The Revolt Of Mother, A High Toned Old Christian Woman

Throughout the history of American Literature there has been a common theme of male oppression. Especially towards the end of the 19th century, before the first wave of feminism, women were faced with an unshakeable social prison. Husband, home and children were the only life they knew, many encouraged not to work. That being said, many female writers at the time, including Emily Dickinson and Charlotte Perkins Gilman, were determined to examine the mind behind the American woman, through the lens of mental illness and personal experience.

Traditionally, men have held the power in society. Women have been treated as a second class of citizens with neither the legal rights nor the respect of their male counterparts. Culture has contributed to these gender roles by conditioning women to accept their subordinate status while encouraging young men to lead and control. Feminist criticism contends that literature either supports society’s patriarchal structure or provides social criticism in order to change this hierarchy. “The Yellow Wallpaper”, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, depicts one women’s struggle against the traditional female role into which society attempts to force her and the societal reaction

During the late 19th century woman’s role in society was very scarce. They could only speak if spoken too and of course did not have the right to vote. Women were seen more as property and were merely useless if they could not have children. This time period’s society was male dominated. Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wall-paper” strongly argues the theme of patriarchal control while in a authentic sense defines a feminist critique of the role of women.

Towards the end of the 1800s and into the beginning of the 1900s, the roles of women in society and in the family began to change drastically compared to what it had been in the past. Women were now allowed to own land, vote, and do more than cook and clean. Willa Cather and William Faulkner portray the roles of women in the early 1900s in their short stories, “Neighbor Rosicky” and “A Rose for Emily.” These short stories were both published around the year 1930. Because of what was happening in the US at the time, these stories are very good examples of the ways women were treated at this time.

Ever since the days of World War I, women have been seen as second rate to men. They had to live up to many social standards that men didn’t have to and had strict guidelines on how to live their lives. This all changed when modernism deliberately tried to break away from Victorian Era standards in which women were subjugated to a lot more scrutiny. Ezra Pound, who was a large figure in the modernist movement, captured the spirit of the era in his famous line “Make it new!” Consequently, many writers started to experiment with many different and wild writing styles, which led to the short stories and poems we have today. The stories The Wife of His Youth and Mrs. Spring Fragrance were all written in this era of modernism. While they are written in a more traditional style of writing, both these stories have strong implications on feminism from the viewpoints of both male and female writers.

The life of a lady in the 19th century is painted in a romantic light. Pictured in her parlor, the lady sips tea from delicate china while writing letters with a white feathered quill. Her maid stands silently off in the background, waiting for orders to serve her mistress. What is not typically pictured, is the sadness or boredom echoed on the lady’s face. Perhaps the letter is to a dear friend, not seen in ages, pleading with the friend to visit, in hopes that the friend will fill the void in the lady’s life made from years spent in a loveless marriage; or possiblyk20 the lady isn’t writing a letter at all, but a novel or a poem, never to be read by anyone but her. Edith Warton and Charlotte Perkins Gilman, are 19th Century ladies who dare to share their writing with the world. Through their works, the darker side of a woman’s life in the late 1800’s is exposed. Gender politics in the 19th dictates that a lady is dependent on her husband for her financial security and social standing; that is if she is fortunate enough to marry at all. In Edith Warton’s The House of Mirth, Lily Bart is a beautiful woman in her late 20’s, who fails to marry a wealthy man. The narrator in Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s The Yellow Wallpaper slowly goes insane under her physician husbands misguided attempts to cure her of depression. The downfall of Lily Bart and the narrator of The Yellow Wallpaper is

Two-hundred years is a sizeable gap of time that allows plenty of room for change. American society had been rapidly changing from the early seventeenth century to the late nineteenth century, but despite this, the roles and rights of women have remained locked in place. There were many factors to consider as to why women were not allowed to flourish in their time and exceed these boundaries, and while some accepted it, there were many that opposed and faced these difficulties head on. Two female authors, one from colonial times, and one from nineteenth century America, have written about the obstacles and misogyny they’ve overcome in a male dominated literary career. Despite the two-hundred-year gap between the lives of Margaret Fuller and Anne Bradstreet, they both face issues regarding the static stereotype that women are literarily inferior and subservient handmaids to men.

The time period between the late 1800s and early 1900s was a ground for many crucial changes for women and how they were viewed and treated. The right to their children, property, and earnings was granted to them during this time period ("Women Suffrage in the Progressive Era - American Memory Timeline- Classroom Presentation | Teacher Resources - Library of Congress"). Many women, no matter what their occupation might have been, supported this movement ("Women Suffrage in the Progressive Era - American Memory Timeline- Classroom Presentation | Teacher Resources - Library of Congress"). Female Writers were extremely proactive when it came to clearly displaying the mistreatment that women endured while society viewed it as right. One writer in particular, Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, published a short story the displayed the injustice in the treatment. “The Revolt of Mother” clearly displays the repression of women in a society much like the one we live in today, and the story leaves the reader with an essential lesson of standing up for one’s self. This piece of work is heavily influenced by the oppression Freedom faced during her life time.

