Upon first reading Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper", it appears to be consecutive journal entries written by a flighty woman-plagued with bouts of depression-about her stay at a vacation home. Though upon closer inspection, the double entendre of this cleverly written story reveals itself. Symbolism is the element that plays the starring role in this production, coyly divulging the clues necessary to illuminate the reality of her psychosis. The physical triggers of said psychosis belong solely to the room she and her husband slept in; now a playroom, it had obviously gone through many other transformations as had this woman, who despised it (nursery, gym, playroom). More importantly, it is the wallpaper that has caught and held her mind's eye. "It is dull enough to confuse the eye in following, pronounced enough constantly to irritate and provoke study, and when you follow the lame uncertain curves for a little distance they suddenly commit suicide-plunge off at outrageous angles, destroy themselves in unheard-of contradiction." With a little imagination and logic, it becomes obvious what the offensive wallpaper personifies: The woman herself. The contrast between how She sees herself and how the rest of the world sees Her can create extreme emotional strain; add on the fact that She hails from the early 1900s and it becomes evident that, though her mental construct is not necessarily prepared to understand the full breach against Her, She is still capable of some iota of realization. The discrimination encountered by a female during this time period is great and unceasing. A closer inspection of the interior design/condition of the room illustrates that: "The furniture in this room is no worse than... ... middle of paper ... ... end, she begins to tear off as much of the paper as possible, in hopes of uncovering a way out for the "woman caught within the walls." (This woman is yet another facet of the original main character, the trapped and weak version.) The climax is illustrated and clarified through the symbolic tearing or exposing of the bare walls. She wants to free the woman within, yet ends up trading places, or becoming, that "other" woman completely. Her husband's reaction only serves as closure to her psychotic episode, forcing him into the unfortunate realization that she has been unwell this whole time. There are more clues and subtle hints that reinforce these statements, most correlating to her mental illness and self-perception. The statements made through the use of said symbolism turns this story into an interesting viewpoint of a psychological breakdown.
Some Critiques explain that the middle aged woman in the story is truly crazy, She was diagnosed as being mad crazy and is being treated as a patient in her own home by John, her husband. The woman’s husband is a doctor and proclaims that this is true and that she is actually sick and needs help. Throughout the entire story she is being ceased from doing things that the average person would do on a daily basis, which is suppose to help her. The woman is being stopped from writing, reading and sometimes even thinking. Her husband doesn’t want her working or doing any other physical activities either. All of these treatments are eventually suppose to help her and she will soon become a normal person again. Throughout the narration the woman does not follow what is being prescribed to her by her husband. She still reads and writes letters, therefore her condition worsens. Towards the end of the story she becomes mad crazy about the wallpaper that is in the room that she is trapped in. She starts to see herself in the paper. When she looks at the paper she sees another woman in the artwork of the wallpaper....
Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story, "The Yellow Wallpaper," is the disheartening tale of a woman suffering from postpartum depression. Set during the late 1890s, the story shows the mental and emotional results of the typical "rest cure" prescribed during that era and the narrator’s reaction to this course of treatment. It would appear that Gilman was writing about her own anguish as she herself underwent such a treatment with Dr. Silas Weir Mitchell in 1887, just two years after the birth of her daughter Katherine. The rest cure that the narrator in "The Yellow Wallpaper" describes is very close to what Gilman herself experienced; therefore, the story can be read as reflecting the feelings of women like herself who suffered through such treatments. Because of her experience with the rest cure, it can even be said that Gilman based the narrator in "The Yellow Wallpaper" loosely on herself. But I believe that expressing her negative feelings about the popular rest cure is only half of the message that Gilman wanted to send. Within the subtext of this story lies the theme of oppression: the oppression of the rights of women especially inside of marriage. Gilman was using the woman/women behind the wallpaper to express her personal views on this issue.
The narrator’s descent into madness deepens as the story progresses, and eventually she imagines women in the wallpaper, and that she is one of them and is among them.
