Landfill By Gilman Analysis

1149 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Psychological themes in the yellow wallpaper

"Landfill" is based on what happened to Hector Jr. The story is about a nineteen - year- old college freshman boy who studied at Michigan State University in Grand Rapids. He wants to be accepted by others, for that, he has faced humiliation, ragging by his friends. He is living a struggling life where he is always trying hard to mix well with the other students. It is getting difficult for him to cope well with the fraternity he joined. He is bullied by his friends and on the same night of March25, while he is heavily intoxicated, he falls down in a trash chute and found dead in his fraternity house. A few weeks later, his body is discovered at the Tioga County landfill (Oates). Drinking is one of the causes people find of Hector to …show more content…

Moreover, the depressed mind can constantly fill with evil thoughts anything that hurts. As in Gilman, “ Yellow Wallpaper , the narrator, to make herself comfortable, she begins to get comfort and peace by watching the mysterious yellow wallpaper. She used to look at the wallpaper most of the times. Her mental problem makes her lonely and parted away from the family. “My darling, “said he, ‘I beg of you, for my sake and for our child’s sake, as well as for own, that you will never for one instant let that idea enter your mind! There is nothing so dangerous, so fascinating, to a temperament like yours. It is a false and foolish fancy. Can you not trust me as a physician when I tell you so?”. The narrator loves her husband, she knows her family is getting disturbed because of their illness. John, the narrator’s husband is trying to help her wife to cure the disease but she is getting more ill . Likewise, the problem is John wants her wife to be in his control. He is maintaining the relation his wife as a doctor and husband. He is unable to understand his wife and request her to take care of herself for their family, she needs to rid of their problem and stop doing this stupid thing. She needs to trust her husband but the narrator feels John wants to keep her in restrictions. On the other side, in Oats,” Landfill, Hector Jr, shows as a hopeless who …show more content…

She is losing her identity because of deep connection with the wallpaper. The narrator is not able to meet the standards or expectations people need to see in her. John, the narrator husband feels that his wife does not want to live the way he wants. She thinks her husband pushes away her creativity and writing skills. "The Yellow Wallpaper" shows the narrator wants to run away from the expectations and live in their own imaginative world which shows she is getting a lack of individualism and loses her own identity and taking the shadowed expressive identity and wants to get the shadow to be free. However, in Oats, “Landfill”, greedy to be accepted by others make Hector Jr. depressed. His mother blames her husband for coercing Hector to get into engineering. The difficult courses make him stressed adding on no one talk to him. He feels lonely, away from their family for the first time in his life. Hector shares a room with two other boys- Reb and Steve, never go out with him and never wants to be friendly with Hector Jr. “none of his Southfield High friends were at Grand Rapids - a town where his university locates. His classes were too large; his professors scarcely knew him” (616). Hector’s parents feel that he is lonely at the university .Hector’s high school friends do not accompany him for the university studies, classes are large as compared to high school classes , and nobody

Show More
Related

  • Similarities Between Sweat And The Yellow Wallpaper

    1256 Words  | 3 Pages

    The narrator, a new mother, is revoked of her freedom to live a free life and denied the fact that she is “sick”, perhaps with postpartum depression, by her husband, a physician, who believes whatever sorrows she is feeling now will pass over soon. The problematic part of this narrative is that this woman is not only kept isolated in a room she wishes to have nothing to do with, but her creative expression is revoked by her husband as we can see when she writes: “there comes John, and I must put this away, - he hates to have me write a word (Gilman,

    Read More

  • Isolation In The Yellow Wallpaper

    1614 Words  | 4 Pages

    The husband and brother of the narrator are physicians, and neither believe that she is sick, they say “there is really nothing the matter with one but temporary nervous depression—a slight hysterical tendency.” (The Yellow Wallpaper, Charlotte Perkins Gilman) and so she is confined mentally, with what they tell her to do, although she thinks there are other things that would fare her better. As the story continues she begins to have more delusions and the wallpaper in her room begins to come alive. But the most alarming effects were the hallucinations.”

    Read More

  • Control in The Yellow Wallpaper

    993 Words  | 2 Pages

    To initiate on the theme of control I will proceed to speak about the narrators husband, who has complete control over her. Her husband John has told her time and time again that she is sick; this can be viewed as control for she cannot tell him otherwise for he is a physician and he knows better, as does the narrator’s brother who is also a physician. At the beginning of the story she can be viewed as an obedient child taking orders from a professor, and whatever these male doctors say is true. The narrator goes on to say, “personally, I disagree with their ideas” (557), that goes without saying that she is not very accepting of their diagnosis yet has no option to overturn her “treatment” the bed rest and isolation. Another example of her husband’s control would be the choice in room in which she must stay in. Her opinion is about the room she stays in is of no value. She is forced to stay in a room she feels uneasy about, but John has trapped her in this particular room, where the windows have bars and the bed is bolted to the floor, and of course the dreadful wall paper, “I never worse paper in my life.” (558) she says. Although she wishes to switch rooms and be in one of the downstairs rooms one that, “opened on the piazza and had roses all over the window. ...” (558). However, she knows that, “John would not hear of it.”(558) to change the rooms.

