Historical Treatment In The Yellow Wallpaper By Charlotte Perkins Gilman

1016 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Literary analysis of yellow wallpaper

The 19th century was a remarkable era for the advancement of technology, marking the creation of the cotton gin, light bulb, telegraph, steam locomotive, and other notable inventions that revolutionized the lives of Americans forever. However, with all of these incredible technological advancements, physicians still created ill-informed theories about the rationale behind mental illness. Men, women, and children in the 1800s could be medically diagnosed as "mentally ill” if they showed any signs of religious excitement, domestic unhappiness, physical sickness, or jealousy, whereas today these diagnoses would be seen as foolish and injudicious. In "The Yellow Wallpaper", Charlotte Perkins Gilman gives an insight into the historical treatment …show more content…

After the birth of her daughter Katharine, she developed postpartum depression which usually arises as a result of hormonal changes, psychological adjustment to motherhood, and fatigue. For years, she battled with this disorder suffering from “a severe and continuous nervous breakdown tending to melancholia - and beyond” until going to an infamous neurologist by the name of Silas Weir Mitchell. Weir advised Gilman to abide by his rest cure, forbidding her from working another day in her life. “..He concluded there was nothing much the matter with me and he sent me home with solemn advice to ‘live as domestic life as far as possible (245)”. Like the narrator in “The Yellow Wallpaper” this did not make Gilman better but worsened her distress. She obeyed the doctor’s directions only for over three months before she came “so near the border line of utter mental ruin that [she] could see over” (245). Then she abandoned the rest cure and moved to California, divorced her husband, remarried, and dedicated herself to the world of literature and politics (232). Unlike Gilman, the narrator succumbs to insanity at the end of the story. Gilman uses this alternative ending to her story to alert national attention to the problem of the resting cure and not “drive people crazy, but to people from being crazy” (246). And it worked. By 1850, postpartum depression was nationally acknowledged by medical professionals as a disorder

Show More
Related

  • Setting And Oppression In The Yellow Wallpaper, By Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    797 Words  | 2 Pages

    Have you at any point been secured a dim wardrobe? You grab about attempting to feel the doorknob, stressing to see a thin light emission originating from underneath the entryway. As the obscurity expends you, you feel as though you will choke. There is a vibe of powerlessness and misery. Forlornness, caused by persecution, resembles a similar haziness that surpasses its casualty. Charlotte Perkins Gilman, in "The Yellow Wallpaper," describes the account of a youthful mother who goes to a mid-year home to "rest" from her apprehensive condition. Her room is an old nursery secured with terrible, yellow backdrop. The additional time she burns through alone, the more she winds up plainly fixated on the backdrop's examples. She starts to envision a lady in jail in the paper. At last, she loses her rational soundness and trusts that she is the lady in the backdrop, attempting to get away. In "The Yellow Wallpaper," the author utilizes setting and imagery to recommend that detaining persecution causes a kind of depression (in ladies) that can prompt a lethal type of madness.

    Read More

  • The Narrator of The Yellow Wallpaper

    832 Words  | 2 Pages

    Gilman tries to show that according to her husband, the narrator continually brings her great depression upon herself. The author, Charlotte Perkins Gilman also attempts to show that the lack of social exposure, physical repression, and ugly wallpaper cause the treatment to be extremely ineffective and detrimental. The disorder which is being treated is actually strengthened to the point of a serious mental illness. Similarly in today’s society, medical and psychological advice may have the same effect. Medical technology and practice have progressed considerably since the time of the “Yellow Wallpaper.” This is not to say that today’s physicians are infallible. Perhaps some of today’s treatments are the “Yellow Wallpaper” of the future .

    Read More

  • The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    1488 Words  | 3 Pages

    would not say it to a living soul, of course, but this is dead paper

    Read More

  • Schizophrenia in The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    960 Words  | 2 Pages

    Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s "The Yellow Wall-Paper," does more than just tell the story of a woman who suffers at the hands of 19th century quack medicine. Gilman created a protagonist with real emotions and a real psych that can be examined and analyzed in the context of modern psychology. In fact, to understand the psychology of the unnamed protagonist is to be well on the way to understanding the story itself. "The Yellow Wall-Paper," written in first-person narrative, charts the psychological state of the protagonist as she slowly deteriorates into schizophrenia (a disintegration of the personality).

    Read More

  • The Yellow Wall Paper, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    987 Words  | 2 Pages

    The “Yellow Wall Paper “ by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, is a chilling study and experiment of mental disorder in nineteenth century. This is a story of a miserable wife, a young woman in anguish, stress surrounding her in the walls of her bedroom and under the control of her husband doctor, who had given her the treatment of isolation and rest. This short story vividly reflects both a woman in torment and oppression as well as a woman struggling for self expression.

    Read More

  • The Deeper Meaning of The Yellow Wallpaper

    1250 Words  | 3 Pages

    Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story, "The Yellow Wallpaper," is the disheartening tale of a woman suffering from postpartum depression. Set during the late 1890s, the story shows the mental and emotional results of the typical "rest cure" prescribed during that era and the narrator’s reaction to this course of treatment. It would appear that Gilman was writing about her own anguish as she herself underwent such a treatment with Dr. Silas Weir Mitchell in 1887, just two years after the birth of her daughter Katherine. The rest cure that the narrator in "The Yellow Wallpaper" describes is very close to what Gilman herself experienced; therefore, the story can be read as reflecting the feelings of women like herself who suffered through such treatments. Because of her experience with the rest cure, it can even be said that Gilman based the narrator in "The Yellow Wallpaper" loosely on herself. But I believe that expressing her negative feelings about the popular rest cure is only half of the message that Gilman wanted to send. Within the subtext of this story lies the theme of oppression: the oppression of the rights of women especially inside of marriage. Gilman was using the woman/women behind the wallpaper to express her personal views on this issue.

