The roles in which gender is the main factor has been fought over but the fact of the matter is that it is still being fought over today. Not only is a gender role an old disagreement, but it is also the hidden symbolic meaning behind Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s The Yellow Wallpaper. In her short story published in 1899, author Charlotte Perkins Gilman effectively use symbolic patterns to comment on how societal oppressions create insanity. Although John thinks he is being supportive by enforcing the “rest cure” for his wife, his lack of listening reflects the roles determined by gender. Men have grown up in a society in which changing what they do not approve of, even women, is okay. Gilman’s main character is intimidated by a figure of her imagination. A figure of being the wife she is supposed to be, whom acts the way she is supposed to act because “[S]he is a perfect and enthusiastic housekeeper, and hopes for no better profession” (Gilman The Yellow Wallpaper 3). As John does not approve of the way his wife acts, he takes it upon himself to diagnose his wife, the main character. He tells her that she is not healthy and for her to be ready to be a mother and an acceptable wife, as well to get better, she needs to live in in their house coincidently three miles from the village. “The Cult of Purity obliged women to remain virtuous and pure even in marriage” (Thomas 1). The men’s role in society pressures women to live up to their standards. The Cult of Purity was established to keep wives faithful to their husbands. Men set the limitations for women to follow because in a society dominated by the male gender women would feel oppressed and instead of blaming the men they could blame the cult. The male race feels as though their ... ... middle of paper ... ...and ‘The Yellow Wallpaper’ by Charlotte Gilman Web. 26 Nov. 2013. . Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. The Yellow Wallpaper. [New York]: Feminist, 1973. Print. Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. “Why I Wrote the Yellow Wallpaper”. Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Web. 23 Nov. 2013. http://www.charlotteperkinsgilman.com/008/04/why-i-wrote-yellow- wallpaper charlotte.html. Snyder-Rheingold, Beth. “Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper”: A Poetics of the Inside.” Women Writers: A Zine. Web. 20 Nov. 2013. http://www.womenwriters.net/domesticgoddess/snyder.htm Thomas, Deborah. “The Changing Role of Womanhood: From True Woman to New Woman in Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper” “Academic and Event Technology Services. Dr. Jim Wohlpart, 27 July 1988. Web. 18 Nov. 2011. http://itech.fguc.edu/falculty/wohlpart/ara/gilman.htm.
Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story, “The Yellow Wall-Paper”, is a first-person narrative written in the style of a journal. It takes place during the nineteenth century and depicts the narrator’s time in a temporary home her husband has taken her to in hopes of providing a place to rest and recover from her “nervous depression”. Throughout the story, the narrator’s “nervous condition” worsens. She begins to obsess over the yellow wallpaper in her room to the point of insanity. She imagines a woman trapped within the patterns of the paper and spends her time watching and trying to free her. Gilman uses various literary elements throughout this piece, such as irony and symbolism, to portray it’s central themes of restrictive social norms
In the short story “The Yellow Paper”, Charlotte Perkins Gilman tells the story through the first person point of view where the story is told by the narrator only. The story takes place around the 80s-90s century where the narrator and her husband stay in a mansion for her rescue. The narrator is predicted to be suffering from temporary nervous depression by her husband, brother, and Weir Mitchell. Throughout the story, the readers could easily see many images that imply to the sexist reality back in time and how women are put under the pressure of the unequal society with the stereotype that they are always the supporters rather than the main financial provider for the family. Gilman introduces a new fictional theme to the audience back in
Charlotte Perkins Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper" is an observation on the male oppression of women in a patriarchal society. The story itself presents an interesting look at one woman's struggle to deal with both mental and physical confinement. Through Gilman's writing the reader becomes aware of the mental and physical confinement, which the narrator endures, and the overall effect and reaction to this confinement.
The psychologically thrilling story of “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman explores the dark and twisted aspect of the American society in the nineteenth century. Through the use of theme, Gilman creatively captures the cultural subordination and struggles women faced on a regular basis.
Gilman has stated in multiple papers that the main reason for her writing “The Yellow Wallpaper” was to shed light on her awful experience with this ‘rest cure’. However, she also managed to inject her own feminist agenda into the piece. Charlotte Perkins Gilman chose to include certain subtle, but alarming details regarding the narrator’s life as a representation of how women were treated at the time. She wants us to understand why the narrator ends up being driven to madness, or in her case, freedom. There are untold layers to this truly simple, short story just like there were many layers to Gilman
As American society progresses, so do the cultural expectations held for women. However, during the 1800s, women were viewed as inferior and were all together categorized under the domineering man. In “The Yellow Wallpaper”, Charlotte Gilman uses irony, dialect, point of view, and symbolism to illustrate the theme—dangers of subordination of women in marriage, and also the demonization of women in society all together.
