Kate Chopin wrote many different things during her career which have helped make her a famous author.  She uses the French Creole and Acadian cultures of Louisiana as both setting and symbol throughout her stories.  Chopin’s stories contain much psychological insight that draw attention to her characters and plots. While Chopin also show recurring themes of feminism, she is also well known in American literature for her use of southern regionalism.  Kate Chopin is able to use the physical setting in her stories to emphasize important themes, affect the psychology of the characters, and add to the ambiance of her stories.

        Much of Kate Chopin’s focal points throughout her work have centered on feminism, but the following five articles discuss her use of regionalism, sometimes called ‘local color,’ and how it plays a key role in her stories. A web site featuring Chopin gives us an overview of her life, allowing us to understand her background and use of Louisiana culture in her writings.  Bryan Bourn, Patricia Evans, Barbara Ewell, Suzanne Jones, and Nancy Walker discuss Chopin’s pivotal role in southern literature.  Each author gives an in depth essay that will allow you to grasp and recognize how Kate Chopin became a distinguished author of regional writing that was ahead of her own time.
 
 

“A Woman Ahead of Her Time (1850-1904).” Kate Chopin. 5 Dec. 2001.<http://www.angelfire.com/nv/
        English243/Chopin.html>.
 
        This site gives us a view of Kate Chopin’s personal life as well as a summary of her most famous works.  Chopin had become a nationally acclaimed writer in the early 1890’s, until her story The Awakening caused an uproar from many and received bad reviews from male critics.  This caused Chopin to retreat from her writing almost completely.  Chopin is described as having “...lived her life the way she wanted to and wrote what she felt, thought, and wanted to say” (4). Kate Chopin discussed many issues that others would not veer towards, often making her the target of disapproval.  We still relate to many of these issues today since many believed “that Kate foreshadowed future events in her writing...” (4).
 
 

Bourn, Bryan D. Louisiana Local Color: Short Stories of Alice Dunbar-Nelson and
        Kate Chopin. 5 Dec. 2001 <http://www.vsold.com/localcolor.html>.

         In this article Bourn classifies Kate Chopin as at times being a “local color” writer.  He depicts Chopin as bringing to life the Creole culture of Louisiana through her stories.  Bourn states that Chopin uses her “fiction not just to record the lives of people in an area, but to show how people in these places encounter issues that have universal value and react to them according to their own values and environment” (2).  In her stories Chopin brings her characters to life by using the places and people of Louisiana as her references.  Bourn gives examples in his article through the Chopin’s story “Love on the Bon-Dieu.”  Kate Chopin is able to add to her stories by using her surroundings of Louisiana which further enhances the tone and themes prevalent throughout the Old South in her time period.
 
 

Evans, Patricia. Southern Literature: Women Writers. 5 Dec 2001. <http://falcon.jmu.edu/
        ~ramseyil/southwomen.htm.>.
 
        Evans states that “characteristics of southern literature are: the importance of family, sense of community, importance of religion, importance of time and place, exploration of the past, sense of human limitation (moral dilemma), and a use of southern voice and dialect” (1).  According to Evans, Kate Chopin envelopes this style and uses it to become one of the leaders in the 1920’s literary movement known as the Southern Renaissance. Chopin also played a major part in the feminist movement in the post Civil War period which helped show northern and southern women the bonds made between female characters and other women throughout her stories.
 
 

Ewell, Barbara C. “Kate Chopin: 1851-1904, Writer,” Documenting the American South. University of
        North Carolina at Chapel Hill Libraries. 5 Dec. 2001. <http://docsouth.unc.edu/chopinawake/about.
        html>.

        Ewell shows us in her article that Chopin “often relied on popular period motifs” to enhance themes throughout her stories (1).  Chopin’s stories are filled with local dialect and engross her readers in the culture of the Creoles of south Louisiana.  Ewell claims Chopin as being known only as a southern local colorist of the 1890s until The Awakening was revived in the 1970s.  The Awakening shows Chopin’s use of realism and female experience. Ewell states that Chopin “evokes the region” with her descriptions and characteristics used (1). Chopin is able to hold your attention through her unique style that many can relate to.
 
 

Jones, Suzanne W. “Place, Perception, and Identity in the Awakening,” Perspectives  on Kate Chopin.
        Natchitoches, Louisiana: Northwestern State University Press, 1990.

        In this article Jones asserts that Chopin’s use of settings in The Awakening “allow her to focus on the changing definition of women and to show her concern both with the psychological cost women pay when following behavior patterns that restrict their individuality and with the social cost they incur in attempting to break such patterns” (60).  The use of these two settings, states Jones, allows Chopin “to expose the confusion and frustration that arise out of the division between social role and personal identity” (60). Jones further claims that the use of settings shows the different emotions experienced and how these places are able to change women's attitudes and even their personalities.  The Awakening is a story in which regional literature illustrates how the psychological moods of the characters are greatly affected by their surrounding environments.
 

Walker, Nancy. Kate Chopin: A Literary Life. Chippenham, Wiltshire: Antony,  Rowe Ltd., 2001.

        Nancy Walker states that Kate Chopin played a major role in making attributions to the regional literature that became popular in the 1870s and 1880s. Walker describes this as “first called ‘local color’ literature because of its representations of the language, customs, geography, and manners of specific regions” (17). The appeal of these short stories, Walker claims, was due to their presentation of life in other parts of the United States that may have seemed foreign to some readers due to the lack of travel in that time.  Scholars have lately called this type of writing regional literature.  Chopin made use of the traits associated with women writers and regionalism that Walker states are “observations of everyday life, faithful delineation of real human experience, and sympathy for ordinary individuals” (18). Walker clearly shows how Chopin utilizes her environment and blends these experiences into her stories, which in turn lead to Chopin’s popularity in the late 19th century.