Theme Of The Yellow Wallpaper

The forceful tone throughout the passage I chose, and story, shows that Gilman was forcefully trying to get her point across through the narrator of the story, that resting, and confinement were not the answers to curing mental health issues, such as postpartum depression, in the late nineteenth century, “Personally, I disagree with their ideas. Personally, I believe that congenial work, with excitement and change, would do me good. But what is one to do? I did write for a while in spite of them, but it does exhaust me a good deal- having to be so sly about it, or else meet with heavy opposition” (Gilman, P. 462). She is forceful. She does not agree with the ideas of rest and confinement as a cure. The narrator wants to be able to be free and live with the normal excitements of life. In addition, she states forcefully, that she writes in spite of her husband and brother. The narrator knows that writing helps her and wants the reader to know that she continues to do it anyways, because she knows that it is in the best interest of her health, to be able to clear her head, by writing down her

If she was free to express her feelings, she wouldn’t have had to shove them aside and try to find other things to occupy her mind with. She finds greatest comfort when she writes, but her husband believes that it is bad for her to do so because it is too stimulating. She makes comments many times expressing how writing makes her feel better, that it would “relieve the press of ideas and rest me” (349) and that she “must say

The essay, "Why I wrote the Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman was written primarily for the purpose of explaining the meaning and reasoning behind her semi-autobiographical short story, "The Yellow Wallpaper". Before stating these reasons, Gilman explains that she had been suffering from a "severe and continuous nervous breakdown tending to melancholia--and beyond" (Gilman, 1913). After three years of this torment, she decided to go see a specialist in nervous diseases. The doctor she went to was named Dr. S. Weir Mitchell. Dr. Mitchell advised Gilman to be put to bed and to apply the rest cure, along with living a domestic life with limited amount of intellectual interaction and to never "touch pen, brush, or pencil again" (Gilman, 1913). As intimidating as this sounded, Gilman took the advise of her doctor, and followed his every suggestion for about three months. She had reached a point of almost complete mental ruin at the end of these three months, that she had to cast aside the specialist's advice. Instead of following his instructions, she began to work again. Ultimately, this is when and where "The Yellow Wallpaper" was written.

Gilman states "I know a little of the principle of design, and I know this thing was not arranged on any law of radiation, or alternation, or repetition, or symmetry, or anything else that I ever heard of." This statement expresses the narrator's attempt to try to understand the limitations and instructions of the rest cure treatment, as well as her current situation. Thou despite her own best judgment and lack of comprehension of this treatment, she still attempts to adhere to the instructions of her husband. The narrator endured two weeks without writing a single word from the day they arrived at the mansion. The narrator's self-control emphasizes the significant amount of effort the narrator invested, and yet she goes on to say "John does not know how much I really suffer. He knows there is no reason to suffer, and that satisfies him." This statement illustrates her husband's lack of understanding of her condition. This knowledge confirmed to the audience that her doctor and husband had no actual comprehension of her health condition, nor her state. Furthermore, neither of these men were equipped with the knowledge to recommend any treatment plan or regimen. Therefore, it was no wonder the pattern of the yellow wallpaper, the narrator's cultural position, appeared to be so confusing and

In an article titled, “Why I Wrote The Yellow Wallpaper”, Gilman talks about her personal experience with the rest cure, also denouncing the diagnosis as a whole. “For many years I suffered from a severe and continuous nervous breakdown tending to melancholia--and beyond.”(Gilman). While this ailment would not be handled as heavily today, Gilman would actually be subject to the rest cure by Silas Weir Mitchel himself. Mitchel would tell Gilman to “live as domestic a life as far as possible”, “(to) have but two hours intellectual life a day”, and “never to touch pen, brush, or pencil again.” Like the fate of her stories protagonist, the treatment would almost drive Gilman

Charlotte Perkins Gilman wrote "The Yellow Wallpaper" after giving birth to her one and only child. Gilman centered her story around the depression she experienced soon after and the "rest cure" prescribed to her by Weir Mitchell. Gilman states that the purpose of writing "The Yellow Wallpaper" was "to reach Dr. S. Weir Mitchell, and convince him of the error of his ways" (Golden). What the author then labeled as "a slight hysterical tendency" (Gilman 1035), is now known as postpartum depression. In Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper", both doctors and society as a whole view and treat postpartum depression differently than today.

