A Reflection

by Kate Chopin

Kate Chopin’s “A Reflection” is a reflection on the fortunes of life. It is a meditation on how some people succeed by harnessing their energy effectively while others get left behind.

Genres: Short Stories, Classics, Audiobook, Nonfiction

Audiobook

First published January 1, 1894

About the author

Kate Chopin was an American author whose fiction grew out of the complex cultures and contradictions of Louisiana life, and she gradually became one of the most distinctive voices in nineteenth century literature. Raised in a household shaped by strong women of French and Irish heritage, she developed an early love for books and storytelling, and that immersion in language later shaped the quiet precision of her prose. After marrying and moving to New Orleans, then later to the small community of Cloutierville, she absorbed the rhythms, customs, and tensions of Creole and Cajun society, finding in its people the material that would feed both her sympathy and her sharp observational eye. When personal loss left her searching for direction, she began writing with the encouragement of a family friend, discovering not only a therapeutic outlet but a genuine vocation. Within a few years, her stories appeared in major magazines such as The Atlantic Monthly, Vogue, and The Century, where readers encountered her local-color sketches, her portrayals of women navigating desire and constraint, and her nuanced depictions of life in the American South. She published two story collections, Bayou Folk and A Night in Acadie, introducing characters whose emotional lives were depicted with unusual honesty. Her short fiction often explored subjects others avoided, including interracial relationships, female autonomy, and the quiet but powerful inner conflicts of everyday people. That same unflinching quality shaped The Awakening, the novel that would later become her most celebrated work. At the time of its publication, however, its frank treatment of a married woman’s emotional and sensual awakening unsettled many critics, who judged it harshly, yet Chopin continued to write stories that revealed her commitment to portraying women as fully human, with desires and ambitions that stretched beyond the confines of convention. She admired the psychological clarity of Guy de Maupassant, but she pushed beyond his influence to craft a voice that was unmistakably her own, direct yet lyrical, and deeply attuned to the inner lives of her characters. Though some of her contemporaries viewed her themes as daring or even improper, others recognized her narrative skill, and within a decade of her passing she was already being described as a writer of remarkable talent. Her rediscovery in the twentieth century led readers to appreciate how modern her concerns truly were: the struggle for selfhood, the tension between social expectations and private longing, and the resilience of women seeking lives that felt authentically theirs. Today, her stories and novels are widely read, admired for their clarity, emotional intelligence, and the boldness with which they illuminate the complexities of human experience.

Reviews

[Lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm not even sure is this can be called a short story. It is a brief thought on life.

Some people are born lucky, with everything they need to survive. To travel through life on a journey with the others like them.

And some people are left at the roadside, desperate to catch up.

[Dave · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting.

[Penny May Davies · Rating 1 out of 5]

This isn’t even a story, it’s a short reflection on life… 1/2 a star babes

[Laura · Rating 1 out of 5]

1 star.
Listened to this with an audiobook while cleaning up my island in animal crossing...

This was so short, I don't remember a single word of it. Still kinda feel bad for giving it one star tho...

[d. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Kate Chopin is actually so influential. Love her work so much.

[Moataz Mohamed · Rating 4 out of 5]

عارف أما الصوت يسكت ثواني ؟ تحس كإن كل الموجودات سكتت احتراما للحظة أكبر مننا جميعا. ده اللي حصل معايا وانا باقرأ ال"حالة" دي وسط الصخب المجسم لكاتبة اكتشفتها بالمصادفة المحضة.
نصف صفحة ، بس لو حبيت آخد منها
Quote
هاخدها كلها من أول كلمة لآخر كلمة.

‏ كل اللي أقدر أقوله إن دي مجرد بداية ليا جوا عوالم كيت شوبان.

[James · Rating 2 out of 5]

It does exactly what the title says. If is a brief and short reflection. Is it actually a story? Not sure?

