Realism In The Yellow Wallpaper And The Awakening

850 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Literary analysis over kate chopin

As a reaction to the Romantic era, realism defies against over dramatizing events, and instead focuses on portraying an accurate representation of society. Kate Chopin’s, The Awakening, is a strong example of a literary revolt against the social order of the time, most prominently the role of women in society. Chopin shows things as they are, not as they should be. This is also representative in The Yellow Wallpaper, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. This short story encaptures the psychological side of realism and also expresses the different societal roles. Both authors allow the audience to experience the problematic aspects of society by exploring the concepts of realism.
Through her novella, Chopin is able to inform the audience of the real …show more content…

In The Yellow Wallpaper, the husband is superior to the wife, Mary. The audience is able to see the psychological effects of oppression through Mary, a person suffering from a nervous disorder. Mary recognizes that she must be active in society in order to heal, but her husband, and physician, will not allow it: “... And what can one do? If a physician of high standing, and one’s own husband, assures friends that there is really nothing the matter... What is one to do?” (YWP 1). Mary sees herself as not being able to do anything but what her husband, John, allows her to. John is overly concerned about what society will think of him instead of his wife’s serious condition. Mary tends show passiveness regarding her illness, but she does show little actions of revolt. She writes and thinks about her sickness, both of which her husband has specifically told her not to do. The imperative imagery of the wallpaper changes in appearance for Mary throughout the short story. At first she describes the color as “repellent, almost revolting” until it eventually grows on her and she regards it as a mystery that is waiting for her to solve (YWP 2). This realistic imagery is important because it shows the serious progression of Mary’s mental state. She ultimately thinks of herself as part of the wallpaper and lets it envelop her. Gilman’s use of the realism themes imagery and the portrayal of life as it is provides an explanation of the dysfunctional social settings people

Show More
Related

  • A Feminist in Action in The Yellow Wallpaper

    1794 Words  | 4 Pages

    "The Yellow Wallpaper," by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, depicts a woman in isolation, struggling to cope with mental illness, which has been diagnosed by her husband, a physician.   Going beyond this surface level, the reader sees the narrator as a developing feminist, struggling with the societal values of the time.  As a woman writer in the late nineteenth century, Gilman herself felt the adverse effects of the male-centric society, and consequently, placed many allusions to her own personal struggles as a feminist in her writing.  Throughout the story, the narrator undergoes a psychological journey that correlates with the advancement of her mental condition.  The restrictions which society places on her as a woman have a worsening effect on her until illness progresses into hysteria.  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

  • Diction In The Yellow Wallpaper, By Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    1360 Words  | 3 Pages

    In “The Yellow Wallpaper”, the author, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, through expressive word choice and descriptions, allows the reader to grasp the concepts she portrays and understand the way her unnamed narrator feels as the character draws herself nearer and nearer to insanity. “The Yellow Wallpaper” begins with the narrator writing in a journal about the summer home she and her husband have rented while their home is being remodeled. In the second entry, she mentions their bedroom which contains the horrendous yellow wallpaper. After this, not one day goes by when she doesn’t write about the wallpaper. She talks about the twisting, never-ending pattern; the heads she can see hanging upside-down as if strangled by it; and most importantly the

    Read More

  • Comparing "Story of an hour "vs "The Yellow Wall Paper"

    347 Words  | 1 Pages

    Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour” and Charlotte Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper” are both centralized on the feministic views of women coming out to the world. Aside from the many differences within the two short stories, there is also similarities contained in Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour” and Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper,” such as the same concept of the “rest treatment” was prescribed as medicine to help deal with their sickness, society’s views on the main character’s illness, and both stories parallel in the main character finding freedom in the locked rooms that they contain themselves in.

    Read More

  • Metamorphosis of Woman in The Yellow Wallpaper and If I Were a Man by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    768 Words  | 2 Pages

    In The Yellow Wallpaper, the narrator weaves a tale of a woman with deep seeded feelings of depression. Her husband, a physician, takes her to a house for a span of three months where he puts her in a room to recuperate. That “recuperation” becomes her nemesis. She is so fixated on the “yellow wallpaper” that it seems to serve as the definition of her bondage. She gradually over time begins to realize what the wallpaper seems to represents and goes about plotting ways to overcome it. In a discussion concerning the wallpaper she states, “If only that top pattern could be gotten off from the under one! I mean to try it, little by little.” “There are only two more days to get this paper off, and I believe John is beginning to notice. I don’t like the look in his eyes.”

