The Yellow Wallpaper Analysis

Charlotte Perkins Gilman uses her short story “The Yellow Wall-Paper” to show how women undergo oppression by gender roles. Gilman does so by taking the reader through the terrors of one woman’s changes in mental state. The narrator in this story becomes so oppressed by her husband that she actually goes insane. The act of oppression is very obvious within the story “The Yellow Wall-Paper” and shows how it changes one’s life forever.

Mental illness plays a central role in Charlotte Perkins Gilman's renowned short story "The Yellow Wallpaper. " The story follows a nameless female narrator who is struggling with a nervous condition and is prescribed by her doctor husband to take a rest cure in a secluded country house. As the protagonist descends further into madness, the wallpaper in her room becomes a manifestation of her deteriorating mental state. From the very beginning of the story, the protagonist's mental state is highlighted through her descriptions of her surroundings and her reflections on her own condition. She observes the oppressive nature of the yellow wallpaper in the room where she is confined, noting how its pattern seems to shift and change in an unsettling manner.

How does the short story, “The Yellow Wallpaper”, by Gilman utilize symbolism in order to strongly develop a central theme? Every aspect of writing assists us as readers to further grasp the understand of a central theme as the writing comes together as one. Without the assistance of symbolism, it would have been strenuous to uncover the true meaning behind the short story, considering we would have no true appreciation for what certain aspects within the story signify. As readers, we could have easily viewed the yellow wallpaper for what it is; a simple decorative aspect within the room. Since we were able to get into the woman’s mind and we know how she viewed it, we know this isn’t true. In the short story “The Yellow Wallpaper”, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, symbolism can be seen within the woman’s husband, and within the yellow wallpaper since it symbolizes many aspects, such as the woman’s hysteria heightening into a toxic take-over of her mind, it represents how she’s trapped within her own life, and the violent imagery shows how the woman has become suicidal; allowing us to comprehend how women were stripped of expressing their feelings during the nineteenth century.

As I started reading this short story, it clearly introduced who the characters are and where it took place. The narrator is a woman; she has no name, remains anonymous throughout the story. She lives with her husband John in a house. This house is isolated from society, since the short story indicates that it is far from village, roads or any means of communication. It also contains locks and gates throughout. The woman is ill and this illness has placed her in a weak position with her husband and everything around her. We know that she likes to write, but her husband doesn’t let her, so she does it in secret. Although this type of writing is mainly to show mild personality disorder in dealing with life,

She was curious about the yellow wallpaper and believes that there is something behind the yellow wallpaper, which she is eager to know. She also writes what’s on her mind to relieve her nervous tension but she hides it when John and his sister are around. Each day that passes by, she stripped the pattern of the yellow wallpaper to make it clearer for her. John and his sister did not believe her about the yellow wallpaper. She noticed that there is something behind it aside from the paper, which is the smell that creeps all over the house.

Isolated and deprived of any creative or intellectual stimulation, your mind finds an outlet in the wallpaper. As his mental state deteriorates, the role becomes an obsession; She begins to see in him a representation of her own situation, trapped and unable to express herself. The story can also be interpreted as a criticism of the medical practices of the time, especially the treatment of hysteria and other female psychological conditions, which were often misunderstood and handled in counterproductive ways. The narrator is forced to undergo the “rest cure,” which ignores her true needs and pushes her further toward the edge of madness. The yellow wallpaper, with its confusing and frustrating patterns, symbolizes the complex web of society, gender expectations, and personal restrictions that imprison the narrator.

Underneath The Wallpaper Written in journal form, the author uses symbolism to paint a vivid picture of the character’s marriage, the social perception of women, and an inadequacy of understanding within field of psychology. The dialogue of “The Yellow Wall-Paper” is taken from the context of the main characters journal. The main character shares her inner thoughts and perceptions to give the reader insight to her reality and deterioration of her mental condition. The yellow wall- paper encountered by the main character serves many symbolism functions to the author and is subject to interpretation by the reader. The main character perceives her husband John and herself as ordinary.

