The Role Of Society's Role In The Yellow Wallpaper?

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When the story was first released to the public in 1892 critics saw “The Yellow Wallpaper” as a ghost story where the female was haunted or possessed as the story went on instead of a story that criticized society 's role for women. Suzanne Owens suggests that Gilman wrote the “The Yellow Wallpaper” as a ghost story because she was influenced by the gothic writings of Edgar Allen Poe and Charlotte Brontë (172). I agree that Edgar Allen Poe and Charlotte Brontë influenced Gilman because they were huge writers during the 19th century but I see Gilman writing “The Yellow Wallpaper” simply as a protest against the male-dominated society that she lived in. Throughout her prolific writing career, she produced works in forms of novels, essays, poems …show more content…

The wallpaper plays a huge role in the “The Yellow Wallpaper” because it refers to how women were trapped in a male-dominated society. For the narrator, the wallpaper is like an entrapment because it is everywhere in the story. In the story, the narrator describes the wallpaper by saying “I never saw a worse paper in my life. One of those sprawling flamboyant patterns committing every artistic sin (2). The reader can see this as Gilman actually describing her hate through the narrator towards a male-dominate society. As the story goes on the narrator’s hate for the wallpaper grows and grows. At the end of the story, the narrator rips away at the yellow wallpaper to release the “woman” behind the paper. Although the narrator saw a woman behind the wallpaper, she was actually freeing herself. This tells us that she no longer worries about what John thinks nor does his fainting discourage her. She is on the path to true womanhood. Gilman writes, “I 've pulled off most of the paper, so you can 't put me back!” (9). The reader can see the wallpaper as a male-dominated society so when the narrator rips the paper that means she is breaking free from society norms. The narrator finally establishes herself as a free independent woman who will not bow to no man nor a society that praises them as

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