What have critics said about “The Storm”?
Until 1969, when the Norwegian scholar Per Seyersted first published the story, critics had not heard of its existence (Daniel Rankin did not discuss it in his 1932 Chopin biography). Seyersted praises the story for its “daring,” its “happy” and “healthy” treatment of sex. In the story, he says, sex “is a force as strong, inevitable, and natural as the Louisiana storm which ignites it.” The work has, he adds, the “unreserved directness and supreme authenticity of truth.” Later critics follow Seyersted’s lead, and, although some focus on themes like isolation, gender, ethnicity, or autonomy, and a few see the story as immoral and the two lovers as sinners, others consider it one of America’s great short stories. One writes that Calixta and Alcée reach out impulsively “for what they want, what they need, what for them is life itself, their ‘birthright’–not selfishly, not unaware of the risks and costs, not with the intention of hurting anybody, but with a lust for life itself, with an e
