Kate Chopin "Désirée's Baby"

From the short story:

" 'Tell me what it means!' she cried despairingly.

" 'It means,' he answered lightly, 'that the child is not white; it means that you are not white.' "

When Kate Chopin's "Désirée's Baby" was written and published

The story was written on November 24, 1892, and published in Vogue on January 14, 1893, the first of nineteen Kate Chopin stories that Vogue published. It was reprinted in Chopin's collection of stories Bayou Folk in 1894.

Kate Chopin's "Désirée's Baby" on line and in print

On line you can read the story here.

In print you can find "Désirée's Baby" in The Complete Works of Kate Chopin, in the Penguin Classics edition of Chopin's Bayou Folk and A Night in Acadie, and in the Library of American Literature Kate Chopin volume, as well as in other paperback and hardcover books. For publication information about these books, see the section "For students and scholars" near the bottom of this page.

"Désirée's Baby" characters

• Armand Aubigny, owner of L'Abri
• Désirée, a foundling, wife of Armand
• Madame Valmondé, the woman who raised Désirée
• Zandrine, a servant at L'Abri
• La Blanche, a slave

"Désirée's Baby" time and place

The story takes place in Louisiana before the American Civil War. It is one of the few stories Kate Chopin sets before the war.

"Désirée's Baby" themes

You can read about finding themes in Kate Chopin's stories and novels on the Themes page of this site.

Questions and answers about "Désirée's Baby"

Q: This is an amazing story. Do other people know about it?

A: Yes. It's been reprinted countless times since 1929 and was Chopin's best-known work before The Awakening was revived in the 1960s and 1970s. In 1936, critic Arthur Hobson Quinn called it "one of the greatest short stories in the language," and many readers over the decades have shared his opinion.

Q: I was totally unprepared for the ending. It stunned me! Is this typical of Kate Chopin?

A: Chopin handles closings as well as any writer. "The Storm," "The Story of an Hour," and "A Respectable Woman," among other short stories, also have brilliant last sentences.

Q: Should I have seen that ending coming?

A: There are some suggestions that point to it. The story notes in paragraph six that Armand Aubigny's mother was French. She and her "easy-going and indulgent" husband raised Armand in Paris, where an interracial marriage was, it seems, socially possible in the first half of the nineteenth century, in part because slavery as it was known in rural Louisiana did not exist in mainland France. And the description of L'Abri, Armand's house, in the sixth paragraph carries overtones of trouble to come.

Q: If Armand was eight when his mother died why doesn't he remember her?

A: Perhaps he does remember her. If by your question you mean why doesn't he remember his mother as having dark skin, it may be that she had light skin.

Q: Are there clues in the story to show Armand might have known he was of African American descent?

A: He is of mixed race, but he is not African American, if by that you mean someone who is a descendant of Africans brought to America as slaves. His mother was French. So he is American (on his father's side) and French (on his mother's side), although his mother evidently had roots in Africa. The question of what he knows about his race is not dealt with in the story. Is this the first time he is seeing that letter? The story does not tell us, so we cannot know.

Q: Why is Armand burning things at the end of the story?

A: Apparently he is trying to destroy memories of his wife and child to remove what he thinks of as the taint of their race.

Q: Is Armand's father dead?

A: Yes.

Q: I'm wondering if you might offer some insight into the importance of La Blanche in the story. The fact that Armand had been at the cabin of La Blanche and the comment by Armand that Désirée's hands were the color of La Blanche's led me to question the relationship between Armand and La Blanche.

A: The story is set before the Civil War, at a time when a white slave owner often considered that because his female slaves were his property, he had a right to have sex with them. Kate Chopin would certainly have been aware of that.

Because of this passage in the story--"And the way he cries," went on Desiree, "is deafening. Armand heard him the other day as far away as La Blanche's cabin"--you might ask why Armand is around La Blanche's cabin.

And you might consider this passage:

"She [Désirée] sat in her room, one hot afternoon, in her peignoir, listlessly drawing through her fingers the strands of her long, silky brown hair that hung about her shoulders. The baby, half naked, lay asleep upon her own great mahogany bed, that was like a sumptuous throne, with its satin-lined half-canopy. One of La Blanche's little quadroon boys--half naked too--stood fanning the child slowly with a fan of peacock feathers. Désirée's eyes had been fixed absently and sadly upon the baby, while she was striving to penetrate the threatening mist that she felt closing about her. She looked from her child to the boy who stood beside him, and back again; over and over. 'Ah!' It was a cry that she could not help; which she was not conscious of having uttered. The blood turned like ice in her veins, and a clammy moisture gathered upon her face."

We don't know what Désirée is thinking, but you might wonder if she sees a resemblance between her own baby and La Blanche's little boy, and--if that's what she sees--if it suggests to her that Armand had been having sex with La Blanche before their marriage. And if you want to look at this long passage in the context of the shorter one, you might want to ask if Désirée wonders if her husband continues to have sex with La Blanche.

Q: How did Kate Chopin know about slavery? Did she grow up with slaves in the house?

A: Yes. Her family in St. Louis, like many families in the city, held slaves in the 1850s.

Q. My literature anthology says that Kate Chopin's mother was Creole. Does that mean that Chopin herself has African roots?

A. No. In American English, the word "Creole" (the noun form of the word) carries several different meanings. For Kate Chopin, the following definition applies (it's from the Merriam Webster online dictionary): "a white person descended from early French or Spanish settlers of the United States Gulf states and preserving their speech and culture."

