Regret

“Mamzelle Aurélie had never thought of marrying. She had never been in love. At the age of twenty she had received a proposal, which she had promptly declined, and at the age of fifty she had not yet lived to regret it.”

The diction of this paragraph seems to suggest the nature of Mamzelle Aurélie’s process for making life decisions. She has prioritized Logic at the Expense of the Senses, with this description prior to the arrival of the children setting the tone for her character. The use of adverbs, for example, convey an absolute quality (she “never thought of marrying” and has “never been in love”), suggesting a thought process that is closed off to future possibilities. Not only that, but she also “promptly” declines a marriage proposal, suggesting a lack of reflection. That she “had not yet lived to regret” her decision to live in the world as a single woman also suggests a point of pride.

“So she was quite alone in the world, except for her dog Ponto, and the negroes who lived in her cabins and worked her crops, and the fowls, a few cows, a couple of mules, her gun (with which she shot chicken-hawks), and her religion.”

The assertion that Mamzelle Aurélie is “quite alone,” yet not alone in that she possesses and manages a dog, property, workers, livestock, a gun, and religion, is an ironic characterization of Mamzelle Aurélie that encompasses her sense of satisfaction. In the balance of Community and Individuality, she lacks community, but possesses and prides herself on her own unique identity. The irony is especially evident in that the items in the list are not her peers, but mostly either inanimate objects and concepts or animals.

“One morning Mamzelle Aurélie stood upon her gallery, contemplating with arms akimbo, a small band of very small children who, to all intents and purposes, might have fallen from the clouds, so unexpected and bewildering was their coming, and so unwelcome.”

This portrayal of Mamzelle Aurélie again casts her as a commanding figure. Furthermore, it is emphasized once more that she possesses her own property—“her gallery.” She is standing “arms akimbo” suggesting confidence, arrogance, or even aggressiveness. It is as if she is meeting an enemy army. The children are “unwelcome.” The staging and diction set the stage for what is to come.

“It’s no question, Mamzelle Aurélie; you jus’ got to keep those youngsters fo’ me tell I come back. Dieu sait, I would n’ botha you with ‘em if it was any otha way to do! Make ‘em mine you, Mamzelle Aurélie; don’ spare ‘em. Me, there, I’m half crazy between the chil’ren, an Léon not home, an’ maybe not even to fine po’ maman alive encore!”

As the first direct address in the story, this dialogue stands in stark contrast to the voice of the omniscient narrator who has introduced the story to this point. The heavily inflected Cajun accent of Odile—in contrast to the literary quality of the narrative voice—is jarring. It is an intrusion into the placid, ordered scene.

“She left them crowded into the narrow strip of shade on the porch of the long, low house; the white sunlight was beating in on the white old boards; some chickens were scratching in the grass at the foot of the steps, and one had boldly mounted, and was stepping heavily, solemnly, and aimlessly across the gallery. There was a pleasant odor of pinks in the air, and the sound of negroes’ laughter was coming across the flowering cotton-field.”

This descriptive passage introduces a sudden engagement of the senses. The sunlight beating on the porch where the children stand is not only a visual engagement but also a tangible one. There is the sense of touch, albeit intense. The chickens remain oblivious to the change in circumstances—scratching in the grass, with one stepping onto the porch. Their behavior provides movement in this otherwise static scene, and their scratching involves sound. The smell of flowers and the laughter of “negroes” suggest a joyous and aesthetic existence independent of Mamzelle Aurélie’s all-consuming affairs and concerns.

“Mamzelle Aurélie stood contemplating the children. She looked with a critical eye upon Marcéline, who had been left staggering beneath the weight of the chubby Elodie. She surveyed with the same calculating air Marcélette mingling her silent tears with the audible grief and rebellion of Ti Nomme. During those few contemplative moments, she was collecting herself, determining upon a line of action which should be identical with a line of duty. She began by feeding them.”

The visual presentation of the children, as Mamzelle Aurélie perceives them, suggests a ragtag menagerie that she plans to address with her usual efficiency. The contrast between the disorder of the children and the regimented thought process of Mamzelle Aurélie is comical. This comedic tone is reinforced by what she believes is the all-encompassing solution: food. This moment introduces the theme of Knowledge as Communal, Experiential, and Revealed, if only by absence of knowledge in the moment. It is only through immersion in community and gaining real-life experience that Mamzelle Aurélie will begin to accumulate a new kind of knowledge that is not oriented around logic.

“But little children are not little pigs; they require and demand attentions which were wholly unexpected by Mamzelle Aurélie, and which she was ill prepared to give.”

