COMPARATIVE STUDY OF THE TWO WOMAN CHARACTERS OF THE SINGING LESSON AND THE STORY OF AN HOUR

Miss Meadows is the protagonist of the story ‘The Singing Lesson’. She is thirty years old. She does not seem to be good-looking. So there
is no physical description about her. That she is a working woman and is in focus is important given she conditions of the society in which
the story is written.
She is no doubt a popular teacher. Her students admire her. When we first see her she wears “cap and gown” and handles “little baton”.
When she talks to the Science Mistress, “hugging the knife”, there is no real knife. It is a wedged letter on her throat, a metaphor about
how she feels in her heart.
She stands keenly contrasted with her colleague, the Science Mistress, who is portrayed as “sweet, pale, like honey”. She has yellow hair.
While the Science Mistress has a “sugary smile”, Miss Meadows is frozen, grim.
Miss Meadows is the singing teacher who carries the baton. She beats the baton and asks for silence. The baton is a sign of her power,
like a magician’s stick or a magic wand. The girls who wear a “sea of coloured flannel blouses” get scared and silent, as if the colours had
to be stagnated. She imposes her will and moods on her students and makes them behave and act as her mood dictates. She is not soft
on her favourite pupil Mary Beazley, playing accompaniment. She gives sharp taps with her baton for silence. Her glance sweeps over
the bobbing pink faces. But she silences them all. She remains indifferent to their excitement because “What could the thoughts of those
creatures matter to someone who stood there bleeding to death, pierced to the heart, by such a letter “from Basil who feels “more and
more strongly that our marriage would be a mistake”.
She is very sensitive. It is Basil’s latest letter that has hurt her most. Miss Meadows allows her inner turmoil to influence not only her
song choices when teaching her class but the way in which the songs are interpreted. She picks a lament for the class’s first song and
instructs her students not to feel any emotion while singing and their voices are, as a result, lifeless and a reflection of her inner thoughts.
A reflection of her mood, the music continues to tread along, the students instinctively picking up on Miss Meadows’ emotions become
angry and afraid as a result. Yet all the time students remain unaware of the clear cause of her mood. Thus for Miss Meadows, music
serves as her emotional outlet without having to divulge her private thoughts. After Miss Meadows receives Basil’s apology, her music
choice reflects her change in the mood and she sings a happier song. She “beams at the girls”, since the sun is shining inside her. The air,
the voices, the sound and all the rest become light. At this point she demonstrates her place at the hierarchy, the goddess that she really
is. She recovers the full moon aspect, Demeter, mother, wife.
According to the typology described by Jung, Miss Meadows seems to be the kind of person sentimental/ introverted, which specially
appears on women. Such persons tend to be quiet, difficult to approach often being a childish or banal masque. They have also a
melancholic temperament.
Mrs. Mallard is the central character in ‘The Story of an Hour’. She remains in focus throughout. Other characters are only peripheral, as
they are mere devices to reveal her character. Mrs. Mallard is young, fair-complexioned and pretty with a calm face that bespeaks
repression and even a certain strength. She is bold enough to endure the heart-breaking news of her husband’s death. She weeps
passionately in her sister’s arms. But when the storm of grief has spent itself, she calms down. She decides to go to her room to be by
herself. She would have no one follow her.
Mrs. Mallard is a complex character. Although she is saddened by her husband’s death, who had always loved her, once she is alone in
her room she seems terrified of some knowledge that is coming to her. This new knowledge is approaching to possess her. At first she
strives to bet it back with her will without realizing it. But finally, she succumbs to it. It is the feeling of her freedom. Her pulses beat fast
and the coursing blood warms in her veins and relaxes every inch of her body as she welcomes this freedom. She thinks as to how she
will cry when she sees her husband’s dead body and how much he loved her. She is kind of excited about the chance to make her own
decisions and not feel accountable to anyone.
Mrs. Mallard cherishes freedom. That is why, she dreams of exciting life ahead. She feels that there would be no one to live for during
the coming years. She would, thus, live for herself. There would be no powerful will to bend her will. She feels even more swept by the
idea of freedom than the fact that she had sometimes felt love for her husband. Now she focuses on how liberated she would feel.
While her fancy is running riot along those days ahead of her, her sister Josephine pleads to her to open the door and let her in. Finally
she arises and opens the door. There is a feverish triumph in her eyes. They come down. At this stage the door opens and Mr. Mallard,
the ‘dead’ husband comes in. As soon as Mrs. Mallard sees him she receives a shock. Unable to bear this shock, she dies of heart trouble.
According to the doctors, she felt so much happiness that it killed her.
In short, she is a sensitive human being who seems to have been much oppressed. She wants to lead a life of freedom, which she fails to
do.

Miss Meadows, as the gods of Olympus in Greek mythology, has human attitudes and defects. She is susceptible to suffer with the
changes of fortune in life and she can make use of her power indiscriminately against the weaker and more vulnerable people to overflow
her pain, hate or joy. Miss Meadows’ inclement mood subdues the girls.
Miss Meadows’ personality skirts the line between that of stereotypical “schoolmarm” or “old maid” and that of a woman who, until
recently, seems to have enjoyed her job and was popular with her students. Her identity struggles between who is at school and who is
in marriage.