Megan Friddle
ENC1102
Professor Baker
Nov 1st 2016
The Yellow Wallpaper, a short story by Charlotte Perkins Gilman is series of private journal entries written by the main character, a woman who is isolated from everything by her husband John due to her temporary nervous depression. Feminist writer Charlotte Perkins Gilman used her personal experiences to inspire this short story and bring to life a major social issue from the 19th century which is women’s rights and the ineffectiveness of the rest cure. Gilman uses her husband’s actions and her obsession with the wallpaper to relay an important message that women were not treated as equals and the Rest Cure should have never been prescribed as a medicine for mental health issue. The
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This is where we start to see that the “Rest Cure” her husband prescribed to her is doing more harm than good. As the narrator sinks further into her fixation with the wallpaper, she becomes progressively more isolated from her day-to-day life. Her husband has taken anything that matters to her out of her life, leaving her no choice but to go mad. She tells us she starts to see a different kind of pattern in the wallpaper and is becoming fond of it. The wallpaper has become her only source of entertainment. The narrator’s obsession continues to grow and the pattern becomes clear to her, what she begins to see is a lady. The lady is “stooping down and creeping” and it seems she is trapped behind bars. The woman becomes possessive over the wallpaper she doesn’t want anyone to examine it or they might also “find out” about the woman in the wallpaper. This woman has turned the wallpaper from something to someone. The narrators tells us she watches this trapped woman creep, she even says “There are so many of those creeping women, and they creep so fast. -- I wonder if they all come out of that wallpaper as I did (Gilman).” Even the narrator becomes a "creeping woman." Our first clue is when she says, "I always lock the door when I creep by daylight."(Gilman) There is no denying that the woman in this story has lost her mind. The woman then starts to identify herself as the woman who is trapped in the
Yellow Wallpaper - Bedroom.. As the story progresses in, The Yellow Wallpaper, it is as if the space of the bedroom turns in on itself, folding in on the body as the walls take hold of it, epitomizing the narrator's growing intimacy with control. Because the narrator experiences the bedroom in terms of John's draconian organization, she relies on her prior experiences of home in an attempt to allay the alienation and isolation the bedroom creates. Recalling her childhood bedroom, she writes, "I remember what a kindly wink the knobs of our big, old bureau used to have, and there was one chair that always seemed like a strong friend. . . I could always hop into that chair and feel safe" (Gilman 17).
would not say it to a living soul, of course, but this is dead paper
"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 which society places on her as a woman have a worsening effect on her until illness progresses into hysteria. The narrator makes comments and observations that demonstrate her will to overcome the oppression of the male dominant society. The conflict between her views and those of the society can be seen in the way she interacts physically, mentally, and emotionally with the three most prominent aspects of her life: her husband, John, the yellow wallpaper in her room, and her illness, "temporary nervous depression." In the end, her illness becomes a method of coping with the injustices forced upon her as a woman. As the reader delves into the narrative, a progression can be seen from the normality the narrator displays early in the passage, to the insanity she demonstrates near the conclusion.
“There are things in that paper which nobody knows but me, or ever will. Behind that outside pattern the dim shapes get clearer every day. It is always the same shape, only very numerous. And it is like a woman stooping down and creeping about behind that pattern. I don’t like it a bit. I wonder—I begin to think—I wish John would take me away from here!” The late 19th century hosted a hardship for women in our society. “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman expressed a form of patriarchy within the story. Gilman never addressed the woman in the “The Yellow Wallpaper” by a name, demonstrating her deficiency of individual identity. The author crafted for the narrator to hold an insignificant role in civilization and to live by the direction of man. Representing a hierarchy between men and women in the 19th century, the wallpaper submerged the concentration of the woman and began compelling her into a more profound insanity.
The Yellow Wallpaper, Written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, is comprised as an assortment of journal entries written in first person, by a woman who has been confined to a room by her physician husband who he believes suffers a temporary nervous depression, when she is actually suffering from postpartum depression. He prescribes her a “rest cure”. The woman remains anonymous throughout the story. She becomes obsessed with the yellow wallpaper that surrounds her in the room, and engages in some outrageous imaginations towards the wallpaper. Gilman’s story depicts women’s struggle of independence and individuality at the rise of feminism, as well as a reflection of her own life and experiences.
The Yellow-Wallpaper is a short story written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. It narrates the story of an unnamed woman that is subjected to the famous “rest cure” in order to cure her from her mental illness. This story shows
“There are things in that paper that nobody knows but me, or ever will” (Gilman 483). Using the central symbol of the wallpaper Ms. Gilman allows her protagonist, Jane, to articulate the state of her own mind via her obsession with the wallpaper of her room. The descriptions of the wallpaper change in complexity to reflect the degree with which the Jane’s mind has descended into psychosis. The wallpaper’s description also serves as a visual frame of reference for the reader as the main character begins to hallucinate.