    Read More

  • An Analysis of Kate Chopin’s The Story of an Hour and Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s The Yellow Wallpaper

    1045 Words  | 3 Pages

    An Analysis of Kate Chopin’s The Story of an Hour and Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s The Yellow Wallpaper

    Read More

  • The Yellow Wallpaper Analysis Essay

    862 Words  | 2 Pages

    Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story, “The Yellow Wall-Paper”, is a first-person narrative written in the style of a journal. It takes place during the nineteenth century and depicts the narrator’s time in a temporary home her husband has taken her to in hopes of providing a place to rest and recover from her “nervous depression”. Throughout the story, the narrator’s “nervous condition” worsens. She begins to obsess over the yellow wallpaper in her room to the point of insanity. She imagines a woman trapped within the patterns of the paper and spends her time watching and trying to free her. Gilman uses various literary elements throughout this piece, such as irony and symbolism, to portray it’s central themes of restrictive social norms

    Read More

  • Setting, Symbolism and Oppression of Women in The Yellow Wallpaper

    787 Words  | 2 Pages

    ...chniques that Charlotte Perkins Gilman uses in "The Yellow Wallpaper" to suggest that a type of loneliness (in women) caused by imprisoning oppression can lead to the deadliest form of insanity. By using setting, Gilman shows how the barred windows intensifies the young woman's imprisoning oppression, the isolated summer home represents the loneliness the young woman feels, and her hallucinations of the wallpaper pattern indicates her transition to insanity. Wallpaper symbolism is used throughout the story the pattern representing the strangling nature of the imprisoning oppression, the fading yellow color showing the fading away of the young woman, and the hovering smell representing the deadly insanity to which she succumbs. Like the darkness that quickly consumes, the imprisoning loneliness of oppression swallows its victim down into the abyss of insanity.

    Read More

  • The Movement for Women's Rights Inside The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    1638 Words  | 4 Pages

    In “The Yellow Wallpaper” Gilman presents the behavior of society of the time. The protagonist is suppressed by her husband, John, and her brother, though they both mean well. The way she is treated by her husband and her brother is not outwardly “mean” because they never deal with her in anger, but the way that they suppress her by not letting her express her feelings or do what she wants, is still abuse. Even though, the way that they are treating her is wrong, it does not seem wrong because they both act gentle and kind towards her and make her think that they really do care about her. Throughout the story, the protagonist states her intentions to herself, but then does not act upon them because of her husband. This is further shown when she speaks of her husband and her brother, who "is also of higher standing," (Gilman 317) showing the high ranking of men in society. They keep her from doing the things she wants because they believe it is best for her to rest. She disagrees. "Personally, I believe that congenial work, with excitement and change, would do me good" (Gilman 317). On p...

    Read More

  • The Power of a Symbol in The Yellow Wallpaper, The Glass Menagerie and The Lottery

    1665 Words  | 4 Pages

    To begin, the short story by Charlotte Gilman, “The Yellow Wallpaper,” uses the deteriorating wallpaper to represent the narrator’s failing mind. The narrator is suffering and is confined in an uncomfortable house in a room she did not choose; she becomes obsessed with the wallpaper of the room. As the yellow wallpaper represents the narrator’s mind, the statement made by the narrator, “The color is repellent, almost revolting; a smoldering unclean yellow, strangely faded by the slow-turning sunlight. It is a dull yet lurid orange in some places, a sickly sulphur tint in others” refers to the condition of her mind by suggesting her condition is revolting and unclean. She is fading away in the su...

    Read More

  • The Yellow Wallpaper Mental Illness

    1526 Words  | 4 Pages

    These thoughts always seem to be optimistic and minimizing of her symptoms. This reflects the standard view of mental illness in the 19th century, which assumed the condition, was just a temporary state of over expressed emotions within a woman. (Gilman. 956) Gilman herself however, used imagery and symbolism to express her ideas concerning her mental illness and the patriarchal ideals that surrounded them. The yellow wallpaper in the story symbolized Gilman’s state of mind. At first, like her depression, the wallpaper was simply an eye sore. It was not disabling to the room however, made it not as appealing as before. As the story progresses, Gilman forms an obsession with the wallpaper. This represents the declining of her mental state and the obsession she developed with her life conditions. We can see the mental illness is now fixated in her like she is fixated on the wallpaper. The wallpaper’s distracting features controlled her mind like her husband controlled her. She was mostly alone when staring vastly into the wallpaper. She begins to see humanly images in the paper. This becomes her sense of social stimulation that her husband forbids her to have. She becomes disgusted with the wallpaper as she is likely disgusted at her disease for disabling her and her husband for limiting her freedom. The humanly image soon develops into “a woman