    Read More

  • The Yellow Wallpaper: Women’s Rights in the Nineteenth Century

    2676 Words  | 6 Pages

    Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s tantalizing short story, “The Yellow Wallpaper,” tells the horrifying tale of a nineteenth century woman whose husband condemns her to a rest cure, a popular approach during the era to treat post-partum depression. Although John, the unnamed narrator’s husband, does not truly believe his wife is ill, he ultimately condemns her to mental insanity through his treatment. The story somewhat resembles Gilman’s shocking personal biography, namely the rest cure she underwent under the watchful eye of Dr. Silas Weir Mitchell in 1887, two years after the birth of her daughter, Katherine. Superficially, the rest cure the narrator in "The Yellow Wallpaper" endures loosely replicates Gilman’s personal anguish as she underwent such a treatment. More complexly, however, the story both accentuates and indirectly criticizes the oppression women faced in both marriage and motherhood.

    Read More

  • How Is Women Inequality In The Late 1800s

    1252 Words  | 3 Pages

    In the short story “The Yellow Wallpaper,” Gilman includes a variation of elements for the reader to try to comprehend the story. However, sickness and gender are associated together. Gilman is a woman from the 19th century that suffered from postpartum depression. Also, back in the 1800s society viewed women as the weaker sex. Carmine Esposito states that: the behaviors women experienced in the 1800s would not be viewed as an illness in men (“Illness”). Therefore, women were more prone to diseases such as the infamous nervous depression. As a part of the cure physicians prescribed that patients stay completely isolated from events that would actively stimulate the brain. According to Esposito, requirements for the “rest cure” stated that patients should avoid physical activity and be completely isolated from the tendency to overthink (“Illness”). Likewise, in “The ...

    Read More

  • Analysis Of The Yellow Wallpaper By Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    913 Words  | 2 Pages

    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.

    Read More

  • The Meaning of the Wallpaper in The Yellow Wallpaper, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    737 Words  | 2 Pages

    The short story titled, “The Yellow Wallpaper” is given its name for no other reason than the disturbing yellow wallpaper that the narrator comes to hate so much; it also plays as a significant symbol in the story. The wallpaper itself can represent many various ideas and circumstances, and among them, the sense of feeling trapped, the impulse of creativity gone awry, and what was supposed to be a simple distraction transfigures into an unhealthy obsession. By examining the continuous references to the yellow wallpaper itself, one can begin to notice how their frequency develops the plot throughout the course of the story. As well as giving the reader an understanding as to why the wallpaper is a more adequate and appropriate symbol to represent the lady’s confinement and the deterioration of her mental and emotional health. In Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper”, the color of the wallpaper symbolizes the internal and external conflicts of the narrator that reflect the expectations and treatment of the narrator, as well as represent the sense of being controlled in addition to the feeling of being trapped.

    Read More

  • Conflict In The Yellow Wallpaper, By Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    1169 Words  | 3 Pages

    Can a story contain more than one antagonist? In “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman there is an overwhelming amount of conflict the unnamed narrator must endure. The protagonist of “The Yellow Wallpaper” is the narrator who is suffering from depression and is taken to a house for the summer to rest. In “The Yellow Wallpaper”, the wallpaper is the antagonist because it causes the narrator to have a breakdown at the end of the short story; John, the narrator’s husband, cannot be the antagonist because he is doing what he believes is best for her, and the narrator cannot be the antagonist because she wants to improve her mental state.

    Read More

  • Realism In The Yellow Wallpaper

    1462 Words  | 3 Pages

    Charlotte Perkins Gilman experienced a relatively similar life story to the life of the narrator in “The Yellow Wallpaper”. She was prescribed the same “rest cure” as the narrator that subsequently led to a mental breakdown. The prescribed “rest cure” entails minimal human contact, repressed imagination, and female confinement. Comparatively, persistently being told that you are insane especially if you’re not, may drive someone to actually become psychotic.

    Read More

  • The Relationship of The Yellow Wallpaper to the Life of Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    1118 Words  | 3 Pages

    "The Yellow Wallpaper" became significant not only in literature, but also socially, it was a current issue that Gilman was relating to at the time. Gilman sought medical help from the famous neurologist S. W. Mitchell for her slight depression. Mitchell, who prescribed his famous "rest cure", that restricted women from doing anything that labored and taxed their minds, and for Gilman, her writing. More than just a psychological study of postpartum depression, Gilman's "The Yellow...

    Read More

  • Response to The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    809 Words  | 2 Pages

    The woman behind this work of literature portrays the role of women in the society during that period of time. "The Yellow Wallpaper" written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, is a well written story describing a woman who suffers from insanity and how she struggles to express her own thoughts and feelings. The author uses her own experience to criticize male domination of women during the nineteenth century. Although the story was written fifty years ago, "The Yellow Wallpaper" still brings a clear message how powerless women were during that time.

    Read More

  • The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    1150 Words  | 3 Pages

    Charlotte Perkins Gilman wrote The Yellow Wallpaper in 1890 about her experience in a psychiatric hospital. The doctor she had prescribed her “the rest cure” to get over her condition (Beekman). Gilman included the name of the sanitarium she stayed at in the piece as well which was named after the doctor that “treated” her. The short story was a more exaggerated version of her month long stay at Weir Mitchell and is about a woman whose name is never revealed and she slowly goes insane under the watch of her doctor husband and his sister (The Yellow Wallpaper 745). Many elements of fiction were utilized by Gilman in this piece to emphasize the theme freedom and confinement. Three of the most important elements are symbolism, setting and character.

    Read More

More about Historical Treatment In The Yellow Wallpaper By Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Open Document