Kessler further explains that Dr. Mitchell’s treatment only made Gilman’s depression worse and that eventually "she ceased to follow his regimen" (158). The character she creates in "The Yellow Wallpaper" also fantasizes about ending her regimen saying, "I wish I could get well faster" (Gilman 81). Both seem to view the rest cure as an unwanted interruption in their lives. It should be no surprise then that Gilman draws from her own experience and Dr. Mitchell’s treatment. She even finds a way to incorporate him into the story as a kind of threat to the narrator. The narrator in the story is thinking about the reaction of her husband, who is also a doctor, to her slow convalescence, "if I don’t pick up faster he shall send me to Weir Mitchell in the fall" (Gilman 82).

Kessler further explains that Dr. Mitchell’s treatment only made Gilman’s depression worse and that eventually "she ceased to follow his regimen" (158). The character she creates in "The Yellow Wallpaper" also fantasizes about ending her regimen saying, "I wish I could get well faster" (Gilman 81). Both seem to view the rest cure as an unwanted interruption in their lives. It should be no surprise then that Gilman draws from her own experience and Dr. Mitchell’s treatment. She even finds a way to incorporate him into the story as a kind of threat to the narrator. The narrator in the story is thinking about the reaction of her husband, who is also a doctor, to her slow convalescence, "if I don’t pick up faster he shall

In the 19th century, mental illness was an uncommon issue to be discussed. The public would treat the illness only by avoiding the matter and forcing the sick to feel helpless. At that time, the medical profession had not yet distinguished between diseases of the mind and diseases of the brain. Neurologists such as Dr. Silas Mitchell treated the problems that would now be treated by psychiatrists, such as depression. The most accepted cure was Mitchell's “Rest Cure,” which required complete isolation from family and friends. It forbid any type of mental or physical energy, and required total bed rest. The harsh results of the “Rest Cure” are easily seen in the story titled “The Yellow Wallpaper” written by

"The Yellow Wallpaper," is a larger-than-life version of Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s own personal experiences. She grieved for several years in depression, as her physician diagnosed her with “neurasthenia” and prescribed the "rest cure" seen in the story. Unable to write or seek company, Gilman's rest drove her insane for three months. Gilman wrote the story not simply to change one man's view of neurasthenia, but to utilize the floor as a symbol of the oppression of women in a patriarchal society as mentioned in her article “Why I Wrote The Yellow Wallpaper”.

After learning of Gilman’s personal story, it becomes apparent that “The Yellow Wallpaper,” and the struggle of its narrator, carries a distinct message. Gilman grew up in an unhappy and impoverished family with a brother, a single mother, and no father figure. She later went on to marry Charles Stetson (whom she later divorced) and had a daughter with him. After the birth of her daughter, Gilman fell into a deeply depressed state, indicating the relevance of postpartum depression. When she consulted Dr. Weir Mitchell about it, she was prescribed a “rest cure.” It was this event that inspired Gilman to write “The Yellow Wallpaper,” and many similarities can be drawn between

In this short story the narrator has recently been suffering from an illness. She is prescribed the rest “cure” and is secured in a room by her husband where she begins to find deeper meaning behind the wallpaper. Gilman creates a narrator on the break

approach is to draw a parallel between the narrator's illness and Gilman's own breakdown and subsequent

“He told me all his opinions, so I had the same ones too; or if they were different I hid them, since he wouldn’t have cared for that” (Ibsen 109). As this quote suggests Charlotte Perkins Gilman, in “The Yellow Wall-Paper” and Henrik Ibsen, in A Doll House dramatize that, for woman, silent passivity and submissiveness can lead to madness.

Gilman wrote her short story, The Yellow Wallpaper in 1892 after undergoing S. Weir Mitchell’s, a popular neurologist of the 19th century, “rest cure” treatment where she was to “live a domestic life as possible” (Perkins. 4). Through her short story Perkins utilizes gothic fiction, a type of horror fiction, to vocalize her private and personal traumatic experience so that no other woman would have to. The format of the story is written from the perspective of a woman with an unnamed nervous condition, who writes a collection of journal entries to record her daily thoughts, while she is being treated for her