The Yellow Wallpaper Woman

Women have always been subjected to confinement in some manner throughout out history. It is a timeless theme carried through generations, and most prominently through literature. Gilman portrays in “The Yellow Wallpaper”, the many constraints women in the nineteenth century faced. The narrator in “The Yellow Wallpaper”, displays to readers the effects of these constraints on women in their daily lives. In “The Yellow Wallpaper” the inside and outside settings of the story have a great influence on the character development of the narrator. The outside setting of “The Yellow Wallpaper” represents the entrapment of the narrator, as well as the freedom the narrator is not aloud to have. The location of the house is important in the development

Inside the nursery the narrator describes the overall setting of the room. Going through the narrator describes the “barred windows” and the “gate at the head of the stairs” (480). Barred windows and the gate, give symbolic reference to a prison. The narrator is confined to one room in which her only purpose is to do nothing, just as you would do if you were put into a prison. Further along in the story the narrator changes her view on the wallpaper. The narrator moves from distaste of the wallpaper to fascination in trying to discover the woman hidden behind the wallpaper. After analyzing the wall for some time the narrator goes on to say “the front pattern does move— and no wonder! The woman behind shakes it!” (486). By being trapped for so long in the room, the narrator find her purpose in analyzing the wallpaper and trying to find meaning from it because she has no purpose to begin with. The idea of freeing the woman behind the paper is the narrator trying to free herself from her life. With the mounting fascination of the paper, the narrator makes a final decision to finally rip down the paper and free the woman. On the last day in the house the narrator decides to rip off the wallpaper: “I peeled off all the paper I could reach standing on the floor.” (488). After ripping off most of the paper the narrator makes a comment to her husband signifying she is now free: “I’ve pulled off most of the paper, so you can’t put me back!” (489). The act of ripping down the paper was to strip the narrator of all her burdens that caused her to feel so trapped in her life. By clearing the wallpaper off the wall the narrator begins a new chapter in her life as a ‘free woman’. The desperate need to free the woman behind the wall was the narrator trying to break out of her