The Yellow Wallpaper By Charlotte Perkins Gilman

“The Yellow Wallpaper,” written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman in 1892, is a great example of early works pertaining to feminism and the disease of insanity. Charlotte Gilman’s own struggles as a woman, mother, and wife shine through in this short story capturing the haunting realism of a mental breakdown.The main character, much like Gilman herself, slips into bouts of depression after the birth of her child and is prescribed a ‘rest cure’ to relieve the young woman of her suffering. Any use of the mind or source of stimulus is strictly prohibited, including the narrator’s favorite hobby of writing. The woman’s husband, a physician, installs into his wife that the rest treatment is correct and will only due harm if not followed through. This type of treatment ultimately drives the woman insane, causing her to envision a woman crawling behind the yellow wallpaper of her room. Powerlessness and repression the main character is subject to creates an even more poignant message through the narrator’s mental breakdown. The ever present theme of subordination of women in “The Yellow Wallpaper” is advanced throughout the story by the literary devices of symbolism, imagery, and allegory.

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

To begin, Gilman reveals very early on in the short story that the main character, Jane suffers from a mental illness that her husband john, who is also her physician fails to acknowledge is real. John along with other men in Janes family downplay her depression by attempting to convince her that she is not

Charlotte Perkins Gilman was born in 1860, in the city of Hartford, CT. She would later move to California. She would end her own life in 1935, after she was diagnosed with breast cancer. She fought for women’s rights and was an advocate of socialism. She wrote novels, poetry and short stories. She was a woman who was educated; her writing reflected her knowledge, relating to her strong thoughts on woman’s rights and independence and how women of Victorian times suffered from this lack of rights. In her short story “The Yellow Wallpaper”, Charlotte Perkins Gilman conveys her views on feminism and how women are treated through characters who represent this treatment. The characters she uses help the reader really get drawn into her story;

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 Yellow Wallpaper” written by Charlotte Gilman is a chilling portrayal of a woman’s downward spiral towards madness after undergoing treatment for postpartum depression in the 1800’s. The narrator, whose name remains nameless, represents the hundreds of middle to upper- class women who were diagnosed with “hysteria” and prescribed a “rest” treatment. Although Gilman’s story was a heroic attempt to “save people from being driven crazy” (Gilman p 1) by this type of “cure” it was much more. “The Yellow Wallpaper” opened the eyes of many to the apparent oppression of women in the 1800’s and “possibly the only way they could (unconsciously) resist or protest their traditional ‘feminine’

The yellow wallpaper is the most obvious symbol in this story. This symbolizes the protagonist 's mind named Jane during the 19th century. The yellow wallpaper symbolizes the way women were perceived. The yellow wallpaper includes models, angles and curves so that they contradict each other. we could say that these angles represents the identity of women during the 19th century. The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, is about the control and attacks the role of women in society. What is expected of women of the 19th century is to have children, take care of the house and do only what the husband says. The man of this time have the privilege of having a good education, have their jobs and they make their own decisions. The

treats her like a child and just like a child she is kept in this

Approximately 8-12% of new mother’s experience post-partum depression, which is showcased in The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Subsequently, this often led to treatments which were really not treatments at all, like the rest cure and confinement in general. In Gilman’s short story, we experience the consequences of the rest cure, confinement, and the general idea that a woman’s husband knew best. The narrator goes on a very dark and twisted journey throughout the story, based on being relocated for the summer by her husband, John. Despite the fact that the physical journey she experiences is supposed to better her mental health, the isolation she feels, the fact that her husband was never around and did not take her seriously, and finally because of the negative feelings that she harbours towards the bedroom chosen for her, it actually aids the path she forges into madness.

Charlotte Perkins Gilman 's career as a leading feminists and social activist translated into her writing as did her personal life. Gilman 's treatment for her severe depression and feelings of confinement in her marriage were paralleled by the narrator in her shorty story, "The Yellow Wallpaper".

Given Gilman’s personal history and that “The Yellow Wallpaper” is a sort of autobiography of the author’s own struggles after childbirth, the story serves as a representation of what Gilman would have become, mental unstable, that is, if she did not take her health into her own

Throughout literary history, there have been prominent fictional and nonfictional narratives that not only concentrate on various cultures, but also allow the writer to critique societal issues that cause one or more of these cultures to come into conflict with one another. Regardless of race, creed or any other defining factor, these issues allow readers to experience different cultures firsthand and, at the same time, better understand what it means to be human. Over the course of this essay, I intend to analyze the societal issues critiqued in Charlotte Perkins Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper" while simultaneously attempting to prove that Gilman uses her writing to protest the oppression against women in a patriarchal social system. The patriarchal

The story “The Yellow Wallpaper” was written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman in 1891. Gilman chose the first person narrator who slowly slides to insanity as a way to protest the men’s and medical harassment against women at the time. Women’s depression considered as hysteria and popular treatment for it was a “rest cure”. Gilman was also under this treatment, when she fell into depression after giving birth to her child. This treatment drove her almost to insanity, but she found a way out of this situation, she divorced her husband, stopped “rest cure” treatment and wrote “The Yellow Wallpaper”. She was raising her voice to describe all problematic conditions of women who were struggling with depression. Narrator point of view plays a significant role in the story because it reveals suppression against women in the men-dominated society that can lead to a tragedy and fall of society as whole.

with a rest cure. The doctor in the story is much like the doctor that