Defiance of Gender-Based Work Ethics in Bartleby and The Yellow Wallpaper
The issue of gender was influential for writers in the 19th century, as Herman Melville and Charlotte Perkins Gilman explore in their pieces. In "Bartleby," Herman Melville presents Bartleby as an employed scrivener, copying documents for the narrator. This form of labor is appropriate for Bartleby according to 19th-century society, which supported and approved of the male professional writer. However, he refuses this duty and challenges the standards held by society through his "I-would-prefer-not-to" statements, reinforcing his individualism.
On the other hand, in "The Yellow Wallpaper," the female narrator is expected and ordered not to work or write by her family and society. But just as Bartleby refuses the expectations set upon him, so does "Wallpaper's" narrator. This reverses "Bartleby's" situation - culture does not want her to write, but she does so anyway. According to Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the 19th-century female writer is suppressed and discouraged by the males of the era - an idea further supported by Richard Polwhele's poem "The Unsex'd Females." In his piece, Polwhele denounces the female writer and criticizes her advancement in the literary world.
Therefore, although both Bartleby and "Wallpaper's" narrator have labor standards to live with, through their defiance of these 19th-century ethics, they present themselves as individuals through the work of writing. In the case of "Bartleby," many examples imply the acceptance of writing as a male profession. Firstly, all of the people in the office are men. On the other hand, the female writer in "The Yellow Wallpaper" individualizes herself by working when she is not supposed to be and by being the alleged unnatural woman that Polwhele describes. She defies what is socially acceptable and chooses to express herself through writing. The end result is the same - both characters grow as individuals through their social dissent.
Works Cited
Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. "The Yellow Wallpaper and Other Stories." New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1997.
Melville, Herman. "Bartleby and Benito Cereno." New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1990.
Polwhele, Richard. “The Unsex’d Females.” Women of the Romantic Period. 27 April 2001 <http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~worp/worp.html>.
"Hysteric." Webster's New World Dictionary. 3rd College ed. New York: Prentice Hall, 1994.
When Paul's father took him out of school and demanded he not work or see anyone at the Theatre, I believe it was at this point of the story that he took away apart of Paul's life, his fantasy life. He took away Paul's meaning of life and put him back into the reality, the world Paul did not like because for him it was the instruments, the music and the lights, as well as, his job responsibilities which made him feel like someone special.
In the 19th century, women were not seen in society as being an equal to men. Men were responsible for providing and taking care of the family while their wives stayed at home not allowed leaving without their husbands. In The Yellow Wallpaper, Charlotte Perkins Gilman writes about a woman named Jane who is trapped by society’s cage and tries to find herself. Throughout the story, the theme of self-discovery is developed through the symbols of the nursery, the journal and the wallpaper.
Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. “The Yellow Wallpaper”. The Story and Its Writer. Ann Charters. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2011. 462-473. Print.
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Paul’s teachers believed his carnation to show is apathetic feelings towards being suspended from school because they “felt was not properly significant of the contrite spirit befitting a boy under the ban of suspension” (10). Paul’s callousness towards school came from the fact that it did not harmonize with his daydreams, it was too dull for him, so his bright red carnation perfectly demonstrates his disinterest in the traditional world, including school. He wanted to live in a vivacious world, like New York City, he even says that he has a “morbid desire for cool things and soft lights and fresh flowers” (8). These flowers even exist artificially as well, “...whole flower gardens blooming under glass cases, against the sides of which the snowflakes stuck and melted; violets, roses, carnations, lilies of the valley—somehow vastly more lovely and alluring that they blossomed thus unnaturally in the snow” (19). These flowers represent Paul living in his imagination, the flowers only bloom under glass, just as Paul only blooms in his fantasy. These flowers couldn’t exist naturally, just as Paul eventually couldn’t exist in reality. Cather shows us how this inability to exist in the real world is disastrous when “The carnations in his coat were drooping with the cold, he noticed; their red glory all over” (27). The carnations died as Paul was ready to commit suicide, which displays how when something is stuck in an artificial world, it is destroyed when it finally faces
The Yellow Wallpaper was written as a realism story. It showed how woman felt they had the same opportunities as men in their personal choices. In this story, the woman expressed her worries to her husband who through good intentions, required that his wife stay in bed 24/7, and not do any of the things she would normally do. In effect his wife became worse until she reached the limit. The behavior of the husband at this time was completely normal. Men were the higher power over women and women, like the one in this story, felt that they couldn?t stand count for themselves.
