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Patriarchy in yellow wallpaper
Critical interpretations of the yellow wallpaper
Patriarchy in yellow wallpaper
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“Personally, I disagree with their ideas. But what is one to do?” declared Charlotte Perkins Gilman in “The Yellow Wallpaper.” Women in the late nineteenth century were bounded by their men figure from their birth to their death. No time to speak their opinions, have a crush on a boy, or to have an education for their own benefit. Charlotte Perkins Gilman asserts that the way women were treated in the late nineteenth-century is one of the factors that caused mental illness. The narrator had no control over how the physician was treating her mental problem since woman’s opinion did not matter. How were women expected to live without having some kind of mental illness with such strict class and gender classifications?
In the late nineteenth century,
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Parents in the late nineteenth century were expected to teach their daughters how to read and write, the basic education everyone should have. However, their intention of teaching wasn't to educate them to get the best job in the world, but to help them be the best housewives. The society having a stereotypical judgement that “writing was job-related skill” only brings women to think that they are not even worth to know more than how to clean their houses, to bake and to smile. Another factor that leads one to have serious mental illness is not being able to express what they want and what they need to achieve. The narrator in “The Yellow Wallpaper” shows great interest in spending her free time writing and said, “I think sometimes that if I were only well enough to write_ a little it would relieve the press of ideas and rest me.” The narrator does not stop writing, because that’s the only hobby she is able to do. Secretly. Later, she informs her readers, “There comes John’s sister. I must not let her find me writing.” No one should be banned from doing what gives them peace and joy. Not being able to perform one’s favorite activity does not only decrease the desire to do any other tasks, but it increases the risk of having depression without even acknowledging they
Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story “The Yellow Wallpaper” has opened many people’s eyes since it was first published in 1892. In the beginning, readers only acknowledged Gilman’s story as showing how women with mental illnesses were treated by physicians during the 1800’s. They overlooked the deeper meaning the text contained, and it was not until later that readers discovered it. Eventually, “The Yellow Wallpaper” became known as feminist literature. Gilman does a great job showing how women suffered from inadequate medical treatment, but above that she depicts how nineteenth century women were trapped in their roles in society and yearned to escape from being controlled by males.
The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman can be perceived in a few different ways. Greg Johnson wrote an article describing his own perception of what he believed the short story meant. In doing so, it can be noticed that his writing aligns well with what can be perceived from Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s story. The narrator Jane, experiences many things throughout Gilman’s story, which Johnson describes thoroughly. It is because of these descriptive points that allow Johnsons article to be a convincing argument. The main ideas that Johnson depicts that are supported and I agree with from the story include Janes developing imaginative insight, her husband and sister-in-law’s belief on domestic control, and her gained power through unconsciousness.
Being constantly alone and prohibited to leave her bedroom, she begins to start being delusional with nothing to occupy her time, but to write. With “barred windows for little children and rings and things in the walls” the bedroom is in similarity to a prison cell. (page 648). While John is keeping her away from reality, Jane begins to feel as if the right thing and she won’t be able to get out.
“The Yellow Wallpaper” is written in the first person narrative of a women's secret journal and her descent into madness. With the medical community of the nineteenth century misunderstanding and mistreating women, despite the protests of women. The treatment that John, the narrator’s husband, offers does not help at all, in fact throughout the story the narrator’s journal entrees and condition progressively worsens. Spending the summer in an abandoned mansion in order to recover from what her physician husband believes is a “temporary nervous depression- a slight hysterical tendency” (648). Her husband does not believe that her illness is serious the narrator states,“You see he does not believe I am sick” (647)! According to history men thought that they knew better than women, especially women who were “hysterical.” ...
“The Yellow Wallpaper” tells the story of a woman who is trapped in a room covered in yellow wallpaper. The story is one that is perplexing in that the narrator is arguably both the protagonist as well as the antagonist. In the story, the woman, who is the main character, struggles with herself indirectly which results in her descent into madness. The main conflicts transpires between the narrator and her husband John who uses his power as a highly recognize male physician to control his wife by placing limitations on her, forcing her to behave as a sick woman. Hence he forced himself as the superior in their marriage and relationship being the sole decision make. Therefore it can be said what occurred externally resulted in the central conflict of” “The Yellow Wallpaper being internal. The narrator uses the wallpaper as a symbol of authenticy. Hence she internalizes her frustrations rather then openly discussing them.
Perhaps the biggest symbol in support of my statement would be the yellow wallpaper itself, hence the name of the story. “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.” She also claimed that “I sometimes fancy that in my condition if I had less opposition and more society and stimulus—but John says the very worst thing I can do is to think about my condition, and I confess it always makes me feel bad.” She is restrained from both writing and reading, so her mind settles onto the wallpaper as her source of literary work instead. This supports my thesis statement because men viewed it “proper” for a woman to be entirely dependent on a man, even though it was economically and socially damaging.
"The Yellow Wallpaper" features an unnamed female narrator who serves to exemplify the expectations placed upon women of the time period. As we are told early on, she is suffering from a "nervous condition" (Gilman 1). While we are not told the specific nature of this condition, we do discover that the cure prescribed by John, the narrator's husband and doctor, entails taking "phosphates or phosphites--whichever it is, and tonics, and journeys, and air, and exercise" while intellectual "work" is "absolutely forbidden Ö until [she is] well again" (Gilman 1). This poses a particular problem for the narrator, due to her desire to write, which she continues to do "in spite of them," and causes her to hide her writing to avoid facing "heavy opposition" (Gilman 1). The treatment to which t...
