ll enjoy in his absence. At the same time, the imagery of Brently’s dead body echoes the descriptions of Louise's previous “dull stare,” further emphasizing how Louise experienced her married life as a kind of living death.
However, the image of Brently’s “kind, tender hands” and “face that had never looked save with love upon her” also characterize him as a gentle, loving man who treated Louise well. Louise isn’t entirely happy about his death—she acknowledges that she’ll miss the qualities in him that this imagery describes. Thus, this passage suggests that it is the institution of marriage, rather than anything particular about Brently himself, that has made Louise feel stifled and unhappy.
