Charlotte Perkins Gilman's The Yellow Wallpaper

The feminist masterpiece

Back to 1800s, in U.S and all over the world, women did not have equal rights and freedom as men. Their main roles are wives and moms, doing household and take care of family. In that scene, Charlotte Perkins Gilman wrote “The Yellow Wallpaper” based on her own experience in 1892. Gilman suffered from postpartum depression after have her first daughter, and she was treated by her husband with “rest cure” method, but it did not work at all. Instead, this method made her illness became worse, and the result is she got obsesses to the wallpaper. In “The Yellow Wallpaper”, Gilman shows to readers how bad the situations of women in 19th century. Through this story, author wants to talks about the subordination of women in

life, so women cannot live as themselves, and there was no solution for them.
First of all, women in “The Yellow Wallpaper” time depend completely on their husbands.

In this story, the protagonist’s husband, John, controls everything around her. He decides where she can live, what she can do, when she can go out…. John dismisses everything that his wife asks for. The narrator is forced to live in a house which she does not want to. She declares the house is "haunted…there is something queer about it" (765). She wants to move out to another space where she feel more comfortable, similar to her desire to have a new life, escape from her marriage. However, her husband does not accept her require, and neither the whole society do not think that’s what she can do. When she expresses her feeling about the house, he said that “what I felt was a draught” (766). She is imprisoned as her husband puts her on the top room, to avoid her of escaping. When the narrator wants to move to another room, says that the wallpaper in her bedroom disturbs her, he thinks that was not correct and refuse to replace the wallpaper. When she suggests to come and see her cousin Henry, her husband denies immediately. Besides, John does not believe that his wife is an independent person has creative and own thought. He thinks she is like a child, calling her “blessed little goose” and “little girl”.

Clearly, he does not seem her like a mature woman who has self idea and opinion. He does not understand her “he doesn't know how much I really suffer” or “I cannot be with him. It makes me so nervous” (767). John always think he is right. When the narrator tries to talk with him about her situation, she cries, and he interprets her tears as evidences that she can’t make decision for herself. John shows no attempt to do what his wife desires. He takes away her writing, which she thinks is helping her better, but he thinks will confuse her and corrupt her imagination. He believes his method is right, no matter how his wife express. After all, John thinks he is the main role in family, so he looks everything through his eyes and support that his wife’s life is satisfactory no matter how she expresses and tries to talk to him.
Moreover, woman in that society do not have a choice to be themselves. They cannot express their idea and ability as well as their ambitious. From the beginning of story, the narrator does not have a name. She is known as John’s wife, an anonymous as any other wife during that time. In everyday life, the wife just likes a shadow, and follow her husband as Gilman says, “he hardly lets me stir without special direction” (766). She follows her husband’s rule by stay in the room whole day, do not have any activities. She also doesn't have a change to show her real ambitious, her ideas. She has to hide her writing, like others need to hide their work, their ambitious from families, as she mentions, “there comes John, and I must put this away” (766). She cries all the time, but “I don't when John is here, or anybody else, but when I am alone” (769). She only be herself when she’s alone. She also knows what she should do, but she cannot express it. Like she thinks “John is a physician…perhaps that is one reason I do not get well faster” (765) She understand her illness, and she knows that his treatment does not work, but why she did not tell him all about that? Is that because she does not have a voice in this family? When “he doesn't believe I’m sick…what can one do?” (765) Especially, there is not only her husband, her brother – another man – “says the same thing” (765). All these details show that men’s voices are much more worthy in that period of time. She even accepts her husband’s explanation “can you not trust a physician when I tell you so?” (771) and then feels ashamed when thinking his method is wrong “he takes all care from me, and I feel basely ungrateful not to value it more” (766). She feels guilty for follow her husband’s guide, so she seems like “a comparative burden already” (768). Also, the protagonist has her own idea “congenial work, with excitement and change, would do me good”. That is the dreams of all women at that time. However, she cannot do so. She has no one to talk to, no one to share her feeling or discuss. Even Jennie, her sister in-law, also stays in John’s side, does what he tells with no reaction. The narrator is expelled from human contact to dedicate her life to her husband.
Furthermore, woman in 19th century do not have any solution for their lives.

In this story, the protagonist has to escape herself inside the wallpaper. Usually, wallpaper is the symbol of women, both are pretty and fixture inside rooms. Women are expected to tend to the housework and the family - and do not go out to work as free as husbands. The wallpaper here is the barriers to women to join the outside world. When the narrator looks out the window, she sees the beautiful world out side, but she can only watch them. This symbol window may be a view of possibilities. The world outside is everything that she could have, but she never has them. That’s why the narrator sinks into the wallpaper. Besides, she can see that the women in the wall paper is just like her. They both have a shape but so not have real lives, “sometimes I think there are a great many women behind, and sometimes only one, and she crawls around fast, and her crawling shakes it all over”, but “nobody could climb through the pattern” (773). When she sees “many women,” it means not only one woman like her, but all of them are not allowed to express themselves. They cannot climb through it, and they are struggle in feeling of imprisoned in their own lives and unable to escape. Sympathize with these women, the protagonist tries to tear out of the domesticated prison of the wallpaper, let all of women there free. To do that, she needs to avoid both her husband and her sister in law. That means not only her

husband restrict her freedom, but also the whole society. Finally, she gets free “I’ve got out at last ... in spite of you and Jane. I’ve pulled off most of the paper, so you can’t put me back” (775). That is the freedom in hopeless for all women without having a solution at that time.
In “The Yellow Wallpaper”, Gilman suggests that women do not have equal rights and freedom as men, and they cannot live for themselves, but there is no way for them to escape. This story is a voice of female, encourages the society to help women have a chance to work, to grow and connect with outside. The wallpaper is the symbol of all women at that time searching for freedom. At the end of story, the narrator of “The Yellow Wallpaper” is not free because she remains physically locked in a room. Anyway, the narrator finally chooses to speak up and expresses herself. Thus, the narrator encourages woman to do everything to satisfy emptiness and desire to control herself, instead of accept the life. To do so, women also need the help from the whole society, to encourage them and remove the barrier around them.