“The Yellow Wallpaper” written by Charlotte Gilman is a chilling portrayal of a woman’s downward spiral towards madness after undergoing treatment for postpartum depression in the 1800’s. The narrator, whose name remains nameless, represents the hundreds of middle to upper- class women who were diagnosed with “hysteria” and prescribed a “rest” treatment. Although Gilman’s story was a heroic attempt to “save people from being driven crazy” (Gilman p 1) by this type of “cure” it was much more. “The Yellow Wallpaper” opened the eyes of many to the apparent oppression of women in the 1800’s and “possibly the only way they could (unconsciously) resist or protest their traditional ‘feminine’ work—or over-work” (Chesler p 11) by going “mad”.
Narration is one literary element of a story that controls the meaning and themes perceived by the reader. The author uses this as a way of putting themselves in their writing; they portray a personal reflection through the narrator. We see this in pieces of literature, such as Charlotte Gilman’s, “The Yellow Wallpaper”, an intense short story that critics believe to be an autobiography. Charlotte Gilman wrote this piece in 1892, around the time of her own personal mental depression, after the birth of her child. This story invites the readers into the mind of a well-educated writer who is mentally ill, and takes you through the recordings of her journal, as her mental health deteriorates so does the credibility of her writing. The author uses the element of the narrators’ mental health to create a story with different meanings and themes to her audience. Gilman uses the role of an unreliable narrator to persuade the audience’s perception of protagonists’ husband John and create a theme of entrapment.
Jane’s husband does not allow her to write because he feels that with her imaginative power and nervous condition it would lead to fancy. “John has cautioned me not to give way to fancy in the least. He says that with my imaginative power and habit of story-making a nervous weakness like mine is sure to lead to all manner of excited fancies” (Gilman 649) without her outlet of writing Jane begins to see women in the wall-paper creeping around from the inside of the wall-paper to the outside in the gardens. She also feels that the women are trapped behind the first layer of design on the paper as if it was bars keeping them trapped. “The faint figure behind seemed to shake the pattern, just as is she wanted to get out. I got up softly and went to feel and see if the paper did move.” (Gilman 652) Jane also begins to believe that the wall-paper know what it was doing to her “This paper looks to me as if it knew what a vicious influence it had!” (Gilman 653) Jane starts to relate to the women being trapped in the paper and like she is trapped with-in the bedroom. Jane becomes one with the women in the wallpaper and referrers to the women as I. Jane begins creeping along the baseboards trying to release the women from their prison of wall-paper, which will release her from her
The very popular short story, “The Yellow Wallpaper” written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman is a compelling story of a woman with a mental illness. Every aspect of this story contributes to its success, including the characters and their interactions, the plot, setting, the most apparent symbols, the point of view used, and the overall message of the story. This story is a great representation of mental illness in the time when it was written – misunderstood, and feared.
Charlotte Perkins Gilman uses her short story “The Yellow Wallpaper” to express her opinions about feminism and originality. Gilman does so by taking the reader through the terrors of one woman's psychological disorder, her entire mental state characterized by her encounters with the wallpaper in her room. She incorporates imagery and symbolism to show how confined the narrator is because of her gender and mental illness.
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.
Charlotte Perkins Gilman wrote The Yellow Wallpaper in 1890 about her experience in a psychiatric hospital. The doctor she had prescribed her “the rest cure” to get over her condition (Beekman). Gilman included the name of the sanitarium she stayed at in the piece as well which was named after the doctor that “treated” her. The short story was a more exaggerated version of her month long stay at Weir Mitchell and is about a woman whose name is never revealed and she slowly goes insane under the watch of her doctor husband and his sister (The Yellow Wallpaper 745). Many elements of fiction were utilized by Gilman in this piece to emphasize the theme freedom and confinement. Three of the most important elements are symbolism, setting and character.
Within the rather disturbing short story, “The Yellow Wallpaper”, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Gilman expresses an underlying tone of women’s suppression. The narrator lived life as normal, under the domestic ideology. Without the realization of what was occurring to women in that era. Throughout the story, the narrator began to realize the social norm was suppressing women and their “voice”. She began to act different from what society view on ideal females. The narrator found the source and reasoning to why the people in her household and other acquaintances acted in such a manner. After putting the puzzle pieces together, she came to accept the reality. During the 1800s, African Americans were given the right to vote in which it essentially