From the “gouged and splintered” floor to the chewed bedstead, each mentioned object contributes to the story’s eerie setting as well as to the narrator’s confinement (229). Objects such as the bolted bed and the bars on the window symbolize the narrator’s inability to do as she pleases, yet another factor which constrains her. At the center of it all is the yellow wallpaper. While the narrator at first regards the yellow wallpaper as “repellant” and “revolting,” she slowly becomes more and more entranced by it and, more specifically, that which lies behind it (227). She begins to imagine a woman inside the wallpaper, looking for escape behind the pattern which entraps her. Under close scrutiny, it is easy to see that the woman inside the wallpaper is a reflection of the narrator, while the wallpaper acts as yet another theoretical cage to entrap her. Just as with the setting, the author uses everyday objects to demonstrate the muddled emotions that the narrator subconsciously feels due to the pressures laden upon
I think the wallpaper symbolizes the internal battle that the narrator is feeling within herself. I think it works as a symbol because the crazier that the narrator feels the more interesting or terrifying the wallpaper becomes. The narrator reflects her feelings onto this wallpaper, it’s almost as if this wallpaper has become a part of her. I think the details that are important about the wallpaper that seem significant
Wallpaper has never been more than a tacky decoration in my home but in “The Yellow Wallpaper” written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, she created it to not only symbolize something greater but also to show how an inanimate object can capture someone and hold them till insanity fill into their insecurities. This unsightful wall decal obtained movement, feeling, and a scent by the end of the story only acknowledged by the unnamed woman herself. The wallpaper was given personified features and obtained a key role in this woman 's life, from being trapped by the sickening yellow paper, the women become stir crazy being that the mustard yellow walls became responsible for her everyday experiences. The poisonous paper was positioned in a way to make
In the 19th century society was from different from what it is today. Women were not in the workforce, could not vote, or even have a say in anything. Women were not permitted to give evidence in court, nor, did they have the right to speak in public before an audience. When a woman married, her husband legally owned all she had (including her earnings, her clothes and jewelry, and her children). If he died, she was entitled to only a third of her husband’s estate. Charlotte Perkins Gilman wanted to change this. She wanted people to understand the plight of women in the 19th century. In her short story The Yellow Wallpaper she tries to convey this to the reader not just on a literal level, but through various symbols in the story. In The Yellow Wallpaper the author uses symbols to show restrictions on women, lack of public interaction, the struggle for equality, and the possibilities of the female sex during the 1800s.
The Yellow Wallpaper is a piece that you really have to sit and analyze. The object of the piece is to highlight how females during that time were forcibly oppressed. Moreover, how oppression can affect one’s mental state. Also, speaking of the mental state, the piece demonstrates how your mind affects your effort or actions. The author speaks about her experience with this through the story. Even though females were being oppressed you can’t help but feel that in some way doctors really thought that was what was best. The author wants you to be able to efficiently visualize the struggles that she and women went through during that time period.
In the grips of depression and the restrictions prescribed by her physician husband a woman struggles with maintaining her sanity and purpose. As a new mother and a writer, and she is denied the responsibility and intellectual stimulation of these elements in her life as part of her rest cure. Her world is reduced to prison-like enforcement on her diet, exercise, sleep and intellectual activities until she is "well again". As she gives in to the restrictions and falls deeper into depression, she focuses on the wallpaper and slides towards insanity. The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman is a story written from a first-person perspective about a young woman's mental deterioration during the 1800's and the adverse affects of the restriction place on her. The setting of the story is a colonial mansion in the country rented for the summer by the narrator's husband while she is treated for her "nervous condition". As the story progresses and the narrator describes her surroundings the setting focuses from the mansion and surrounding gardens to a bedroom in the mansion and finally on the wallpaper in the bedroom. This narrowing focus of the setting directly parallels the narrator's mental deterioration. Gilman's emphasis on the complex symbolism of the wallpaper illustrates the narrator's depression and the adverse affects of limited intellectual activity which, in this case, leads to insanity.