She started looking at the room as if it was a mental prison and there were no escape “There are things in the wallpaper that nobody knows but me, or ever will. Behind that outside pattern the dim shapes get clearer every day. It is always the same shape only very numerous. And it is like a woman stooping down and creeping about behind that pattern. I don’t like it a bit. I wonder- I begin to think- I wish John would take me away from here!” (Schilb and Clifford 238). The author began seeing an image in the wallpaper of a woman trying to escape from the wallpaper and be free “The front pattern does move- and no wonder! The woman behind shakes it!” (Schilb and Clifford 241). The quotes are showing that the narrator has completely lost her mind as she is unstable mentally to realize what real or not. Another quote shows how stable her conditions are “I’m feeling ever so much better! I don’t sleep much at night, for it is so interesting to watch developments (Schilb and Clifford 240). This is psychologically unhealthy for the protagonist, showing how she went from being a well stable lady to an insane

Throughout Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story, “The Yellow Wallpaper”, the author displays the destructive outcomes of isolation, inequality, and limitations. Following childbirth and being committed to an imbalanced marriage, Gilman experienced a period of severe depression and was prescribed the rest-cure, complete bed rest and reduced intellectual activity, which stands as the basis for her short story. Due to the author’s personal experiences, she published “The Yellow Wallpaper” in 1899 to prevent other members of society from being driven to the verge of insanity and to demonstrate the kind of madness produced by the popular rest-cure. Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s work exhibits the inequitable social status of women in the nineteenth

Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper,” and Jamaica Kincaid’s “Girl,” both tell us that some women have a lack of independence because of being told what to do, having limitations put on their abilities, and having a family member being an authoritarian figure in their life. Both stories are very similar when discussing the lack of independence that women may have. Women are always being belittled or controlled somewhere.

The word mental illness implies different things to various individuals, yet collectively, our society’s thoughts come down to what can be bluntly put as "shun it". Charlotte Perkins Gilman, however, addresses this perception with a different approach through her short story. It revolves around the narrator, who is diagnosed with temporary nervous depression and is consequently prescribed a treatment that forbids her from doing the one thing she could do all day – write, but instead spend all her time imprisoned in a room with a disturbing wallpaper. Gilman gathered inspiration from a personal encounter with a similar mental illness due to which he was prescribed rest cure, which she found very ineffective (Gilman 669). Similar to some of today’s psychiatric hospitals’ treatment methods, Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper” depicts the society’s undeveloped negative approach towards psychological sickness.

In brief, the narrator’s depression ultimately drives her to insanity, as she tries to cope in a secluded environment. Furthermore, “The Yellow Wallpaper” is primarily based off of the author’s own encounters with depression and the resting treatment. Gilman condemns the rest cure and the harmful treatment of the women by physicians, most of which were men. She describes how the narrator gradually becomes insane, “I always lock the door when I creep by daylight. I can’t do it at night, for I know John would suspect something at once” (Gilman 245). The narrator’s creeping is a sign of her lack of mental stability. In fact, Gilman is not the only female author to write about the rest cure and its impact. Other authors include Virginia Woolf and Jane Addams (Stiles par. 13). This rest cure has become a debatable solution for people who are constantly struggling with depression.

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

“The Yellow Wallpaper” a short story about a mentally ill women,written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman at age 32, in 1892 is a story with a hidden meaning and many truths. Charlotte Perkins Gilman coincidentally also had a mental illness and developed cancer leading her to kill herself in the sixties. The story begins with Jane, the mentally ill woman who feels a bit distressed, and although both of the well respected men in her life are physicians she is put simply on a “rest cure”. This rest cure as well as many symbols such as the Yellow Wallpaper, her journal, and her inevitable breakdown are prime examples of the typical life of a woman in this time period and their suppressed lives that they lived even with something as serious as a

Through a woman's perspective of assumed insanity, Charlotte Perkins Gilman comments on the role of the female in the late nineteenth century society in relation to her male counterpart in her short story "The Yellow Wallpaper." Gilman uses her own experience with mental instability to show the lack of power that women wielded in shaping the course of their psychological treatment. Further she uses vivid and horrific imagery to draw on the imagination of the reader to conceive the terrors within the mind of the psychologically wounded.