You can read more questions and answers about Kate Chopin and her work, and you can email us your questions.

For students and scholars

Accurate texts of "Désirée's Baby"

The Complete Works of Kate Chopin. Edited by Per Seyersted. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State UP, 1969, 2006.

Bayou Folk and A Night in Acadie. Edited by Bernard Koloski. New York: Penguin, 1999.

Kate Chopin: Complete Novels and Short Stories. Edited by Sandra Gilbert. New York: Library of American Literature, 2002.

Selected recent publications about "Désirée's Baby"

Some of the articles listed here may be available on line through university or public libraries.

Perrin-Chenour, Marie-Claude. "'Désirée's Baby', de Kate Chopin ou
l'envers de l'histoire." Nouvelles du Sud: Hearing Voices, Reading
Stories. 105-111. Paris, France: École Polytechnique, 2007.

Gibert, Teresa. “Textual, Contextual and Critical Surprises in ‘Désirée’s Baby.’” Connotations: A Journal for Critical Debate 14 (2004-05): 38-67.

-------. "The Role of Implicatures in Kate Chopin's Louisiana Short Stories." Journal of the Short Story in English 40 (2003): 69-84.

Skredsvig, Kari Meyers. "Mapping Gender: Feminist Cartographies in Kate Chopin's 'Regionalist' Stories." Revista de Filología y Lingüística de la Universidad de Costa Rica 29 (2003): 85-101.

Fitz, Brewster E. "Kate Chopin's 'Désirée's Baby': Emancipating the Readers." Short Story 8 (2000): 78-91.

Foster, Derek W., and Kris LeJeune. "'Stand by Your Man ...': Désirée Valmondé and Feminist Standpoint Theory in Kate Chopin's 'Désirée's Baby'." Southern Studies 8 (1997): 91-97.

Arner, Robert D. "Pride and Prejudice: Kate Chopin's 'Désirée's Baby'." Critical Essays on Kate Chopin. 139-146. New York: Hall, 1996.

Bauer, Margaret D. "Armand Aubigny, Still Passing after All These Years: The Narrative Voice and Historical Context of 'Désirée's Baby'." Critical Essays on Kate Chopin. 161-183. New York: Hall, 1996.

Koloski, Bernard. "The Anthologized Chopin: Kate Chopin's Short Stories in Yesterday's and Today's Anthologies." Louisiana Literature 11 (1994): 18-30.

Selected books that discuss Chopin's short stories

Beer, Janet. The Cambridge Companion to Kate Chopin Cambridge, England: Cambridge UP, 2008.

Ostman, Heather. Kate Chopin in the Twenty-First Century: New Critical Essays Newcastle upon Tyne, England: Cambridge Scholars, 2008.

Arima, Hiroko. Beyond and Alone!: The Theme of Isolation in Selected Short Fiction of Kate Chopin, Katherine Anne Porter, and Eudora Welty Lanham, MD: UP of America, 2006.

Beer, Janet. Kate Chopin, Edith Wharton and Charlotte Perkins Gilman: Studies in Short Fiction New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005.

Stein, Allen F. Women and Autonomy in Kate Chopin's Short Fiction New York: Peter Lang, 2005.

Walker, Nancy A. Kate Chopin: A Literary Life Basingstoke, England: Palgrave, 2001.

Koloski, Bernard. "Introduction" Bayou Folk and A Night in Acadie by Kate Chopin New York: Penguin, 1999.

Toth, Emily. Unveiling Kate Chopin Jackson: UP of Mississippi, 1999.

Koloski, Bernard. Kate Chopin: A Study of the Short Fiction New York: Twayne, 1996.

Petry, Alice Hall (ed.), Critical Essays on Kate Chopin New York: G. K. Hall, 1996.

Boren, Lynda S. and Sara deSaussure Davis (eds.), Kate Chopin Reconsidered: Beyond the Bayou Baton Rouge: Louisiana State UP, 1992.

Perspectives on KateChopin: Proceedings from the Kate Chopin International Conference, April 6, 7, 8, 1989 Natchitoches, LA: Northwestern State UP, 1992.

Toth, Emily. "Introduction" A Vocation and a Voice New York: Penguin, 1991.

Papke, Mary E. Verging on the Abyss: The Social Fiction of Kate Chopin and Edith Wharton New York: Greenwood, 1990.

Toth, Emily. Kate Chopin. New York: Morrow, 1990.

Elfenbein , Anna Shannon. Women on the Color Line: Evolving Stereotypes and the Writings of George Washington Cable, Grace King, Kate Chopin Charlottesville: UP of Virginia, 1989.

Taylor, Helen. Gender, Race, and Region in the Writings of Grace King, Ruth McEnery Stuart, and Kate Chopin Baton Rouge: Louisiana State UP, 1989.

Bonner, Thomas Jr., The Kate Chopin Companion New York: Greenwood, 1988.

Bloom, Harold (ed.), Kate Chopin New York: Chelsea, 1987.

Ewell, Barbara C. Kate Chopin New York: Ungar, 1986.

Skaggs, Peggy. Kate Chopin Boston: Twayne, 1985.

Seyersted, Per. Kate Chopin: A Critical Biography Baton Rouge: Louisiana State UP, 1969.

Quinn, Arthur Hobson. American Fiction: An Historical and Critical Survey New York: Appleton-Century, 1936.

Rankin, Daniel, Kate Chopin and Her Creole Stories Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania P, 1932.