This causes a reversal in gender roles when her husband faints following the realisation of his wife’s mental state and she walks over him ‘I had to creep over him every time’. In addition to showing physical power it also shows power within the relationship, as previously John walked over her metaphorically. Her empowerment is caused when the narrator believes that she has escaped from the wallpaper and also begins to see other women escaping the entrapment of the wallpaper ‘I wonder if they all came out of the wallpaper as I did’ which is a symbol of breaking free from societies trap and treatment. This may be viewed as a gain of power and the narrator, representing women as a whole, finally becoming proactive.
She, as the narrator, starts off with revealing that she is very open to how she see’s things. Her description of this summer vacation leads to the recollection of herself remembering her nightmares growing up, and she insists the house they are staying at this time is haunted, “I use to lie awake as a child and get more entertainment and terror out of blank walls and plain furniture than most children could find in a toy-store.” (Gilman 650) She can’t rely on John so she turns to writing instead, causing her to be secretive instead of confiding in what is supposed to be her life partner. She then proceeds with the growing mystery of this “yellow wallpaper”. With john’s notorious attitude towards her about this infatuation, “He said that I was letting it get the better of me, and that nothing was worse for a nervous patient than to give way to such fancies” (Gilman 649), her character played like she was not interested anymore only to satisfy her husband’s demands when really she is still persistent on the issue. She begins to be devious around John, causing climax in the end with the realization that it is herself that she helped “escape” from behind the bar designs within the wall, “I wonder if they all come out of that wallpaper as I did?” (Gilman 656). With that being said, the author illiterates that the use of control on this woman not only drove her to madness but was produced by being in such
In the end, both characters experienced freedom in exchange for hefty sacrifices. The woman goes insane. She has delusions of freeing a woman from the ugly wallpaper, but in the end, it was she that wanted freedom. In the ending scene, she exclaims to her husband, "I've got out at last" (Lynch para. 263). He faints in response, ironically taking on a feminine quality that he had previously undermined. Finally, Gilman depicts the woman “creeping” over her husband to illustrate a victory over a long-time oppressor, which emphasizes the power within women to stand against the dictatorial actions of men (Lynch 263-264; “Analysis: What’s up with the ending” para. 3).
The yellow wallpaper is about a couple who has an unequal relationship. The husband is a doctor, and the wife is suffering from severe mental illness. The husband rents out a mansion in the countryside symbolizing as an asylum. She was kept in the attic of the mansion in a strange room cover in yellow wallpaper. There are four windows facing toward every direction, but all four windows are barred. The wife grows more insane looking at the wallpaper. The wallpaper has a strange, formless pattern, and Gilman (1892) describes it as “revolting” and behind the pattern of the wallpaper she thinks that she see women who are trying to escape. On the last day at the mansion, the wife locks the door and refuses to leave disobeying her husband. When the
Thesis Statement – The author uses the short story as a representation of the inner thoughts and experiences of females using hidden connotation, irony and mental images to demonstrate the inequality and
She describes her illness (as seen in the wallpaper) as "not arranged on any laws of radiation, or alternation, or repetition, or symmetry, or anything else that I ever heard of" (68). In other words, she cannot make any sense of what is causing her illness. A pivotal moment in the story is when the woman protagonist is concerned only with the yellow wallpaper in her journal. In lieu of her obsession with the wallpaper, she becomes engaged in the actions of the women she sees in the wallpaper which, of course, is really her own actions. The women "is all the time trying to climb through [the wallpaper]" (72). At this moment, she is desperate to escape her illness but she is unable to because her confinement in the room has already affected her more so than she realizes. The imagery of this situation is described when "the pattern strangles [the women] off and turns them upside down, and makes their eyes white!" (72). In the end or in her last day at the mansion, the isolation intensifies her illness to the point where she is no longer curable and insanity takes over. The protagonist finally recognizes the fact that the women she witnesses is really her own frame of mind and proclaims "I shall have to get back behind the pattern when it comes night, and that is hard!" (75). She believes that she has at last gained her freedom from the illness when in reality, the exact opposite has occurred. The incessant creeping is the final summation to her