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Doctor Mandelet is an elderly family friend of the Pontelliers whose age and experience has granted him a wealth of understanding of human nature. Just as he no longer devotes time to curing illnesses, his role in the novel is as someone who can recognize interpersonal crises, but does not and cannot fix them. He is thus able to identify that Edna wants more freedom in her marriage and counsels Mr. Pontellier to give her space. He also tells Edna a cautionary tale about a woman who grows bored with her lover, a push in what he believes is the right direction, but does not make a serious attempt to change Edna’s mind. Instead, he offers her sympathy and an open ear. Edna ultimately opts not to tell him her woes, perhaps because she knows his response will be to counsel her back toward her husband, offering no real cure.
Doctor Mandelet’s diagnosis of Edna’s unhappiness demonstrates his deep understanding of how society works. He recognizes the artificiality of societal norms surrounding marriage. He believes the romanticization of marriage comes from the natural desire to reproduce, but ultimately, “Nature takes no account of moral consequences, of arbitrary conditions which we create, and which we feel obliged to maintain at any cost.” In other words, nature encourages people to marry when they’re young, but society forces people to stay married long after their feelings have dwindled. Although Doctor Mandelet understands this dissonance between nature and society, he appears to simply accept this as an unfortunate fact of life. He sees the problem, but can only note it, not fix it.
