Yellow Wallpaper: Insanity and Unseen Oppression

1060 Words3 Pages

Wallpaper has never been more than a tacky decoration in my home but in “The Yellow Wallpaper” written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, she created it to not only symbolize something greater but also to show how an inanimate object can capture someone and hold them till insanity fill into their insecurities. This unsightful wall decal obtained movement, feeling, and a scent by the end of the story only acknowledged by the unnamed woman herself. The wallpaper was given personified features and obtained a key role in this woman 's life, from being trapped by the sickening yellow paper, the women become stir crazy being that the mustard yellow walls became responsible for her everyday experiences. The poisonous paper was positioned in a way to make The women had fallen into a deep place of postpartum depression after her child had been born and was placed into what she had been told “a nursery” to the people placing her there it had been a nursery for mentally ill patients as the readers had the first impression of it resembling a children 's nursery. The nursery had no resemblance of a children 's room in any way but it did have a nasty yellow wallpaper decorating the walls. During the story the wallpaper was used both ironically and a way to hide many of the stories symbols. The narrator spent most of her day in the yellow lines room and had became a liking towards the pattern and finding things in the pattern. At points the narrator had become so trapped by the wallpaper she had said “I don 't want to go out, and I don 't want to have anybody come in.” (Gilman 12) showing to the readers that she had developed a longing and a protective feature over the wallpaper. She has been captured by the pattern being the only thing that she will worry about and knows that if the women that watch her during the day saw her studying the paper she 'd be forced to move away from the wallpaper, so she studied it at night, “I suppose I shall have to get back behind the pattern when it comes night, and that is hard.” (Gilman 13) because she knew the lack of privacy during the day. The wallpaper and her reacted towards it had an increase of worsening, in the student paper they described it as “That pain “a constant dragging weariness” would eventually lead to a nervous breakdown. As the days passed into months, the depression began to consume her.” (Denise D. Knight 470) The depression was taking control of her life so much as instead of seeing the increasing improvements in the beginning of the story with pride and encouragement changing to a trapped women inside of the

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