In Willa Cather’s Paul’s Case, is about a young boy that is depressed about his life, and loves his job in a theater, because he He is looking for fame, wealth and is not interested in his studies; when he is discovered by his lies he ends up committing suicide. The meeting between his teachers and Paul shows his indifferent and rebellious attitude. There is no good relationship between Paul and his father. He is not happy with himself and does not accept his reality. In his attempt to live a false life he makes many mistakes. He does not enjoy being in school or at home, he just feels good in the theater where he works and in New York. The theme in this story is the American dream. The subthemes are: materialism, ambition, rebellion, adolescence,
Wage inequalities are not a result of women’s qualifications or choices. Wage discrimination persists despite women’s increased educational attainment, greater level of experience in workforce, and decreased amount of time spent out of the workforce raising children.
In "Paul's Case," Willa Cather manages to apply the emotions, feelings, troubles, and thoughts of modern society, allowing the reader to relate to the story. By incorporating the same heavy burdens that bother and aggravate people in their daily lives, Willa explores the pain and treatment unwanted people experience. Obviously, nobody wants to feel rejection or alienation from the world, but instead they desire to encounter acceptance and agreement with the world's standards. In the story, the main character, Paul goes through excruciating transformations and lengths to try and impress the people around him. Attempting to belong in a superficial society, Paul loses a part of his identity without acknowledging it and therefore he strays from his own personality. Blinding himself from reality, Paul succumbs to the materialistic requirements of society, which contributes largely to his peculiar behavior.
The short story "The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman gives a brilliant description of the plight of the Victorian woman, and the mental agony that her and many other women were put through as "treatment" for depression when they found that they were not satisfied by the life they had been given.
... mechanism” to cope with his everyday pressures. Unlike the girl in “Boys and Girls”, Paul never did accept society’s idea of an educated, school-orientated adolescent. Rather, the lesson he learns is that he could have compromised, dealing with social pressures imposed upon him by simply “losing himself” and imagining a world of his own.
"Paul’s Case." Short Stories for Students. Ed. Kathleen Wilson. Vol. 2. Detroit: Gale, 1997. 192-209. Short Stories for Students. Gale. Web. 21 Jan. 2010.
“The Yellow Wallpaper” written by Charlotte Perkins-Gilman explores the oppression of women in the nineteenth century and the constant limitation of their freedom, which many times led to their confinement. The short story illustrates male superiority and the restriction of a woman’s choice regarding her own life. The author’s diction created a horrific and creepy tone to illustrate the supernatural elements that serve as metaphors to disguise the true meaning of the story. Through the use of imagery, the reader can see that the narrator is living within a social class, so even though the author is trying to create a universal voice for all women that have been similar situations, it is not possible. This is not possible because there are many
The film Pauls Case is by Lemont Johnson but is written by Willa Cather. Its about Paul, a sensitive high school student, felt very frustrated with his home life and his family's expectations that he would grow up to work in a factory or the steel mills as his father and most of his neighbors did. He was not close to anyone in his family and had no neighborhood or school friends. Instead, he spent his evenings ushering at the symphony hall or backstage at a local theater. Paul dreamed of living the life of the performers he saw. He was without discipline and without direction. He had problems at school and was surly when called before a school committee. Eventually he was pulled out of school and sent to work by his father. He devised a scheme to steal money from his employer and then ran away to New York City where he stayed at the Waldorf Astoria, living for a few days the life of his dreams. When he realized that he would have to return home and accept his punishment he killed himself. Paul felt like his father, his uncaring teachers and classmates weren’t worthy of his company.
"The Yellow Wallpaper" motivated the female mind of creativity and mental strength through a patriarchal order of created gender roles and male power during the nineteenth century and into the twentieth century. While John represented characteristics of a typical male of his time, the yellow wallpaper represented a controlling patriarchal society; a sin of inequality that a righteous traitor needed to challenge and win. As the wallpaper deteriorates, so does the suppressing effect that male hierarchy imposed on women. Male belief in their own hierarchy was not deteriorating. Females began to think out of line, be aware of their suppression, and fight patriarchal rule. The progression of the yellow wallpaper and the narrator, through out the story, leads to a small win over John. This clearly represents and motivates the first steps of a feminist movement into the twentieth century.