Gender Issues In The Yellow Wallpaper

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The short story "The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman perfectly portrays and embodies the suppression of late nineteenth-century married women in a male-dominated society which resulted in a whole class of people plagued by the severe mental ramifications of this defective structure. The plot greatly aligns with a personal experience the author (Gilman) had in which the constraint of her freedoms following the advice of her doctor drove her near the edge of madness, nearly making "The Yellow Wallpaper" a personal account of these events. During this period in the nineteenth-century women held very few legal rights and were actively expected to take on the role of homemaker and were often bombarded by oppressive gender stereotypes, …show more content…

Under the care of her husband and her doctor all creative endeavours and the like are completely withdrawn from the narrator using a classic medical practice known as the "rest cure" and she is misdiagnosed with a "nervousness (Gilman)" disorder and forced to suppress any urges to engage in them. Unfortunately, to the narrator self-expression is a necessity and a way of life and abhorring to this ridiculous medical practice is the narrator 's one safe haven. It 's this deprivation and the lack of any exterior stimulus which, "ultimately drives the narrator to dwell on the patterns of her wallpaper, which she initially detests (O 'Farrell)" and festers obsession. The declining state of her personal relationships only fan the flames for the narrator 's declining mental health. John (her husband) and Jennie (her step-sister) act as both caregivers and, in the narrator 's eyes, wardens who are adamant to carefully observe and control every aspect of her day-to-day life in order to ensure her complete "recovery". John in particular refuses to acknowledge the narrator 's capability for self-care and even unintentionally goes as far as to demean her to the role of a child when casually brushing off her protests. Despite this both John and Jennie have good intentions and unfortunately as Gilman describes, "her husband as one more victimized than victimizing (Hume)". Briefly the narrator also recognizes herself as the "woman" trapped in the wallpaper and admits that that same "woman" was "created and sustained by not only John, but women like Jane and herself (Hume)" who willingly allow and commend their mistreatment. It isn 't until the end of "The Yellow Wallpaper" that the narrator actively begins taking steps towards freeing herself from her confining lifestyle. Often

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