During the Victorian Era and late 1800’s, the conventional norms of society prevented women from ever attaining true independence and freedom. This was a direct result of the expectations that women were supposed to fulfill their household duties and devote their live towards their family, which prohibited them from achieving bliss and self-happiness. Subsequently, Charlotte Perkins Gilman wrote her sensational short story, ”The Yellow Wallpaper,” in 1983 and illustrates a couple in which the power is unequally divided; the husband is a doctor and he makes all the decisions in the household. For instance, the wife is supposedly suffering from a “temporary nervous depression” is prescribed by her husband to stay in a secluded room and is forbidden …show more content…
The narrator describes it as a “great immovable bed . . . nailed down,” (4) and “looks as if it had been through the wars” (4). At first glance, it appears that the bed is chained down to the floor is completely normal in the context of the room; this particular part of the house was a “nursery first, and then playroom and gymnasium” (2) and the unsettling condition of the bed is simply a safeguard for the children. However, in the perspective of the author and the era in which this literary piece was written, these nails have a far deeper meaning – the bed is traditionally viewed as a place for sex, therefore, the nails on the bed essentially represent the suppression of female sexuality and the restraints of women to truly express their …show more content…
At first the dirty old yellow wallpaper makes the narrator feel uneasy. For example, she writes in her journal that “the color is repellent, almost revolting; a smouldering unclean yellow, strangely faded by the slow-turning sunlight” (3). However, as time passes and she has very minimal physical stimulation, it is clear that the endless solitary confinement drives her mind towards insanity. Subsequently, she later realizes that there is a sub-pattern in the wallpaper of a trapped woman who is trying to escape. Undoubtedly, this wallpaper is a direct representation of the domestic culture and tradition of docile women in 19th century society – the time in which this literary piece was published. Therefore, the narrator’s act of tearing down the wallpaper is a symbolic representation of women asserting their self-identity and “creeps” around to signify the initial stages of the feminist
On their final day in the house she completes her plan by stripping all that she could of the rest of the wallpaper from the walls. Her intention was to bring a sense of shock to her husband. This seems to be her way of punishing him for the part he played in trapping her in the room with this hideous wallpaper. I think it goes further than just the room to make a statement of how she feels trapped in her entire life with her husband. She is “freeing” the woman who is trapped...
As the narrator’s mental state changes so does the way she perceives things around the house. The most prominent example of this is the imagery of the wallpaper and the way the narrator’s opinion on the wallpaper slowly changes throughout the story; this directly reflects what is happening within the narrator’s mind. At the beginning of the story the narrator describes the wallpaper as “Repellent...revolting... a smoldering unclean yellow” (Gilman 377). As the story continues the narrator starts to become obsessed with the wallpaper and her opinion of it has completely changed than that of hers from the beginning. Symbolism plays a big part in “The Yellow Wallpaper” too. This short story has a multitude of symbols hidden in it but there are specific ones that stand out the most. The recurrence of the wallpaper definitely makes it a symbol. An interesting interpretation is that the wallpaper represents women, in the sense that the 18th century woman was considered almost decorative and that is exactly what the purpose of wallpaper is. Another prominent symbol that runs parallel with the wallpaper, are the women the narrator would see in the wallpaper. The women appear trapped behind bars in the paper and one could argue that the women the narrator sees represents all women of her time, continuously trapped in their gender
The bars on windows, bedstead nailed down, and a gate at the top of the stairs suggest an unsafe place. The narrator’s preference for living in the downstairs room is undermined by John’s control over her. Furthermore, John puts his wife into an environment with no communication, making her socially isolated. The protagonist is home alone most of the time while John is at work. She is not allowed to raise her own baby, and Jennie, John's sister, is occupied with her job.
In the 19th century, women were not seen in society as being an equal to men. Men were responsible for providing and taking care of the family while their wives stayed at home not allowed leaving without their husbands. In The Yellow Wallpaper, Charlotte Perkins Gilman writes about a woman named Jane who is trapped by society’s cage and tries to find herself. Throughout the story, the theme of self-discovery is developed through the symbols of the nursery, the journal and the wallpaper.