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.
Gilman focuses on a sense in why gender roles consequences are made by male-dominated societies back in the nineteenth century. Gilman represents a marriage in which the narrator and her husband are trapped because of their irresponsibility. Because of this the narrator and her husband fail to come to an agreement. The woman suffers from a disorder called, post pardon syndrome. Due to this syndrome instead of her husband loving her, he tends to misguide her by loving her at a distance. Since her disorder is handle misunderstood by a physician, John who is her husband. He considers the best treatment will be the “rest cure.” At the time gender roles were a tad bit rigid. Silly to say that John, the physician is the person that people consider the serious person to go to. In this reading, you can see how Gilman is struggling to defend her argument on the reason male and female gender role has such a negative effect. The woman is being overwhelming by her emotions because it’s like her husband the one who supposed to care for her is taking her as a joke. She says her husband” “hates to have [her] write a word” (5)—and wallpapering her room (6). John is afraid for his wife to write only because he feels this will rekindle her thoughts of being a mother and wife again. Like before women aren’t the ones that will be the stronghold. “It is so hard to talk with
"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.
The narrator claims that John loves her, “He loves me very dearly, and hates to have me sick” (651). The narrator believes that John loves her and wants to get her better. If the narrator is correct, then John would provide the best treatment for his wife; especially, because he is a “…physician of high standing…” (648). John provides rest as a recommended treatment, “I lie down ever so much now. John says it is good for me, and to sleep all I can” (653). In this quote, the narrator is saying that he is offering advice that he thinks is best for her. “The Yellow Wallpaper” has a historical setting that occurs during a time in medicine where any physician can treat a patient’s physical body or their physiological well-being. In today’s health profession, there are now doctors who treat the physical body and doctors who work solely on the physiological part of the body. Since there isn’t any specialist on the mental part of health, a common treatment for depression is “rest cure”. When one is treated with the “rest cure”, a part of the treatment is to get a lot of rest, so John is simply giving her what treatment is available in her time period. In addition to John’s affection and professional opinion of the narrator’s mental health, the narrator declares, “John says if I don 't pick up faster
John, the narrator's husband, represents society at large. Like society, John controls and determines much of what his wife should or should not do, leaving his wife incapable of making her own decisions. John's domineering nature can be accredited to the fact that John is male and also a "physician of high standing" (1). John is "practical in the extreme. He has no patience with faith, an intense horror of superstition, and he scoffs openly at any talk of thi...
This was particularly true of middle-class women, and men strived to keep them restrained within the influences of the home. The expectation was for the woman to be “fixed firmly within their sphere of home and hearth” (Harper, 1999, p.1298), tending to the needs of the family, caring for children, and taking care of the home. Women were expected to remain virtuous and pure, to be modest, devout in their faith , and submissive to their male counterparts. This was evident in the medical profession and in The Yellow Wallpaper Gilman demonstrates the arrogant attitude men display towards women when she highlights the fact that even her husband does not believe she is ill, that she merely suffers from “temporary bouts of nervous depression.”
“The Yellow Wallpaper” written by Charlotte Perkins-Gilman explores the oppression of women in the nineteenth century and the constant limitation of their freedom, which many times led to their confinement. The short story illustrates male superiority and the restriction of a woman’s choice regarding her own life. The author’s diction created a horrific and creepy tone to illustrate the supernatural elements that serve as metaphors to disguise the true meaning of the story. Through the use of imagery, the reader can see that the narrator is living within a social class, so even though the author is trying to create a universal voice for all women that have been similar situations, it is not possible. This is not possible because there are many
Advocating social, political, legal, and economic rights for women equal to those of men, Charlotte Perkins Gilman speaks to the “female condition” in her 1892 short story “The Yellow Wallpaper”, by writing about the life of a woman and what caused her to lose her sanity. The narrator goes crazy due partially to her prescribed role as a woman in 1892 being severely limited. One example is her being forbidden by her husband to “work” which includes working and writing. This restricts her from begin able to express how she truly feels. While she is forbidden to work her husband on the other hand is still able to do his job as a physician. This makes the narrator inferior to her husband and males in general. The narrator is unable to be who she wants, do what she wants, and say what she wants without her husband’s permission. This causes the narrator to feel trapped and have no way out, except through the yellow wallpaper in the bedroom.
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.