    Read More

  • Using Biographical and Historical Criticism in Critiquing The Yellow Wallpaper

    441 Words  | 1 Pages

    Evidence of Gilman's life experiences can be seen all throughout the story. The main character in the story, a slightly neurotic woman, is married to a prominent physician. This husband refuses to believe anything is wrong with his wife's health simply because her physical health is intact. Thus, he prescribes for his wife nothing more than relaxation and cessation of her writings. This character clearly correlates to the doctor who "treated" Gilman for her nervous breakdown. The description of the room and the wallpaper is clearly crucial to the story as a whole. The room itself is described as large and airy, with windows facing towards a "delicious garden." The wallpaper does not fit the room at all. It is a repulsive, pale yellow color. The description of the wallpaper seems to function metaphorically. The wallpaper becomes much more detailed and much more of a fixture in the main characters life as the story progresses. The wallpaper essentially takes on a life of its own. This progression seems to represent mental illness itself. As mental illness progresses, it becomes much more whole and enveloping. Gilman attempts to represent the depth of mental illness through the wallpaper. For example, the woman in the story comes to the conclusion that there is a woman in the wallpaper behind the pattern.

    Read More

  • Romanticism And The Yellow Wallpaper

    1914 Words  | 4 Pages

    Realism in American literature was a profound movement because it depicted current social realities and lives of normal people especially woman. Two major stories had a major description on what realism is. “Story of An Hour” and “The Yellow Wallpaper” showed the characteristics, definition, and how women had a voice and verbalized the reality of life. Kate Chopin and Charlotte Perkins Gilman were the authors of these two stories who influenced the movement of realism. With these two stories written by two great authors during the time helped view how it was different from romanticism.

    Read More

  • Symbolism in The Yellow Wallpaper

    1293 Words  | 3 Pages

    The yellow wallpaper itself is one of the largest symbols in the story. It can be interpreted to symbolize many things about the narrator. The wallpaper symbolizes the mental block mean attempted to place on women during the 1800s. The color yellow is often associated with sickness or weakness, and the narrator’s mysterious illness is an example of the male oppression on the narrator. The wallpaper in fact makes the narrator more “sick” as the story progresses. The yellow wallpaper, of which the writer declares, “I never saw a worse paper in my life,” is a symbol of the mental screen that men attempted to enforce upon women. Gilman writes, “The color is hideous enough, and unreliable enough, and infuriating enough, but the pattern is torturing” this is a symbolic metaphor for restrictions placed on women. The author is saying subliminally that the denial of equality for women by men is a “hideous” act, and that when men do seem to grant women some measure of that equality, it is often “unreliable.” The use of the words “infuriating” and “torturing” are also descriptions of the feelings of women in 19th century society.

    Read More

  • Psychiatric Treatment: Mental Disorders, Schizophrenia, and The Yellow Paper

    2076 Words  | 5 Pages

    The Yellow Wallpaper is a popular book when discussing psychology in the late nineteenth century. The author, Charlotte Gilman, wrote her experience of mental illness through her narrator. Gilman suffered with depression after giving birth and she never fully recovered from it. (Gilman 95). The narrator is depicted as a woman who has been diagnosed with what was called a nervous disorder. Her husband, a psychologist, gave her several different tonics and other substances that are supposed to make her better. She was also put on bed rest meaning that she was not able to work or do anything that would tire her out. She is told to go and rest several times during the story and it is evident that her ‘psychosis’ gets worse when she is forced to stay in her room and rest for the majority of her days and all night. She begins to see women in the pattern of her wallpaper and she becomes obsessed with it. The narrator becomes very protective of her wallpaper and gets almost jealous when she sees her sister-in-law looking at it and touching it. She even says “no person touches this pa...

    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

More about Realism In The Yellow Wallpaper And The Awakening

Open Document