Theme Of Isolation In The Yellow Wallpaper

Isolation and depression stem closely from the same root. Charlotte Perkins Gilman took feminist literature and theory into a new perspective, focusing on a route that depicts situations women were usually in, but seldom spoken of. The story The Yellow Wallpaper shines new light upon a woman’s opinion, something that was generally neglected. At nearly impossible lengths a woman in her time of need after a sudden miscarriage is left alone to her own wits in a bedroom adorned with a color that would soon become a key factor to her psychosis. Throughout this equinox of solitude, her reality starts to detach from the normal. There are many different instances throughout the story where the people in her life are continually forcing isolation

Throughout the story, her practitioner and husband neglects and isolates her constantly. Throughout the story, many other characters go to great lengths to make sure that she is kept isolated, prolonging her psychosis. The final destruction of the dreaded yellow wallpaper is a clear indicator of her true self peeking through during her time of need. Through many different instances of symbolism and analysis, one can procure that through being isolated, this woman had spiraled into a psychosis that helped to identify with her true, more radical personality, thus ridding herself of the pain that is the yellow wallpaper. The Yellow Wallpaper uses the idea of isolation from family and society to help create a sense of true identity that the narrator wants to desperately to be

Her days are spent bedridden after an unknown trauma forces her husband to prescribe “rest cures” as the antidote. During this time period, women were dehumanized to an object that was to be seen and not heard. Resistance during this era was futile, so whatever a man deemed worthy of a woman’s doing, she permitted to do so. “If a physician of high standing, and one’s own husband, assure friends and relatives that there is really nothing the matter with one but temporary nervous depression- a slight hysterical tendency- what one to do?” (Gilman 126) Although nothing is specifically identified in the story, this woman is suffering from post-partum depression and delirium. There is no baby to be found in the story, so one may assume a miscarriage or a stillborn death. This initial period of isolation is a key factor in helping the narrator identify truly with herself, for she starts to question the actions of the people around her who are pleading their merit through their absence. This negligence, this abuse helped to mold the mindset that she has been forced to create due to the lack of communication between doctor and patient. Feminism comes into play when the gender of the patient compromises treatment. Due to the severity of this trauma which was kept on an extremely low profile, this woman was not able to properly grieve for her lost