    Read More

  • A Feminist in Action in The Yellow Wallpaper

    1794 Words  | 4 Pages

    The narrator makes comments and observations that demonstrate her will to overcome the oppression of the male dominant society. The conflict between her views and those of the society can be seen in the way she interacts physically, mentally, and emotionally with the three most prominent aspects of her life: her husband, John, the yellow wallpaper in her room, and her illness, "temporary nervous depression. " In the end, her illness becomes a method of coping with the injustices forced upon her as a woman. As the reader delves into the narrative, a progression can be seen from the normality the narrator displays early in the passage, to the insanity she demonstrates near the conclusion.

    Read More

  • The Traditional Gender Roles in The Yellow Wall by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    778 Words  | 2 Pages

    ...e his wife tearing the yellow paper like manic and creeping over him to tear the yellow wallpaper symbolizes the power now Jane has over her husband shifting the traditional gender roles even though it temporary .The tearing of the yellow wallpaper symbolizes Jane’s traditional gender role of being an obedient wife was a imprison to her l health .Jane felt trapped without a voice and not being able to do anything but to obey reflects her imprisonment to the woman trapped in the yellow wallpaper and the need to be free. In which in her own way she escapes her traditional gender role by letting the woman out and taking control of her husband when she locks the door and he faints.

    Read More

  • Analysis of John in The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins

    840 Words  | 2 Pages

    The character of the husband, John, in “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman is introduced as a respected physician and a caring husband who strives to improve the mental health of his wife, the narrator, who is diagnosed with temporary nervous condition. John tries throughout the story to apply professional treatment methods and medications in his approach to helping his wife gain strength. However, his patient, his wife, seems to disregard John’s professional opinions and act as if she is following his advices only during his awakening presence with her. The narrator seems to be in need of John’s positive opinion about the status of her mental condition in order to avoid the criticism even though she disagrees with his treatment methodology. John, without doubt, cares for his wife and her wellbeing, but he does not realize how his treatment method negatively impacts their relationship his wife’s progress towards gaining strength. Although John was portrayed as a caring and a loving physician and husband to the narrator through out most of the story, he was also suggested as being intrusive and directive to a provoking level in the mind of the narrator.

    Read More

  • The Repression of Women in The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    833 Words  | 2 Pages

    The narrator is afflicted with temporary nervous depression. She makes it evident that this affliction is due to her repression by her husband, John. He has total control over her thoughts and feelings, her health, and over her life. He does not take her seriously and laughs at her but, in this society, “one expects that”. (Gilman 1) He controls every aspect of her life. He forces her to stay in a room which she despises, and consequently, drives her insane. Gilman builds up the story to convey her feelings of the repercussions a woman faces in total supervision and domination by a man. She follows her husband’s counsel of total bed rest, but deep within her, she knows this will be her destruction. However, as characteristic of a woman of this time period, she obediently accommodates the demands of the man. This leaves her no choice, but to subject herself to the anguish of being totally alone in a room with ghastly yellow wallpaper.

    Read More

  • Effect Of Oppression In Yellow Wallpaper

    902 Words  | 2 Pages

    Even though her husband treats her with what seem at first as love, it becomes clear she is nothing more to him than a piece of property. Every time he talks to her, he asks her to get better for his sake and the children's, and only after mentions hers interests. He doesn't think that she has any normal human feelings or worries and attributes her behavior to minor nervous depression. He doesn't see her true suffering since he believes "there is no reason to suffer" (574). He could never understand that a woman can be unsatisfied with the role imposed on her by society. Even though the heroine recognizes that her condition is caused by something other than John's theory, she is too scared to voice her opinion.

    Read More

  • How Is The Narrator Trapped In The Yellow Wallpaper

    725 Words  | 2 Pages

    The narrator is ordered by her husband, who is serving as her physician as well, that she is “absolutely forbidden to work” and instead get “perfect rest,” and “all the air” the narrator can get (Gilman, 549). The narrator is confined to spend her time in a room which is playing tricks on her mind until she can no longer identify reality from her imagination. Another cause of the narrator’s loneliness is her husband’s rare presence at home due to his work as a physician, “away all day, and even some nights when his cases are serious,” leaving the narrator with his sister, who even then also leaves the narrator alone most of the time (Gilman, 550). The narrator falls into a state of insanity because she hardly had anyone with her to normally interact with. The only interaction she did have was that of the yellow wallpaper which constantly plagued her mind.

