it is only at the very end when she finally drifts away. She could have chosen sleeping pills as her method of death, but she returns to the beach because of its memories of the summer, and the men in her life. Her near-death experience in the summer left an impression on her that influences her choice of escape from life. Throughout the story, Edna struggles to free herself. Leonce Pontellier tries to hold Edna down, wanting her to be a mother and a housewife, when she knows she is not like that. Her husband's oppression forces her to break free. This time, she escapes and begins life on her own, to succeed at first. Then she meets Alece Arobin. He is a disreputable man-about-town who draws Edna out to the horse races. For a moment, he brings her away from the precipice of suicide. His attentiveness attracts her, but in the end she realizes that he means little to her. Eventually she sees Robert again. Having left her husband, she hopes to start a fresh new life with Robert. Edna reminds him, that it was he who awoke her last summer out of a life-long ,stupid dream; however, Robert only leaves her a note that reads, "I love you. Good-by - because I love you." (Chopin, 695). He does not understand what she needs either. She realizes, during the long sleepless night that follows, that eventually she will forget her love for even Robert. That night she thinks about the forces that have tried to hold her down. She thinks of ". . . Leonce and of the children." (Chopin, 698); they sought to drag her into the soul's slavery for the rest of her days. Finally, she realizes that her only escape is suicide. All her life, she has known people who try to hold her down; she will forget them and meet others. This is her surrender to a tradition and a society that is too powerful. She has flirted with suicide throughout the novel; in the end she ". . . looked into the distance . . . heard her father's voice and her sister Maragret's" (Chopin, 6...
