An Atmosphere of Uncertainty of Confusion in The Yellow Wallpaper

By looking at The Yellow Wallpaper, show how the writer achieves an

atmosphere of uncertainty and curiosity.

The author, Charlotte Perkins Gilman has invented a narrator who is

mentally disabled to tell the story. Charlotte Perkins Gilman is

talking about a woman who is ill and is slowly suffering in a room

because we believe that she may be anorexic so she is put in the room

with the yellow wall paper. We learn about her husband John who is a

doctor. The woman can not seem to communicate wit her husband about

how she feels because he would not believe her anyway. She is stuck in

their temporary home and becomes obsessed with the wall paper. The

fact is most likely that the narrator is very similar to the author.

Charlotte Perkins Gilman was a married woman who loved art-but she

fell into depression and the doctor prescribed a ‘rest cure’: “live as

domestic a life as possible... lies down an hour after each meal. Have

but two hours intellectual life a day. And never touch pen, brush, or

pencil as long as you live” The supposed ‘cure’ almost drove Charlotte

mad. She wrote The Yellow Wallpaper to show just how destructive

attitudes to women could be. In 1932 Charlotte found out she had

cancer and committed suicide.

We can not tell what is wrong with the woman because she is mentally

ill and some of her views do not make sense.

“ I have watched John when he did not know I was looking, and come

into the room most suddenly on the most innocent excuses, and ive

caught him several times looking at the paper! And Jennie too. I

caught Jennie with her hand on it once.”

The woman is making out as if John and Jennie are looking at the wall

paper in horror, but they are looking at what the woman had done to

...

... middle of paper ...

..., so when the woman behind the wall tries to escape, she can tie

it to her. She has also “escaped”, and when her husband John saw her,

he fainted.

“I’ve got out at last,” said I, “in spite of you and Jane. And I’ve

pulled off most of the paper, so you can’t put me back! Now why should

that man have fainted? But he did, and right across my path by the

wall, so that I had to creep over him every time!”

The woman is describing herself like the woman in the yellow wall

paper which makes it seem odd. It also doesn’t tell us exactly what

happened to the woman, but I believe she has committed suicide by

attaching the rope to herself.

“If that woman does get out, and tries to get away, I can tie her!”

Overall, the story is strange and shows curiosity and uncertainty. The

woman once hated to be stuck in the yellow wall paper, now loved to be

in that room.