In Charlotte Perkins Gillman’s short story “The Yellow Wallpaper”, the author takes the reader through the terrors of a woman’s psychosis. The story convey to understatements pertaining to feminism and individuality that at the time was only idealized. Gillman illustrates her chronological descent into insanity. The narrators husband John, who is also her physician diagnosed her with “nervous depression” and therefore ordered her to isolate until she recuperates. She is not only deprived of outside contact but also of her passion to write, since it could deteriorate her condition. The central conflict of the story is person versus society; the healthy part of her, in touch with herself clashing with her internalized thoughts of her society’s expectations. In a feminist point of view the central idea pertains to the social confinement that woman undergo due to their society.
Women have been mistreated, enchained and dominated by men for most part of the human history. Until the second half of the twentieth century, there was great inequality between the social and economic conditions of men and women (Pearson Education). The battle for women's emancipation, however, had started in 1848 by the first women's rights convention, which was led by some remarkable and brave women (Pearson Education). One of the most notable feminists of that period was the writer Charlotte Perkins Gilman. She was also one of the most influential feminists who felt strongly about and spoke frequently on the nineteenth-century lives for women. Her short story, "The Yellow Wallpaper" characterizes the condition of women of the nineteenth century through the main character’s life and actions in the text. It is considered to be one of the most influential pieces because of its realism and prime examples of treatment of women in that time. This essay analyzes issues the protagonist goes through while she is trying to break the element of barter from her marriage and love with her husband. This relationship status was very common between nineteenth-century women and their husbands.
The "Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Gilman is a great story about the repression of women in the late 1800's but is still representative of issues faced by women today. She writes from her own personal experiences and conveys a message that sometimes in a male dominated society women suffer from the relentless power that some men implement over women.
Can a story contain more than one antagonist? In “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman there is an overwhelming amount of conflict the unnamed narrator must endure. The protagonist of “The Yellow Wallpaper” is the narrator who is suffering from depression and is taken to a house for the summer to rest. In “The Yellow Wallpaper”, the wallpaper is the antagonist because it causes the narrator to have a breakdown at the end of the short story; John, the narrator’s husband, cannot be the antagonist because he is doing what he believes is best for her, and the narrator cannot be the antagonist because she wants to improve her mental state.
"If a physician of high standing, and one's own husband, assures friends and relatives that there is really nothing the matter with one but temporary nervous depression -- a slight hysterical tendency -- what is one to do?" (Gilman 1). Many women in the 1800's and 1900's faced hardship when it came to standing up for themselves to their fathers, brothers and then husbands. Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the narrator of the story, "The Yellow Wallpaper", is married to a physician, who rented a colonial house for the summer to nurse her back to health after her husband thinks she has neurasthenia, but actually suffers from postpartum depression. He suggested the 'rest cure'. She should not be doing any sort of mental or major physical activity, her only job was to relax and not worry about anything. Charlotte was a writer and missed writing. "The Yellow Wallpaper" is significant to literature in the sense that, the author addresses the issues of the rest cure that Dr. S. Weir Mitchell prescribed for his patients, especially to women with neurasthenia, is ineffective and leads to severe depression. This paper includes the life of Charlotte Perkins Gilman in relation to women rights and her contribution to literature as one of her best short story writings.
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 to this act.
Women were regard as a second class of people. They had neither legal right nor respect from their male counterparts. When the narrator's husband, John, a physician, placed the narrator in the horrid room with yellow wallpaper, and bed-rested, he claimed that he knew what is best for his wife. The narrator had no choice but to obey her husband since her brother, who was a male physician, was convinced by her husband's theory. "So I take phosphates of phosphites-whichever it is-and tonics, and air and exercise, and journeys, and am absolutely forbidden to "work" until I am well again" (pg277). Male domination is clearly seen here as the males claimed that their decision was always the right choice. "I thought it was a good time to talk, so I told him that I really was not gaining here, and that I wished he would take me away"(pg283). The narrator tried to convince her husband to change his treatment because she thought that her husband's prescription was not working for her, instead her husband asked her to go to sleep. Her husband's ignorance clearly shows that even the narrator herself had no power over her own health. She just simply said, "But ...
The short story titled, “The Yellow Wallpaper” is given its name for no other reason than the disturbing yellow wallpaper that the narrator comes to hate so much; it also plays as a significant symbol in the story. The wallpaper itself can represent many various ideas and circumstances, and among them, the sense of feeling trapped, the impulse of creativity gone awry, and what was supposed to be a simple distraction transfigures into an unhealthy obsession. By examining the continuous references to the yellow wallpaper itself, one can begin to notice how their frequency develops the plot throughout the course of the story. As well as giving the reader an understanding as to why the wallpaper is a more adequate and appropriate symbol to represent the lady’s confinement and the deterioration of her mental and emotional health. In Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper”, the color of the wallpaper symbolizes the internal and external conflicts of the narrator that reflect the expectations and treatment of the narrator, as well as represent the sense of being controlled in addition to the feeling of being trapped.