[READERSBEWARE · Rating 3 out of 5]

I find A Reflection hauntingly beautiful in its quiet contemplation: Chopin doesn’t spin a story so much as she paints an emotional landscape, where the narrator stands on the sidelines of a stormy “moving procession” of human ambition and energy — vivid, mesmerizing, relentless — and feels left behind, drifting toward the stillness of grass, clouds, and “dumb animals,” as if nature offers both refuge and resigned comfort.  There’s a kind of bittersweet dignity in that detachment: the narrator doesn’t envy the rush, but recognizes their own rhythm is different — slower, quieter, more introspective. In that sense, the piece becomes a reflection on identity, belonging, and the cost of being out of sync with societal pace, as well as a meditation on solitude and acceptance. The lyrical, almost poetic quality of Chopin’s language makes the reading feel less like a narrative and more like a mood, a fleeting but powerful snapshot of alienation and inner calm. It’s a short work — almost like a prose-poem — but one that lingers, inviting the reader to question whether “keeping pace” truly matters. 

[Nolan · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is creative nonfiction, not a short story. The reviews whinging about it not being a narrative are astonishing, as if they're scared to have stumbled into something that isn't escapism for their ears but rather an author's thoughts expressed directly, without all those pesky symbols and themes getting in the way. The fact that its rating is getting bombed because people are choosing to argue with a book's formatting instead of judging what the book actually says is all the more astonishing, but when you realize that said people are audiobook """"readers"""", it lines up.

Anyway, Chopin (or, generously, the narrator) bemoans her fate as someone too deviant from the status quo and of society to enjoy functioning within it. This isn't hard to understand if you can read, but most of these reviewers are not capable of reading, merely listening. Truly, Goodreads is home to some of the dumbest readers on the planet.

[Phil Syphe · Rating 3 out of 5]

This feels more like flash non-fiction than fiction.

The narrator reflects. Not much else to say!

[M.W. Lee · Rating 4 out of 5]

A nice short-short story, worth the three minutes needed to read, and not wasted. Lovely prose, beautiful images. For me, the beautiful handling of the theme makes this the great story it is.

[Jennifer · Rating 2 out of 5]

Wasted one of my digital downloads. This is so short I would not even consider it a short story...more like a fleeting thought that was never fully fleshed out into story form.

[dani · Rating 2 out of 5]

interesting

[IU_read · Rating 1 out of 5]

Short audiobook, briefly reflection about life. Ili wont call this as a short story, its not.

[Saksham · Rating 1 out of 5]

So any book/story which dwells into absurdism needs to have a certain charm that makes readers enjoy it even when nothing happens. This however does not have it

[Elizabeth · Rating 2 out of 5]

I have read a couple of other very short works by Kate Chopin, which I have generally enjoyed. A Reflection is exactly as the title describes. It is a reflection on life, and does not really class as a short story. It brings the idea of some people falling to the wayside in life to the table, an idea I can certainly relate to. That said, I didn't really feel this had enough to it for me to fully enjoy. The language was certainly pretty enough, and the concept is there, but I feel like she could have perhaps managed both of those things with a little bit more substance behind them.

This isn't really bad, I just didn't see much there to fall in love with. I would probably only recommend it to completionists looking to read all of Chopin's works, but I would hardly talk someone out of reading it, particularly given how short it is.

[a · Rating 2 out of 5]

A Reflection is a short ramble of things Kate Chopin thought about human energy. It has no plot or anything, yet it shows how Chopin discusses an idea. She used descriptive words and mentioned nature to animate her idea. I am amazed by how she writes even if I am not entirely fond of this.

[Viji (Bookish endeavors) · Rating 2 out of 5]

A plot? No.
Characters? No.
Any brainstorms? No.
Then why did I read it.? I guess out of curiosity. I just wanted to know how worse he can do. This is the first time I feel so with this author.

[Elizabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Salve! ye dumb hearts. Let us be still and wait by the roadside."