The Yellow Wallpaper: A Short Story

Berenji, Fahimeh Q. "Time and Gender in Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wall-Paper” and Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour”." Journal of History Culture and Art Research, vol. 2, no. 2, 1 Jan. 2013, pp. 221-234, Database: MLA International Bibliography -- Publications. kutaksam.karabuk.edu.tr/index.php. Accessed 18 Nov. 2017.

“The Yellow Wallpaper”, written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, is a first-person narration of madness experienced by an unnamed woman in the Victorian era. The madness is exposed through a “nervous condition” diagnosed by the writer’s husband, a physician, who believes the only cure is prohibiting all intellectual thought and to remain in solitude for a “rest-cure”. The act of confinement propels the narrator into an internal spiral of defiance against patriarchal discourse. Through characterization and symbolism, “The Yellow Wallpaper” exhibits an inventive parallel between the narrator’s mental deterioration and her internal struggle to break free from female oppression imposed on her through her husband and society.

Whether a story is fictional or not there’s a significance to the author or anything that could relate to today’s society of life, back in time, or it’s a story written to entertain the reader. Some authors write stories to tell the reader how one must look deeper into their story to be able to interpret their story to fully comprehend and to realize how the author is trying to make a point. After reading “The Yellow Wallpaper” the reader could stat that it is a fictional story that is somehow linked to the author’s life, and how women were treated back then. Simply reading the title, “The Yellow Wallpaper” one could say that it does not seem like if it’s going to tell readers about an

Perkins Gilman’s ‘The Yellow Wallpaper’ and Edgar Allen Poe’s ‘The Fall of The House of Usher’ both serve a highly horrific purpose which is both good examples for the gothic. The strongest example of gothic is ‘The Fall of The House of Usher’ as it established the extreme horror intense and shows the gothic scene of the house.

“The Yellow Wallpaper”, written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, shows the slow progression of madness from the point of view of the person who is going mad. Our narrator, unnamed, but possibly named Jane, says she is sick, as does her doctor and husband, John. This short story can be interpreted in many different ways, but mainly focuses on the oppression of women in the late 1800’s. This woman who is seemly mad journeys through “hell” as she slides deeper into the confines of madness.

In the story, The Yellow Wallpaper the author Charlotte Perkins Gilman brings to life the tale of a woman suffering from post partem depression. Her husband is a physician and makes the mistake of keeping her closed off from the world. (John) thinks that the right thing to do is to keep her alone in an unfamiliar room. In this room, there is a bed that is nailed down to the floor and a yellow wallpaper that at first, she despises. However, she eventually becomes obsessed with it and goes completely insane. How can she differentiate between what is real and what is not? It mostly comes down to her amount of freedom and self-expression. The mental strains placed on the narrator are ultimately what drives her to the point of insanity.

In the “Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, there are many of literary techniques that illustrates the theme to express the story. Irony, imagery and symbolism are some literary devices that is presented among the story.  “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 acceptance and how she struggles to express her own thoughts and feelings. The story appears to take place during a time where women were oppressed. Women were treated as if they were under one’s thumb in society during this period which is approximately the 19th century.

In “The Yellow Wallpaper,” written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the idea of “true womanhood” is challenged. The white woman portrayed in the story is prescribed what is known as the “rest cure” due to the overwhelming pressure of being the perfect woman, wife, and mother. Driven mad by the smothering of her husband and her inability to do anything for herself, the woman in this story goes crazy attempting to free herself from the constraints. In stark contrast to the woman in “The Yellow Wallpaper,” Sojourner Truth, a former slave, delivers a speech titled, “Ain’t I a Woman,” in 1851 that shakes people to their very core. A little before “The Yellow Wallpaper” was released, Truth shares a message that is astoundingly different from the

Tyler Stollings Mrs. Klueh ENGL 102 August 29, 2014 The Yellow Wallpaper Theme: Fear and depression I. Jane and her husband went to stay at ancestral halls over their Summer break. A. In Jane’s opinion the house looked like it was haunted. B. The whole time that the couple had spent there, Jane felt as if there was something different/creepy about the home.

My perspective of Gilman’s short story, "The Yellow Wall-Paper" is influenced by a great number of different and diverse methods of reading. However, one cannot overlook the feminist theorists’ on this story, for the story is often proclaimed to be a founding work of feminism. Further, the historical and biographical contexts the story was written in can be enlightened by mentioning Gilman’s relationship with S. Weir Mitchell. And I can’t help but read the story and think of Foucault’s concept of Panopticism as a method of social control. Lastly, of course, there’s the psychological perspective on the story, although in my readings of psychology, particularly the psychological knowledge surrounding both women and queers, I find the

“The Yellow Wallpaper” is a 6,000 word short story written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. This story first appeared in The New England Magazine in January 1892 and became a classic in the realm of gothic literature. Although this story does provide information regarding feminism, the ghostly horror prevails itself throughout this story. Gilman’s story depicts elements that definitely link it to the Gothic genre. Not only does “The Yellow Wallpaper” contain haunting features in the character’s life, but also provides its own twist of a ghost story.

The women in William Faulkner’s A Rose for Emily and Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s The Yellow Wallpaper are troubled protagonists that have been neglected, isolated, and pushed to the point of insanity. There are many contributing factors to their decent into psychosis. Both women have lost their ability to function in society due to their obsessive behavior and the controlling men in their lives. Although both stories have similarities, there are also differences in their paths that have led to their mental breakdowns. During the Victorian era, women were considered weak and emotional.

In a classic piece of feminist writing, “The Yellow Wallpaper,” Charlotte Perkins Gilman depicts the mental deterioration of a woman diagnosed with hysteria and prescribed the rest cure, an infamously ineffective treatment for anxiety and depression pioneered by Dr. Silas Weir Mitchell at the turn of the nineteenth century. The story is framed as the narrator’s journal entries, which are infrequent and rushed because writing them violates the rest cure, thus making her writings a better representative of her descent into madness as well as her potent emotions regarding her confinement than had she written one for every day of her three month stay in the room with the repellant and titular yellow wallpaper. Gilman expresses the narrator’s societally mandated respect for her husband in addition to her resentment of the inferior treatment of women through her formal and impassioned tone and virulent imagery in reference to the setting in her 1892 short story, “The Yellow Wallpaper.”

Throughout history and cultures today, women have been beaten, verbally abused, and taught to believe they have no purpose in life other than pleasing a man. Charlotte Perkins Gillam uses her short story, "The Yellow Wallpaper" as a weapon to help break down the walls surrounding women, society has put up. This story depicts the life of a young woman struggling with postpartum depression, whose serious illness is overlooked, by her physician husband, because of her gender. Gillman 's writing expresses the feelings of isolation, disregarded, and unworthiness the main character Jane feels regularly. This analysis will dive into the daily struggles women face through oppression, neglect, and physical distinction; by investigating each section

First published in 1982, The yellow wallpaper is an engaging narrative , written in first person in which the narrator suffers from some type of nervous disorder . Her husband who prefers to refer to her condition as a temporary nervous depression or a slight hysterical tendency recommends that the narrator seeks solitude so as to recuperate . The short story mimics the form of secret and private entries on journals by the author. The haunting short story chronicles that descent of the narrator and protagonist into maddened and paranormal activities. Some people however interpret it as her chronicles to freedom .The author effectively employs the use of literary