At the beginning of this story, the narrator sees the wallpaper as ugly and dull. Then towards the middle a lot deeper meanings start to develop. She starts to see imaginative people in the wallpaper. These objects/people start to talk to her and make her think about her life. In the yellow wallpaper, she sees a striped pattern and to her it looks like a jail cell. With this, it reminds her of all the women stuck in second class not being able to speak up with their own voice. She believes that the wallpaper stands for something, holding women back from their life. Then at the end of the story, the wallpaper turns ugly and she has begun a since of insanity. She has begun to tear down the wallpaper and go
The story "The Yellow Wallpaper," by Charlotte Perkins Gilman is a story about control. In the time frame in which the story was written, the 1800’s, women were looked upon as having no effect on society other than bearing children, maintaining a clean house, and food on the table etc. etc. There was really no means for self expression as a woman, when men not only dominated society but the world. The story was written at a time when men held the jobs, knowledge, and society above their shoulders. The narrator on, "The Yellow Wallpaper" in being oppressed by her husband, John, even though many readers believe this story is about a woman who loses her mind, it is actually about a woman’s struggle to regain, something which she never had before, control of her life.
Susan B. Anthony, a woman’s rights pioneer, once said, “Oh, if I could but live another century and see the fruition of all the work for women! There is so much yet to be done” (“Women’s Voices Magazine”). Women’s rights is a hot button issue in the United States today, and it has been debated for years. In the late 1800’s an individual named Charlotte Perkins Gilman wrote literature to try and paint a picture in the audience’s mind that gender inferiority is both unjust and horrific. In her short story, “The Yellow Wallpaper” Gilman makes the ultimate argument that women should not be seen as subordinate to men, but as equal.
Throughout the late 1800s Americans were workaholics, constantly working in order to make a living for their families at home. Women stayed home and took care of the house as well as the children. The short story “The Yellow Wallpaper” takes place in the late 1800s.The author, Charlotte Perkins Gilman is no stranger to the hysteria that took over women in the 19th century. According to Mary Ellen Snodgrass, after her own postpartum emotional collapse and treatment in 1887, Gilman knew about the situation women were experiencing (“Gilman”). All the pressure of working and raising children affected all Americans, but society blamed the nervous depression mainly on women because they were women. Charlotte Perkins Gilman conveys her own life experience and illness that she went through and how women were treated during the 1800’s.
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.
"The Yellow Wallpaper," by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, depicts a woman in isolation, struggling to cope with mental illness, which has been diagnosed by her husband, a physician. Going beyond this surface level, the reader sees the narrator as a developing feminist, struggling with the societal values of the time. As a woman writer in the late nineteenth century, Gilman herself felt the adverse effects of the male-centric society, and consequently, placed many allusions to her own personal struggles as a feminist in her writing. Throughout the story, the narrator undergoes a psychological journey that correlates with the advancement of her mental condition. The restrictions society places on her as a woman have a worsening effect on her until illness progresses into hysteria.
The room describes the narrator. The room was once a nursery so it reminds her that she has a baby which she is not able to see or hold. The room was also a playroom so it reminds her once again that she cannot play with or watch her baby play. The room has two windows which she looks out of and sees all the beautiful places she cannot go because of her husband. The bars on the windows represent a prison which her husband has put her in to heal from her illness.
The ideas expressed by Gilman are femininity, socialization, individuality and freedom in the short story “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Gilman uses these ideas to help readers understand what women lost during the 1900’s. She also let her readers understand how her character Jane escaped the wrath of her husband. She uses her own mind over the matter. She expresses these ideas in the form of the character Jane. Gilman uses an assortment of ways to convey how women and men of the 1900’s have rules pertaining to their marriages. Women are the homemakers while the husbands are the breadwinners. Men treated women as objects, as a result not giving them their own sound mind.
"The Yellow Wallpaper," by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, tells the story of a woman's descent into madness as a result of the "rest and ignore the problem cure" that is frequently prescribed to cure hysteria and nervous conditions in women. More importantly, the story is about control and attacks the role of women in society. The narrator of the story is symbolic for all women in the late 1800s, a prisoner of a confining society. Women are expected to bear children, keep house and do only as they are told. Since men are privileged enough to have education, they hold jobs and make all the decisions. Thus, women are cast into the prison of acquiescence because they live in a world dominated by men. Since men suppress women, John, the narrator's husband, is presumed to have control over the protagonist. Gilman, however, suggests otherwise. She implies that it is a combination of society's control as well as the woman's personal weakness that contribute to the suppression of women. These two factors result in the woman's inability to make her own decisions and voice opposition to men.
"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.
The woman behind this work of literature portrays the role of women in the society during that period of time. "The Yellow Wallpaper" written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, is a well written story describing a woman who suffers from insanity and how she struggles to express her own thoughts and feelings. The author uses her own experience to criticize male domination of women during the nineteenth century. Although the story was written fifty years ago, "The Yellow Wallpaper" still brings a clear message how powerless women were during that time.