Literary Analysis Of The Yellow Wallpaper

Charlotte Perkins Gilman, an avid feminist of her time, uses her own experience with mental illness and misogyny to write “The Yellow Wallpaper”. Gilman clearly illustrates that this story is taking place in a time where women are often oppressed by men. She challenges the common belief of the time, that women have a different brain than men. A belief that led many physicians to disregard the severity of a patient’s mental state and thus prescribe insufficient treatments. In “The Yellow Wallpaper”, Gilman suggests through the narrator of the story that confinement, in oppose to freedom, ultimately worsens mental illness and will lead to completely insanity.

The narrator begins to describe a mansion that her and her husband are staying at.

“...in a great place on the other side of the room low down. I never saw a worse paper in my life.” (957). She tries to figure out the patterns and describes the “almost revolting” color. This is important because this is the first time she speaks about the wallpaper that arguably drives her insane. “At first he meant to repaper the room, but afterward he said that I was letting it get the better of me…” (958). This shows again how John does not take his wife’s thoughts too seriously and how he only worsens her mental state. She is forced to live in a house she finds strange and stay in a room where the wallpaper disturbs her, despite making these things known to her

The wallpaper begins to be almost the only thing she writes about now, showing that she spends an excessive amount of time in her room. “I am getting really fond of the room in spite of the wallpaper. Perhaps because of the wallpaper.” (960). She says that she lies on her bed, a bed that is nailed down and looks at the wallpaper. The immobile bed also can be seen as a symbol of imprisonment and confinement. “It makes me tired to follow it.” (960). It can be concluded that when the narrator says she is tired, it means she is feeling worse. She is so engrossed in the wallpaper and trying to make something of the meaningless patterns that she is aware that it is negatively affecting her health but she does not seem to