Character analysis
The Colonel
in The Awakening by Kate Chopin
The Colonel is Edna Pontellier's father, a retired Kentucky colonel who makes a brief but significant appearance in Kate Chopin's The Awakening. He comes to New Orleans for a portrait sitting, and his presence in the Pontellier home offers a clear glimpse into the patriarchal society that has influenced Edna. As a former Civil War officer, he carries himself with strict authority and traditional beliefs, representing the very social norms Edna is trying to break away from.
The Colonel's most revealing moment comes when he advises Léonce on how to handle Edna, insisting that husbands need to assert "authority and coercion" over their wives—drawing a parallel between managing a marriage and leading a military unit. This scene is steeped in irony: Léonce, who already dismisses Edna's feelings, is encouraged to be even more controlling by the man who raised her. The Colonel serves as a symbol of how the oppression of women is passed down through generations.
Even with his stern demeanor, Edna feels a complex sense of duty to him, attending her sister's wedding partly to meet his expectations. Their relationship is marked by emotional distance; she feels closer to him out of obligation than affection. As a minor yet crucial character, the Colonel sheds light on the roots of Edna's upbringing—the military-style discipline she grew up with—making her awakening all the more poignant and her eventual isolation feel inevitable.
Who is The Colonel?
The Colonel is Edna Pontellier's father, a retired officer from Kentucky who fought in the Civil War and carries that martial identity long after the war's end. He appears in Chapters 23 and 24 of The Awakening, arriving in New Orleans for a portrait sitting arranged by Léonce. Though his time on the page is brief, Chopin uses every detail of his characterisation economically: his erect bearing, his taste for whiskey toddies, his habit of issuing pronouncements rather than entering conversations. He embodies the world that shaped Edna — a physical representation of a social order that treats women as subordinates requiring management instead of individuals needing understanding.
What is The Colonel's arc and motivation?
The Colonel has no transformative arc; this rigidity is his narrative function. His motivation during his visit is the maintenance of order — order in the household he surveys, order between husband and wife, order consistent with the hierarchies he commanded on the battlefield. He arrives confident in his values, dispenses advice, sits for his portrait, and departs unchanged. Chopin does not grant him the possibility of self-examination. He is static by design, a fixed point against which Edna's movement can be measured. His presence in the novel highlights not who he is becoming but what he already represents: the institutionalised authority that preceded Edna's life and continues to influence it.
What are The Colonel's key moments?
The pivotal scene occurs in Chapter 24, when the Colonel advises Léonce on marital management. He insists that a husband must wield "authority and coercion" over his wife, comparing the governance of a marriage to the discipline required in military command. This comparison fuses domestic life with the chain of command, reducing Edna to the rank of subordinate soldier. The irony here is layered: Léonce already neglects Edna's emotional life, yet the Colonel urges him toward even greater control. The scene frames patriarchy not as individual cruelty but as institutional wisdom passed between men.
An earlier moment in Chapter 23 is equally telling. The Colonel is charming in mixed company — animated, sociable, capable of entertaining Edna's friends. This social grace makes his prescriptive authoritarianism in private even more insidious. He is not a villain of melodrama; he is a man entirely comfortable with his assumptions, which makes those assumptions harder to challenge.
What are The Colonel's most important relationships?
With Edna: Their relationship is defined by obligation rather than affection. Edna attends her sister's wedding partly to satisfy his expectations, a compliance that underscores how deeply his authority has been internalised. She feels no particular tenderness toward him and no hostility either — what she feels is duty, perhaps the coldest emotion Chopin assigns in the novel. He shaped her through the discipline of his household, and that shaping is precisely what her awakening is struggling to undo. Every rule she breaks implicitly answers him.
With Léonce: The Colonel's counsel to Léonce in Chapter 24 is the novel's clearest illustration of how patriarchal power reproduces itself. He treats the problem of an independent wife as a management failure, something correctable through firmer handling. That Léonce receives this advice seriously — and that Doctor Mandelet is later consulted in a similar spirit — suggests the Colonel's worldview is normative, not eccentric. He does not corrupt Léonce; he confirms him.
How is The Colonel connected to the other characters?
- Edna Pontellier
The Colonel is Edna's father. Their relationship is defined by duty rather than warmth; he is emotionally distant and authoritarian, and his rigid expectations—evidenced by Edna attending her sister's wedding under his pressure—represent the patriarchal conditioning she spends the novel trying to shed.
