Imagine being waited on hand and foot in a mansion, yet removed from society, your own baby and any work that arouses your mind. Such is the life of the wife in Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s The Yellow Wallpaper, whose husband diagnoses her with a temporary nervous depression and leaves her to his improper care which includes isolation, lots of medication and a strict suspension of mental stimulation. The short story reflects the excessive power of men over their wives during the nineteenth century, while challenging the patriarchal conditions in unconventional manners. Despite her husband’s positive intentions, his remedies become the conditions that drive her completely insane. Despite the irrationality of the narrator’s insanity to others, …show more content…
The narrator’s pursuit of finding a conclusion to the pattern is very significant because it is symbolic of her wanting to figure out the purpose and meaning of her own life. When she quotes, “You think you have mastered it, but just as you get well underway in following, it turns a back-somersault and there you are. It slaps you in the face, knocks you down, and tramples upon you”, I interpret her to not only be describing the difficulty of figuring out the pattern in front of her, but also the difficulty of figuring out how to escape the oppressive patterns of her own life and the mental illness that keeps her locked down in bed. During this time, the narrator also reflects on memories as a child when her imagination provided her safety and a sense of refuge in the “one chair that always seemed like a strong friend” (pg. 103). Though the narrator may not have known her husband during the time of the memory, Gillman uses this flashback to confirm that the narrator’s misunderstood imagination has always empowered and benefitted her in some way. Therefore, if John forbids her to take part in any stimulating tasks, including creative writing, she will become weaker over time. That is exactly what proceeds to happen in the story. This compels his wife to take up a competitive obsession with the wallpaper.
It was commonly casted that women during the 19th century were not to go beyond their domestic spheres. If a woman were to go beyond the norms and partake in a “male” activity and not assign to “womanly” duties, it were to take an ill effect on her, because she was designed to act merely as a mother, wife, and homemaker. The short story “The Yellow Wallpaper”, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, demonstrates the status of women in the 19th century within society, revealing that madness in this story stems from the oppressive control of gender on woman. A woman who is trying to escape from confinement may result in madness. The use of madness characterizes women as victims of society, suffering the effects of isolation brought on by oppression driving
An anonymous author once said, “What consumes your mind, controls your life.” In the story, “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the narrator is suffering from severe depression, at the very least and constantly tries to get better. While trying to get better she becomes increasingly fixated on the yellow wallpaper that encompasses her in her room. It gets to the point where the wallpaper is all she thinks about and slowly, it starts to control her life. The yellow wallpaper in this story is a representation of the narrator’s relationship with her disease.
In Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s story, The Yellow Wallpaper, the setting is very symbolic when analyzing the different the meanings of this book. The main character in the story is sick with nervous depression. In the story, John, her husband, and also a physician, takes his wife to a house in the middle of the summer and confines her to one room in hopes of perfect rest for her. As the story progresses, it is made clear that confinement, sanity, insanity, and freedom are all tied together and used to make the setting of the story symbolic.
In the 1950’s, women weren’t respected for doing anything besides being an outstanding wife and mother. Women and men weren’t on the same level when it came to rights in the eyes of the law. Also during this time, mental illnesses were not accurately researched, and since doctors weren’t fully aware of all the information about mental illnesses, patients did not always get the best treatment and were treated as freaks. In the short story “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, both of these elements are present. Gilman did a wonderful job portraying how women are not taken seriously and how lightly mental illnesses are taken. Gilman had, too, had firsthand experience with the physician in the story. Charlotte Perkins Gilman 's believes that there really was no difference in means of way of thinking between men or women is strongly. “The Yellow Wallpaper” is a short story about a woman who has a mental illness but cannot heal due to her husband 's lack of belief. The story appears to happen during a time period where women were mistreated. Women were treated as second rate people in community during this time period. Charlotte Perkins Gilman shows the thought process of the community during the time period in which “The Yellow Wallpaper” is written. Using knowledge on equal rights between women and men, one can carefully study “The Yellow Wallpaper” by
In Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story “The Yellow Wallpaper,” she discusses some of the issues found in 19th century society such as women’s oppression and the treatment of mental illness. Many authors throughout history have written stories that mimic their own lives and we see this in the story. We see Gilman in the story portrayed as Jane, a mentally unstable housewife who cannot escape her husband’s oppression or her own mind. Gilman reveals a life of depression and women’s oppression through her short story “The Yellow Wallpaper.”