    Read More

  • Mental Disorder In The Yellow Wallpaper By Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    953 Words  | 2 Pages

    The beginning of the short story starts with the narrator's description of her mental state and the perception of her family members towards her condition. The narrator talks about, despite how she feels, her family, especially her physician husband John, did not take her condition seriously. She even mentions that John being

    Read More

  • The Oppression of Women by Society in The Yellow Wallpaper

    1607 Words  | 4 Pages

    "The Yellow Wallpaper" is about a creative woman whose talents are suppressed by her dominant husband. His efforts to oppress her in order to keep her within society's norms of what a wife is supposed to act like, only lead to her mental destruction. He is more concerned with societal norms than the mental health of his wife. In trying to become independent and overcome her own suppressed thoughts, and her husbands false diagnosis of her; she loses her sanity. One way the story illustrates his dominance is by the way he, a well-know and established doctor who should know better than to diagnose a family member, diagnoses her as having a temporary nervousness condition and what he prescribes for her illness, which is bed rest. Without asking her, he takes her to their summer home to recover from an illness that he doesn't believe she has. He tells her there is "no reason" why she feels the way she does; she should get rid of those "silly fantasies." In saying this to her, he is treating her like a child who doesn't really know how she feels, thus making her doubt herself. When she tries to tell him what she needs, she is completely shut out and ignored. "I sometimes fancy that in my condition if I had less opposition and more society and stimulus-but John says the very worst thing I can do is to think about my condition, and I confess it always makes me feel bad." This statement has a two-fold meaning, in the first part of the sentence he reveals part of his insecurity problem. He is not interested in getting her help because he doesn'...

    Read More

  • Analysis Of The Yellow Wallpaper

    770 Words  | 2 Pages

    “If a physician of high standing, and one’s own husband, assures friends and relatives that there is really nothing the matter with one but temporary nervous depression—a slight hysterical tendency—what is one to do? . . .So I take phosphates or phosphites—whichever it is, and tonics, and journeys, and air, and exercise, and am absolutely forbidden to “work” until I am well again. Personally, I disagree with their ideas” (Gilman 545). In this passage the narrator is using very descriptive and vivid lines to show her dissatisfaction with her husband’s authoritative and anarchy behavior, how her medical situation is used to serve as an impediment towards her movements and her accomplishment. She wants to be free and engaged in everyday activities like every normal person but she is denied of these things by her own husband who assures everyone that everything is all right. She is in strong opposition to such treatment and but her opinion means nothing to him and she has no power to even constructively contribute to her treatment. The narrator is also seen in a position wherein she is told not to worry about her si...

    Read More

  • The Narrator of The Yellow Wallpaper

    832 Words  | 2 Pages

    All through the story the yellow wallpaper acts as an antagonist causing her to become very annoyed and disturbed. There is nothing to do in the secluded room but stare at the wallpaper. The narrator tells of the haphazard pattern having no organization or symmetrical plot. Her constant examination of and reflection o...

    Read More

  • Theme Of Self Expression In The Yellow Wallpaper

    888 Words  | 2 Pages

    Gilman shows through this theme that when one is forced to stay mentally inactive can only lead to mental self-destruction. The narrator is forced into a room and told to be passive, she is not allowed to have visitors, or write, or do much at all besides sleep. Her husband believes that a resting cure will rid her of her “slight hysterical tendency” (Gilman 478). Without the means to express herself or exercise her mind in anyway the narrator begins to delve deeper and deeper into her fantasies. The narrator begins to keep a secret journal, about which she states “And I know John would think it absurd. But I must say what I feel and think in some way - it is such a relief” (Gilman 483)! John tells his wife that she must control her imagination, lest it run away with her. In this way John has asserted full and complete dominance over his wife. The narrator, though an equal adult to her husband, is reduced to an infancy. In this state the narrator begins her slow descent into hysteria, for in her effort to understand herself she fully and completely loses herself.

    Read More

  • Imagery: The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    1021 Words  | 3 Pages

    Signs of the depth of the narrator's mental illness are presented early in the story. The woman starts innocently enough with studying the patterns of the paper but soon starts to see grotesque images in it, "There is a recurrent spot where the pattern lolls like a...

    Read More

More about Landfill By Gilman Analysis

Open Document