This ironic statement comparing children to pigs invites the reader into an evaluation of Mamzelle Aurélie’s qualifications as a guardian. The use of animals versus children as a motif also more broadly prompts reflection on Knowledge as Communal, Experiential, Revealed. While Mamzelle Aurélie is well equipped to care for animals, which follows a straightforward logic, caring for children requires an emotional investment that is foreign to her.

“How could she know that Marcélette always wept when spoken to in a loud and commanding tone of voice? It was a peculiarity of Marcélette’s.”

These lines mark the beginning of a section in which rhetorical questions are asked as another way of anthologizing all the specific ways in which Mamzelle Aurélie falls short as a surrogate mother. It is as if Mamzelle Aurélie is defending herself to a jury via legal representation. How could she know of their personalities, proclivities, preferences, and needs, both individual and corporate? What stands out here is not that she is inept in general but that she lacks knowledge of the particulars of these particular children.

“At night, when she ordered them one and all to bed as she would have shooed the chickens into the hen-house, they stayed uncomprehending before her. What about the little white nightgowns that had to be taken from the pillow-ship in which they were brought over, and shaken by some strong hand till they snapped like ox-whips?”

Mamzelle Aurélie is once again disabused of the usefulness of her overly simplistic approach in caring for the children. Following these lines is a rhetorical question that begins a brief summary of all the subtle actions that Mamzelle Aurélie has failed to perform in order to prepare the children for bed. Most of these tasks, much like Aunt Ruby’s odd advice, are seemingly nonsensical—they respond more to the children’s emotional needs than to their most basic physical needs. These lines have a light humor given the almost hyperbolic detail depicting the manner in which Mamzelle Aurélie must perform each task in order for the performance to be satisfactory, suggesting just how invested Odile is in mothering her children.

“And it made Marcéline and Marcélette laugh merrily—the idea that Mamzelle Aurélie should for a moment have believed that Ti Nomme could fall asleep without being told the story of Croque-mitaine or Loup-garou; or that Elodie could fall asleep at all without being rocked and sung to.”

Mamzelle Aurélie at this point has revealed her incompetency in the simple tasks entailed in putting the children to bed. No longer in control and dominant, the one with all the answers, she is subject to their laughter. The hyperbolic phrasing—“should have for a moment believed” and “could fall asleep at all”—heighten the portrayal of the spinster’s incompetence and the girls’ reason for laughter.

“I tell you, Aunt Ruby,” Mamzelle Aurélie informed her cook in confidence; “me, I’d rather manage a dozen plantation’ than fo’ chil’ren. It’s terrassent! Bonté! Don’t talk to me about chil’ren!”

Mamzelle Aurélie speaks to Aunt Ruby in these lines about her difficulties in managing the children. Chopin portrays the auditory nature of Mamzelle Aurélie speech using colloquialism and slang. Amplification is also used to emphasize the dire nature of her situation.

“’Tain’ inspected such as you would know airy thing ‘bout ‘em, Mamzelle Aurélie. I see dat plainly yisstiddy w’en I spy dat li’le chile playin’ wide yo’ baskit o’ keys. You don’ know dat makes chillum grow up hard-headed, to play wid keyes? Des like it make ‘em teeth hard to look in a lookin’-glass.”

Aunt Ruby’s speech is also portrayed with the use of colloquialism. In response to Mamzelle Aurélie’s sense of overwhelm, Aunt Ruby tells her she expected as much, having observed Mamzelle Aurélie allowing one of the children to play with a basket of keys. According to superstition, which Aunt Ruby seems to take as fact, playing with keys makes children stubborn. This assertion plays into the themes of Knowledge as Communal, Experiential, and Revealed and Logic at the Expense of the Senses. To raise children effectively, Aunt Ruby’s observations seem to suggest, one must set logic aside; child rearing demands a different kind of knowledge.

“It took some days to become accustomed to the laughing, the crying, the chattering that echoed through the house and around it all day long. And it was not the first or second night that she could sleep comfortably with little Elodie’s hot, plump body pressed close against her, and the little one’s warm breath beating her cheek like the fanning of a bird’s wing.”

Near the end of the story, we see a different Mamzelle Aurélie, a depiction that is a sharp juxtaposition to her initial portrayal, with her arms akimbo, contemplating with her “discerning eye” a band of small “unwelcome” guests approaching. In this section, Mamzelle Aurélie has changed such a great deal that she has grown used to the noises the children make. She has even become accustomed to the baby sleeping “pressed close against her,” so close that Mamzelle Aurélie detects the baby’s light exhalations on her cheek. Even now, Mamzelle Aurélie perceives the children as somewhat like animals, but her perception has nonetheless shifted dramatically. With her deepening emotional connection to this small community of little humans, the comparison has become tender.