Written in 1892, Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story “The Yellow Wallpaper” tells the experience of a nervous woman named Jane who falls into psychosis during the “rest cure” treatment prescribed by her husband John. The rest cure admits the patient to bed rest with limited activity for the body and mind allowed; Dr. S. Weir Mitchell advocated the rest cure and is mentioned by name in the short story by Gilman who had him as her doctor (Gilman 80). During Jane’s rest cure, she is banned from creative work like writing her thoughts but finds “great relief from writing on dead paper”, even if it includes hiding her banned writings from being discovered. The one main complaint Jane has in her writings is the yellow wallpaper that surrounds the room without pattern or end and slowly grows more bothersome to Jane during her rest cure. Jane describes how the colors remind her of disgusting yellow things, how even the wallpaper smells up the rental house, and shakes by a woman within the wallpaper (Gilman 85-86). With nothing to occupy Jane’s mind the wallpaper becomes an obsession that torments her anxiety and consumes her sanity towards the end of her rest cure. Gilman experiences the same madness from her rest cure treatment as Jane in “The Yellow Wallpaper”. The horrid treatment of “rest cure” from doctor Silas Weir Mitchell led author Charlotte Perkins Gilman into writing “The Yellow Wallpaper,” sharing her experience of madness resulting from her treatment to represent the
The narrator’s insanity does not unravel overnight. She is just an ordinary woman who suffers from depression. Her
In Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s brilliant work, The Yellow Wallpaper, readers explore the consequences of the ignorance of mental health, as well Gilman’s underlying message of the restriction of women, in nineteenth century America. The author of this story doesn’t want readers to focus on the progression of the woman when realizing her real situation, but in my opinion, how Gilman comments with this piece of fiction to the real oppression of women, and lack of weight Medicine held on the patient 's opinions in Charlotte’s society.
The constant act of avoiding the worth women have in society spirals down to the core fact how women are envisioned inferior to men. In The Ways We Lie by Stephanie Ericsson, the simple declaration, “We lie. We all do. We exaggerate, we minimize, we avoid confrontation, we spare people’s feelings, we conveniently forget, we keep secrets, we justify lying to the big-guy’s institutions.” Depicts how far lies have come to fit in the spectrum of society, which has inevitably caused women to lose their voice in established lies – mistaken as truths – into thinking that the unfair treatment they receive is what they deserve.
In "The Yellow Wallpaper," Charlotte Perkins Gilman tells a psychological horror story depicting the narrator's descent into madness while struggling to recover from an episode of depression.
She begins to fixate on the yellow wallpaper that coats the walls of their room. She hates this wallpaper, specifically stating, “I never saw a worse paper in my life” (Gilman, 1892). However, over time she slowly begins to see herself in the wallpaper. She is living a life where she feels trapped; something is wrong with her and every time she tries to talk to her husband about it he tells her it is all in her head. She wants to get out, she wants to feel better, but her thoughts begin to take her into a deep downward spiral. She believes she is the one stuck behind the wallpaper and that those around her put her back in every night, “I’ve got out at last, said I, in spite of you and Jane! And I’ve pulled off most of the paper, so you can’t put me back!” (Gilman, 1892). Her husband faints because at last he finally sees just how sick his wife really is (Gilman,
Through given belittling comments, often disguised as cute nick-names, John was able to settle any doubts, yet maintain his suppression over her. Such examples are “Bless her little heart! She shall be as sick as she pleases! And talk about it in the morning!” Unfortunately, because she was so depressed and vulnerable John was easily able to dominate and suppress her. Also, throughout the story John would commonly mistake her kindness for weakness and in coalition, abuse her trust.
treats her like a child and just like a child she is kept in this
She would write about everything that happened not to read it later but so she was more relaxed and could think a little clearer with whatever she wrote not in her mind. The whole story is her journal and she writes mostly about the wallpaper and how her husband is always gone. This journal idea is essential because we know what she is thinking and that really helps understand the story and her character better. Also, in order for her to forget about her surroundings she studies the wallpaper. This method, not unlike her husbands, just shows that she is avoiding the problem as well. She spends hours on end following the pattern of the wallpaper. The curves and patterns that go along it mystify her. This is avoidance from the obstacle at hand and she doesn't deal with them directly sometimes. However, unlike John, she always wanted to talk about her condition and other problems that they had. Her problem was when he just avoided the problem she just let it be when she should have persisted. Also, if she has an obstacle to get around, she focuses on that obstacle until she can clear it. This is shown with the lady in the wallpaper. All she thought about was the lady and how she could get her free from the wallpaper. She spent days plotting how to do so. And she persisted on it until the task at hand was completed. So although she has some traits that are the same as John's when dealing with obstacles, she also has some
with a rest cure. The doctor in the story is much like the doctor that