Topics of great social impact have been dealt with in many different ways and in many different mediums. Beginning with the first women’s movement in the 1850’s, the role of women in society has been constantly written about, protested, and debated. Two women writers who have had the most impact in the on-going women’s movement are Kate Chopin and Charlotte Perkins Gilman. The Awakening and The Yellow Wallpaper are two of feminist literature’s cornerstones and have become prolific parts of American literature. Themes of entrapment by social dictates, circumstance, and the desire for personal independence reside within each work and bond the two together.

The story “Revolt of Mother,” by Mary E. Wilkins depicts a woman (Sarah Penn) who is constantly exempt by her husband (Adonriam Penn) in taking part in important decisions until her frustration reached a breaking point, which ultimately leads to drastic changes in their family. In contrast a similar conflict arises in the movie Sleeping With the Enemy (1991), which was directed by Joseph Ruben. In the movie the main character, Laura Burney, had everything her heart desired. On the surface she had a beautiful house, a successful husband, and any material item she could ever want. However below the surface she was really married to a possessive as well as a physically abusive husband who made all the impressive luxuries she had seem

Since ancient times, women have had to live under men’s shadow. Nonetheless, it has been until the mid-20th century when women started getting out of that shadow. However, women have always tried to jump and step out of the darkness where a chauvinist society had them hidden. Moreover, Charlotte Perkins Gilman in the story “The Yellow Wallpaper,” and Susan Glaspell with her play Trifles were two of many women who tried to overcome society and show what women are capable of. In their works, they explore the role that women played in society at that time, also try to demonstrate that marriage is not but an instrument used to limit women’s power, making use of symbols throughout their works.

Charlotte Perkins Gillman was one of America’s first prominent feminist. Gillman used her literature to speak on and bring awareness to the flaws in a mainstream, orthodox society, more specifically the role and treatment of women. Born in 1860, Gilman’s work made her a controversial figure whose literature was ahead of its time. Gilman’s unorthodox ideals were embedded in her psyche from an early age. Her father abandoned her family and left them poor and distraught. Livings isolated, impoverish, and hardly ever loved; Gilman found an escape in literature, which influenced her interests in writing. Her troubled childhood shaped her unorthodox views of a writer. Although Gilman has a plethora of works, they all speak on women’s struggles with male centric thinking and societal norms. Gilman uses her own life experiences to bring attention to the restrictive lifestyles of women in her quasi-autobiographical short story “The Yellow Wallpaper.” Gilman’s use of characters, symbols, and the narrators own insecurities and frustrations cleverly demonstrate the struggles for women during that time.

In comparing the three authors and the literary works of women authors Kate Chopin (1850 -1904), The Awakening, Charlotte Perkins Gilman's (1860-1935), The Yellow Wallpaper, and Edith Wharton's (1862-1937) Souls Belated, a good number common social issues related to women are brought to light and though subtly pointed out are an outcry against the conventions of the time. In these three stories, which were written between 1899 and 1913, the era was a time in which it seems, that women had finally awaken to realize their social oppression and were becoming rebellious in their pursuit of freedom from

Even in the 21st century, there is still a lingering idea that women strictly belong in the home. This can be attributed to both the continuous, though evolved, embrace of the Cult of Domesticity and natural law. In the eighteenth century the Cult of Domesticity was embraced and challenged by many women, as it is today. “The Revolt of Mother” by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman is a literary example that reinforces the idea of the Cult of Domesticity by showing the reader the boundaries between genders and the power, however limited, that a woman has. In contrast, Kate Chopin’s “The Story of An Hour”, shows the constraints that gender roles put on a woman. Chopin’s story challenges the Cult of Domesticity by using the character’s internal dialogue to show that this was not the life she pictured. The Cult of Domesticity can be tied to other themes, such as the burden of motherhood, as in “I Stand Here Ironing” by Tillie Olsen. The home and the children were all under control of the woman of the house, and though it sometimes feels like a burden, it is the woman’s obligation. Olsen did not fully accept nor fully condemn the Cult of Domesticity; she simply presented it as the way of life. By using the main character’s internal monologues and their actions to control, or not control, their domains, each of these authors presents their view on the Cult of Domesticity.

Oladapo Ebenezer ENG 4U1 Ms. Cali April 21th 2015 Yellow Wallpaper Critical Analysis The feminist theory is an ougrowth of the general movement to empower women world wide. Likewise to the feminist theory the short story “Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perems Gillmarn exposes the mental state of women in the late 1800s, and perharps even of the author's own struggle with society run by men. Additionally, the three main areas of study and points of criticism in the feminist theory, likewise to the short story exist through, the diffrences between men and women, power dynamics between men and women and the female experience.