Women In Charlotte Perkins Gilman's 'The Yellow Wallpaper'

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During the Victorian Era and late 1800’s, the conventional norms of society prevented women from ever attaining true independence and freedom. This was a direct result of the expectations that women were supposed to fulfill their household duties and devote their live towards their family, which prohibited them from achieving bliss and self-happiness. Subsequently, Charlotte Perkins Gilman wrote her sensational short story, ”The Yellow Wallpaper,” in 1983 and illustrates a couple in which the power is unequally divided; the husband is a doctor and he makes all the decisions in the household. For instance, the wife is supposedly suffering from a “temporary nervous depression” is prescribed by her husband to stay in a secluded room and is forbidden …show more content…

The narrator describes it as a “great immovable bed . . . nailed down,” (4) and “looks as if it had been through the wars” (4). At first glance, it appears that the bed is chained down to the floor is completely normal in the context of the room; this particular part of the house was a “nursery first, and then playroom and gymnasium” (2) and the unsettling condition of the bed is simply a safeguard for the children. However, in the perspective of the author and the era in which this literary piece was written, these nails have a far deeper meaning – the bed is traditionally viewed as a place for sex, therefore, the nails on the bed essentially represent the suppression of female sexuality and the restraints of women to truly express their …show more content…

At first the dirty old yellow wallpaper makes the narrator feel uneasy. For example, she writes in her journal that “the color is repellent, almost revolting; a smouldering unclean yellow, strangely faded by the slow-turning sunlight” (3). However, as time passes and she has very minimal physical stimulation, it is clear that the endless solitary confinement drives her mind towards insanity. Subsequently, she later realizes that there is a sub-pattern in the wallpaper of a trapped woman who is trying to escape. Undoubtedly, this wallpaper is a direct representation of the domestic culture and tradition of docile women in 19th century society – the time in which this literary piece was published. Therefore, the narrator’s act of tearing down the wallpaper is a symbolic representation of women asserting their self-identity and “creeps” around to signify the initial stages of the feminist

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