Narrative Voice in “The Yellow Wallpaper” and “The Virgin Suicides”
Both “The Yellow Wallpaper” and “The Virgin Suicides” are told in first-person. The former, singular and the latter, plural. While the stories themselves are different in terms of plot and content, the narrative used is actually very similar, and the narrators share similar characteristics and patterns through their respective stories. Both of the narrators in “The Yellow Wallpaper” and “The Virgin Suicides” suffer from a neurosis of sorts, adding effectiveness to which the reader understands the story. The two narrators experience severe obsessive tendencies, talk about events that cause them to go back to a more immature state of mind, and both are ambiguous about themselves.
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In The Virgin Suicides, there is no character development of the narrators, as they serve solely to retell the story to the readers, even if they throw in their own opinions here and there. Therefore, there is no real need for the reader to know who the boys really are, as long as they can explain to us the story of the Lisbon girls. This just helps the reader get a side of the story that’s relatively unbiased, since it’s not from the Lisbon girls themselves. This is contrary to The Yellow Wallpaper, where the ambiguity of the narrator actually adds an important element to the story: mystery. We never find out the name of the narrator, nor much of her background, history, or even what is to become of her once the story is over. The only clues we get are from slight mentions by herself, her husband, her sister-in-law and from a single line spoken near the end of the story: “‘I’ve got out at last,” said I, ‘in spite of you and Jane?’…” (Gilman, 656). This line could possibly mention her name, however, it could also be a misprint of her sister-in-law’s name, Jennie, but it could also be our final clue into who she was before her spiral into madness through her time in the rest
Both stories were written different years, but both are written about women in the same era. When women went against the norm during the era the stories were written in they were often looked down on. Especially, Emily, who never married and because she was never married she was constantly judged by the women and men in her city. During that time it was odd for women not to be married. Emily eventually found someone, but it was known that he was a homosexual. The narrator in The Yellow Wallpaper was told what not to do by her husband and his sister. She was forced to write in secret, for
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
Kate Chopin’s “The Story of the Hour” and Charlotte Perkins Gillman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper” are viewed from a woman’s perspective in the nineteenth century. They show the issues on how they are confined to the house. That they are to be stay at home wives and let the husband earn the household income. These stories are both written by American women and how their marriage was brought about. Their husbands were very controlling and treated them more like children instead of their wives. In the nineteenth century their behavior was considered normal at the time. In “The Story of the Hour” and “The Yellow Wallpaper,” both women explore their issues on wanting to be free from the control of their husband’s.
Charlotte Perkins Gilman's The Yellow Wallpaper is partly autobiographical and it illustrates the fight for selfhood by a women in an oppressed and oppressive environment. In the story, the narrator is not allowed to write or think, basically becoming more dysfunctional as she is entrapped in a former nursery room where bars adorn the windows and the bed is nailed to the floor. In this story there is an obstinacy on behalf of the narrator as she tries to go around her husband's and physician's restrictions, however, there is no resisting the oppressive nature of her environment and she finally surrenders to madness even though it represents some kind of selfhood and resistance because it allows her to escape her oppression, "She obsesses about the yellow wallpaper, in which she sees frightful patterns and an imprisoned female figure trying to emerge. The narrator finally escapes from her controlling husband and the intolerable confines of her existence by a final descent into insanity as she peels the wallpaper off and bars her husband from the room" (Gilman, 1999, 1).
The "Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Gilman is a great story about the repression of women in the late 1800's but is still representative of issues faced by women today. She writes from her own personal experiences and conveys a message that sometimes in a male dominated society women suffer from the relentless power that some men implement over women.
MacPike, Loralee. "Environment as Psychopathological Symbolism in 'The Yellow Wallpaper.’” Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism, edited by Thomas J. Schoenberg, vol. 201, Gale, 2008. Literature Resource Center, go.galegroup.com.gmclibrary.idm.oclc.org/ps/i.do?p=LitRC&sw=w&u=mill30389&v=2.1&it=r&id=GALE%7CH1420082948&asid=562f132388d74c4bd92439b5842a2fe7. Accessed 25 Oct. 2017.
Symbolism plays a major role in The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Several symbols are used to show the oppression of women by men as well as the struggle against that male dominated society. While there are a plethera of symbols that could be cited from the text to support this, there are a few especially important symbols throughout the story that lend support to the woman's suffrage theme. The wallpaper itself is symbolic of the mental barrier that men attempted to place on women during the 1800s. The color yellow is often associated with illness or weakness, and the writer's mysterious sickness is a symbol of man's oppression of the female sex. The two windows from which the writer loooks out of, observing the world but not participating in it, represent the possibilities of women if seen as equals by the opposite sex. The yellow wallpaper, about which the writer says, "I never saw a worse paper in my life," is a symbol of the mental restrictions that men attempted to enforce upon women (pg 423). Gilman writes, "The color is hideous enough, and unreliable enough, ...
