Complete stylistic analysis

     The text under analysis "A Pair of Silk Stockings" is written by an American author Kate Chopin. Kate Chopin is best-remembered for wring about a hundred short stories. Most of her best-known work focuses on the lives of sensitive and intelligent women. Chopin used her creative writing skills to express a point of view on different issues. She is considered to be the forerunner of the feminist authors of the 20th century. Among her best-known short stories are: "The Story of An Hour", "Regret", "A Pair of Silk Stockings", "The Storm". Kate Chopin was widely recognized as one of the leading writers of her time.
     The story describes the struggle of a woman searching for a balance between family life and personal satisfaction. It portrays a woman caught between different roles: Mrs. Sommers does not want to abandon her family, but she also does not want to abandon her personal identity while fulfilling the role of wife and mother.
     The events in the analysed text happen in the time of the repression of women and the story itself reflects the role of women in society.Thus, the events in the story are taking place approximately in the end of XIX-beginning of the XX century. The main character lives in unnamed city, but it is big enough to have department store, restaurant and theatre. The setting of the events in this short story is definitely realistic. It is presented in a general way. To my mind, the setting of the story is perfectly chosen for the events that are going on, because it intensifies and underlines the position and troubles that women had and faced at that time.
     From the point of view of presentation the text is the 3rd person narrative, which produces an effect of observing each event and its details.
     The protagonist in the given short story is Mrs. Sommers, a wife and a mother. We meet Mrs. Sommers when she is thinking about money she possesses and about the ways how to spend them. Usually she doesn't have money at all and can't afford to buy something, but now the situation has changed in favour of her. The writer reveals Mrs. Sommers by means of indirect characterisation in which she shows what the characters are like. Nevertheless, from fact we identify that Mrs. Sommers is not selfish, because in the first place she thinks about her children and about what she can buy them. But then she finds a pair of silk stockings that she desires for herself and she can't stop. When the narrator informs us that Mrs. Sommers buys gloves, shoes, visits a restaurant and a theatre, we come to feel some disrespect and dissaproval for the character's actions and behaviour. She follows the temptations and becomes egocentric woman, who lavishly spends money on everything. But we also can't judge Mrs. Sommers, because every person wants to live his full life, to experience something new and not to be at a stop. In the short story "A Pair of Silk Stockings" there are also some minor characters, such as: clerks, lady at the theatre and a man at the train station. All these characters play some small roles in the story, but they also serve for characterising the main character Mrs. Sommers in different situations.
     The plot runs as follows: The story begins with the initiating incident, when we get acquainted with Mrs. Sommers, who is a possessor of fifteen dollars, which sets the conflict of the story.Then goes the rising action, when the main character is reflecting upon the investment of her money. She wants to spend some money on her children and on herself. The climax is when Mrs. Sommers buys a pair of silk stockings. It is the highest emotional point. The falling action which lead into the resolution of the story is the moment when Mrs. Sommers spends all her money on herself and wishes never to return to her real dull life.
     The types of speech employed by the author of the analysed short story are narration and description. "A Pair of Silk Stockings" is rather narration than a description, with help of which the author presents the plot.
     In order to portray the characters, to describe the setting and to reveal the main idea of the story convincingly the author resorts to some devices.The short story is full of cases of simile: a vision of the future like dim, gaunt monster sometimes appalled her, which is used to portray Mrs. Sommers's anxiety about her dull life, she smiled just as if she had been asked to inspect a tiara of diamonds, which emphasises the main heroine's feelings while she is doing shopping, she seemed for the time to be taking a rest from the laborious and fatiguing function, which highlights Mrs. Sommer's delight from devoting time and money to herself, she felt like lying back in the cushioned chair, which describes her impressions from being fitted and dressed, it was like a dream ended, which shows the end of Mrs. Sommers's oneday good life.Cases of personification are also of great importance in the story, for example: her stockings and boots and well fitting gloves had worked marvels and the impulse was guiding her, which are used to intensify Mrs. Sommers desire and longing to spend her money agreebly. There are some cases of epithets as well: soft stepping waiters, shining crystal, spotless damask, gaudy woman, which represent the main character's vision of perfect wealthy life.
Hyperboles, which are used in the given short story represent the state of mind and behaviour of the main heroine: she had no time - no second of time to devote to the past; she was not thinking at all. 
The example of irony underlines Mrs. Sommers's fastidiousness: She didn't want a profusion, she craved a nice and tasty bite - a half dozen blue-points, a plumb chop with cress, a something sweet - a creme-frappe, for instance, a glass of Rhine wine, and after all a small cup of black coffee. After all, the case of allusion makes the behaviour and thoughts of the main character more vivid and picturesque: to feel them glide serpent-like through her fingers, referring to Bible and showing temptations of Mrs. Sommers, which she can't resist. Kate Chopin brilliantly uses exactly lexical means to present the events of the short story, to characterize the characters and to reveal their nature, and to create vivid images.
     Summing up the analysis of the short story "A Pair of Silk Stockings" one should say that this story is worth reading, as it has catching plot, interesting characters and unexpected denouement, that can't leave one indifferent.