- Léonce Pontellier
The Colonel advises Léonce to use 'authority and coercion' to keep Edna in line, drawing on his military background to frame marital control as a matter of discipline. This counsel reveals how patriarchal power reproduces itself across generations and institutions.
Questions readers ask about The Colonel
Who is the Colonel in The Awakening?
The Colonel is Edna Pontellier's father, a retired Civil War officer from Kentucky who appears briefly in Chapters 23 and 24. He visits New Orleans for a portrait sitting and serves as a symbol of the rigid patriarchal authority that shaped Edna's upbringing. Though a minor character, his presence clarifies the social conditioning Edna is struggling to escape throughout the novel.
What advice does the Colonel give Léonce about Edna?
The Colonel tells Léonce that husbands must use 'authority and coercion' to manage their wives, comparing marital governance to military command. This advice, given in Chapter 24, frames Edna as a subordinate requiring discipline rather than a person deserving understanding. The irony is sharp: Léonce already dismisses Edna's feelings, yet her own father encourages him toward even tighter control.
What is the Colonel's relationship with Edna like?
Their relationship is defined by obligation rather than affection. Edna feels duty toward the Colonel rather than genuine warmth, attending her sister's wedding largely to meet his expectations. He shaped her through strict, military-style discipline, and that conditioning is precisely what her awakening is working to undo—meaning every boundary she pushes implicitly answers him.
How does the Colonel's relationship with Léonce reveal the novel's view of patriarchy?
The Colonel's counsel to Léonce in Chapter 24 shows patriarchy reproducing itself across generations: he treats Edna's independence as a management failure correctable through firmer handling. That Léonce takes this advice seriously suggests the Colonel's worldview is normative, not eccentric. Chopin frames oppression not as individual cruelty but as institutional wisdom passed between men.
Why does the Colonel compare marriage to military command?
The comparison reflects how completely he equates authority structures—he governs a household the same way he once governed troops, reducing his wife and daughter to subordinates requiring discipline. Chopin uses this analogy deliberately: it exposes the structural logic of gender oppression by making explicit what usually goes unsaid, that domestic control and military hierarchy share the same assumption that some people exist to be managed.
Is the Colonel portrayed as a villain in The Awakening?
No—Chopin makes him socially charming and animated in company during Chapter 23, which is precisely the point. His authoritarianism in private is more insidious because he is not a melodramatic tyrant but a man entirely comfortable with his assumptions. His likeability suggests that oppressive ideology does not require an oppressive personality, making the system he represents harder to identify and resist.
Does the Colonel change or develop over the course of the novel?
The Colonel undergoes no transformation whatsoever—he arrives confident in his values, dispenses his advice, sits for his portrait, and departs unchanged. Chopin designs him as a static character by intention: his immovability serves as a fixed ideological monument against which Edna's awakening and movement can be measured, illustrating that the institutions he represents offer no possibility of self-examination.
How does the Colonel's influence connect to Edna's sense of isolation by the novel's end?
The Colonel represents the origin point of Edna's conditioning—the military-style discipline of her upbringing that taught her compliance before she ever met Léonce. Because that authority was internalised so deeply, Edna's struggle to shed it is immense, and the social order he embodies surrounds her on all sides. Chopin suggests this inherited patriarchal structure makes Edna's eventual isolation feel inevitable rather than accidental.
Use this in your essay
The military-domestic analogy: Examine how the Colonel's equation of marital authority with military command reveals the structural logic underlying gender oppression in the novel. What does framing a wife as a subordinate soldier imply about consent, personhood, and domestic space?
Fathers and formation: Argue that the Colonel is the origin point of Edna's conditioning. How does Chopin trace Edna's learned compliance
and her difficulty shedding it — back to her upbringing under his discipline?
Static characters as ideological monuments: The Colonel does not change. Discuss how Chopin uses his immovability to critique the institutions he represents. What does it mean that the novel offers him no moment of reflection?
Patriarchy as inheritance: The Colonel advises Léonce, a man of a different generation and class. How does this cross-generational transmission of control suggest that patriarchy is systemic rather than personal?
Charm as camouflage: The Colonel is socially agreeable in Chapter 23. Build a thesis around how Chopin uses his likeability to argue that oppressive ideology does not require an oppressive personality
and what that means for resistance.