I think that the first person point of view for the story "The Yellow Wallpaper" and the third person point of view for the story "Sweat" match well with each story. In "The Yellow Wallpaper" the narrator has a mental illness, and so the first person narration flows really nicely with this notion. The readers get an inside look at the narrator's thought process and ideas, which I think would be harder to convey and comprehend if the narration were to be in third person. This completely contrasts the beginning of the story "Sweat" the readers are immediately introduced to the setting and characters, whereas in "The Yellow Wallpaper" we never even really learn the narrator's name.
The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman can be perceived in a few different ways. Greg Johnson wrote an article describing his own perception of what he believed the short story meant. In doing so, it can be noticed that his writing aligns well with what can be perceived from Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s story. The narrator Jane, experiences many things throughout Gilman’s story, which Johnson describes thoroughly. It is because of these descriptive points that allow Johnsons article to be a convincing argument. The main ideas that Johnson depicts that are supported and I agree with from the story include Janes developing imaginative insight, her husband and sister-in-law’s belief on domestic control, and her gained power through unconsciousness.
In literature, women are often depicted as weak, compliant, and inferior to men. The nineteenth century was a time period where women were repressed and controlled by their husband and other male figures. Charlotte Gilman, wrote "The Yellow Wallpaper," showing her disagreement with the limitations that society placed on women during the nineteenth century. According to Edsitement, the story is based on an event in Gilman’s life. Gilman suffered from depression, and she went to see a physician name, Silas Weir Mitchell. He prescribed the rest cure, which then drove her into insanity. She then rebelled against his advice, and moved to California to continue writing. She then wrote “The Yellow Wallpaper,” which is inflated version of her experience. In "The Yellow Wallpaper," the main character is going through depression and she is being oppressed by her husband and she represents the oppression that many women in society face. Gilman illustrates this effect through the use of symbols such as the yellow wallpaper, the nursery room, and the barred windows.
The setting of these two stories emphasize, on visually showing us how the main characters are based around trying to find freedom despite the physical, mental and emotional effects of living in confinement. While on the other hand, dealing with Psychology’s ugly present day behavior showing dystopia of societies views of women during the time period they lived.
Emily and the narrator both face issues pertaining to their identity in the short stories. Both take place in different settings although both women are essentially imprisoned in their houses. The two women are at very different places in life. In “A Rose for Emily,” she is young in the beginning and it ends with her being an old woman. “The Yellow Wallpaper,” focuses on the narrator when she is middle aged woman, it takes place over the course of just a few months. Both stories give different outlooks on the women as “The Yellow Wallpaper” is written in first person while “A Rose for Emily” is written in third person. Nonetheless, it is seen that the lives of both women are similar in certain ways yet different in other aspects.
"The Yellow Wallpaper," by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, tells the story of a woman's descent into madness as a result of the "rest and ignore the problem cure" that is frequently prescribed to cure hysteria and nervous conditions in women. More importantly, the story is about control and attacks the role of women in society. The narrator of the story is symbolic for all women in the late 1800s, a prisoner of a confining society. Women are expected to bear children, keep house and do only as they are told. Since men are privileged enough to have education, they hold jobs and make all the decisions. Thus, women are cast into the prison of acquiescence because they live in a world dominated by men. Since men suppress women, John, the narrator's husband, is presumed to have control over the protagonist. Gilman, however, suggests otherwise. She implies that it is a combination of society's control as well as the woman's personal weakness that contribute to the suppression of women. These two factors result in the woman's inability to make her own decisions and voice opposition to men.
Set in 1970s Michigan, The Virgin Suicides (1999) tells the story of the five Lisbon sisters from the perspective of four neighborhood boys, whose narration throughout the movie describes the girls’ lives, personalities, and deaths. Therese, Mary, Bonnie, Lux, and Cecilia Lisbon (listed oldest to youngest) live at home with their two overly strict and protective parents. The film opens up with thirteen-year-old Cecilia attempting to kill herself by slitting her wrists in the bathtub. Cecilia’s psychiatrist claims that it was simply a cry for attention, and that she didn’t intend to succeed. He suggests the girls be allowed to participate in social events, and stresses that it would benefit them to be around
Gender roles seem to be as old as time and have undergone constant, but sometime subtle, revisions throughout generations. Gender roles can be defined as the expectations for the behaviors, duties and attitudes of male and female members of a society, by that society. The story, “The Yellow Wallpaper,” is a great example of this. There are clear divisions between genders. The story takes place in the late nineteenth century where a rigid distinction between the domestic role of women and the active working role of men exists (“Sparknotes”). The protagonist and female antagonists of the story exemplify the women of their time; trapped in a submissive, controlled, and isolated domestic sphere, where they are treated as fragile and unstable children while the men dominate the public working sphere.