Esplanade Avenue
Avenue on the edge of the French Quarter in New Orleans, once lined with Creole family houses.
At a glance
| Source | Author | Role | In one line |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Awakening | Kate Chopin | setting | The Pontellier house Edna rebels in, and the little “pigeon house” she moves to. |
The Awakening — Kate Chopin (1899)
Source: The Awakening · Readwise highlight
The Pontelliers possessed a very charming home on Esplanade Street in New Orleans.
- Role: setting
- In the book: Back from Grand Isle, Edna gives up her Tuesday receptions; after a quarrel over dinner she smashes a vase and stamps on her wedding ring in the house. With Léonce away in New York she enjoys its solitude, then moves out because the house is his, renting the tiny “pigeon house” around the corner. After her farewell dinner she walks there with Arobin, and the scene ends with her yielding to him.
- Why it matters: The move from the double cottage to the pigeon house traces Edna’s break with her marriage: she “descended in the social scale” but “risen in the spiritual”.
- Real vs. fictional: Real street, named in the text as Esplanade Street; both houses are fictional.