The Yellow Wallpaper, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

1491 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Meaningful of yellow wallpaper

Everyone thinks differently yet they can be made so see thinks the same. Created by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, The Yellow Wallpaper was written in the early 19 and late 18 hundreds to express her thoughts about the way the world treated depression. The universal understanding of the wall paper is always the same, yet the unique view point of the individual causes the two main conflicts towards the narrator to be seen differently towards the resolution.
“Lame uncertain curves for a little distance they suddenly commit suicide- plunge off at outrageous angles, destroy themselves in unheard of contradictions” (Stetson, 648). She truly hated the yellow wall paper, with all of its uncertainties the moment she laid her eyes on it. She loved everything else about the summer home except for the broken down green house that “spoils my ghostliness” (648), yet the yellow wallpaper was the one thing that ruined everything for her. She stays in the room with everything she will need to get rest and to get better. She is not allowed to do anything but rest: no walk, no writing, and no helping around the house, no visitors that might cause stress, and no baby. With all that time occupied by nothing her mind wonders to finds something else to do. “[I] never saw a worse paper in my life.” (649) she found something to keep her busy the one thing that’s always in front of her , the thing she hates the wallpaper and that makes her go crazy and it gets worse the more time she is stays in the room. “But there is something else about that paper- the smell! [She] noticed it the moment [her and her husband] came into the room, but with so much air and sun in the room it was not bad” (654). She gets attracted to the wallpaper and notices every little detai...

... middle of paper ...

... in the marriage and getting her free will back, and the moment John fainted meant the down fall in the way thing where. His wife was finally able stand up for her salve and it’s easy to see that the theme of The Yellow Wallpaper is women being depressed by man and the point to the store to show women power even thou it made some people feel weird. Yet the ended and the reason for the story was,” not intended to drive people crazy, but save people from being driven crazy, and it worked” (Gilman).

Works Cited

Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. The Yellow Wallpaper. proposed by Prof. Catherine Leivender. The collage of Staten Island of the city University of New York. 8 June 1998.Ret. 11 Feb.2014 { csive.csi.cuny.edu }
Stetson Charlotte Perkins. The Yellow Wallpaper. United States National Library and Medicine Bathesole, Maryland. 647-656.Ret. 11 Feb. 2014. {nlm.nih.gov}

Show More
Related

  • Free Yellow Wallpaper Essays: Oppression of Women

    1089 Words  | 3 Pages

    The Yellow Wallpaper is a story, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Although the work is short, it is one of the most interesting works in existence. Gilman uses literary techniques very well. The symbolism of The Yellow Wallpaper, can be seen and employed after some thought and make sense immediately. The views and ideals of society are often found in literary works. Whether the author is trying to show the ills of society of merely telling a story, culture is woven onto the words. The relationship between the narrator and her husband would be disagreeable to a modern woman's relationship. Today, most women crave equality with their partner. The reader never learns the name of the narrator, perhaps to give the illusion that she could be any woman. On the very fist page of The Yellow Wall-Paper, Gilman illustrates the male dominated society and relationship. It was customary for men to assume that their gender knew what, when, how, and why to do things. John, the narrator's husband, is a prominent doctor and both his and his wife's words and actions reflect the aforementioned stereotype: "John laughs at me, of course, but one expects that in marriage," (9). This statement illustrates the blatant sexism of society at the time. John does not believe that his wife is sick, while she is really suffering from post-partum depression. He neglects to listen to his wife in regard to her thoughts, feelings, and health through this thought pattern. According to him, there is not anything wrong with his wife except for temporary nerve issues, which should not be serious.

    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

  • 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

  • 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

  • The Yellow Wallpaper, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    457 Words  | 1 Pages

    “The faint figure behind seemed to shake the pattern, just as if she wanted to get out.” The woman had started seeing another female in the wallpaper, imprisoned behind bars and shaking the paper to be freed. The wallpaper began depreciating, and so did the conquering influence that male hierarchy forced on women. Women arose to reason out of line, be conscious of their overthrow, and conflict patriarchal statute. The development of the yellow wallpaper and the narrator, within the story, indicates to a triumph over John.

    Read More

  • Internal Struggles in The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    772 Words  | 2 Pages

    Finally, the yellow wallpaper presents perspectives of how men control females. As stated previously, In the story, John uses his power as a doctor to control his wife. He encaged his wife in a summer home, placing her in a room filled with barricades and many faults. As a human she is deprived of her rights and her ability to form house duties is taken away so she can rest as he calls it. Without a doubt, she fell into insanity because of the situation she was placed in. When she ripped the paper off the wall, it was a sign of freedom from her husband, and the bars that held her captive for weeks. Certainly she has a vivid imagination and being placed in bondage and unable to write which in turn lead her to mental health problems.

    Read More

  • Essay on Narrator and Point of View in Yellow Wallpaper and Story of an Hour

    1323 Words  | 3 Pages

    Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. "Why I Wrote 'The Yellow Wallpaper'" Ed. Catherine Lavender; The College of Staten Island of the City University of New York, Fall Semester, Oct. 1997. (25 Jan 1999)   http://www.library.csi.cuny.edu/dept/history/lavender/whyyw.html

    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

  • How Is The Narrator Trapped In The Yellow Wallpaper

    725 Words  | 2 Pages

    In the short story, the Yellow Wallpaper, the narrator chooses to write about a married woman in a new home who ultimately falls down into a spiral of insanity. The Yellow Wallpaper centers primarily on the narrator and her discovery in the room she must stay in to rest. There she sees a yellow wallpaper that soon begins to take the form of a woman who is trapped, and is shaking the wallpaper in order to get out. The narrator continues trying to figure out the wallpaper and its pattern until eventually deciding to rip the wallpaper off in an attempt to free the creeping woman trapped inside. Thus, the narrator in the Yellow Wallpaper suffers a mental collapse by going insane in her attempt to understand the wallpaper which can be attributed

    Read More

  • The Yellow Wallpaper, by Charlotte Gilman

    931 Words  | 2 Pages

    Narration is one literary element of a story that controls the meaning and themes perceived by the reader. The author uses this as a way of putting themselves in their writing; they portray a personal reflection through the narrator. We see this in pieces of literature, such as Charlotte Gilman’s, “The Yellow Wallpaper”, an intense short story that critics believe to be an autobiography. Charlotte Gilman wrote this piece in 1892, around the time of her own personal mental depression, after the birth of her child. This story invites the readers into the mind of a well-educated writer who is mentally ill, and takes you through the recordings of her journal, as her mental health deteriorates so does the credibility of her writing. The author uses the element of the narrators’ mental health to create a story with different meanings and themes to her audience. Gilman uses the role of an unreliable narrator to persuade the audience’s perception of protagonists’ husband John and create a theme of entrapment.

    Read More

  • A Bad Case of Inferiority

    1421 Words  | 3 Pages

    Perkins Gilman, Charlotte. ""Why I Wrote The Yellow Wallpaper"" The Forerunner Oct. 1913. The College of Staten Island Library. The College of Staten Island of The City University of New York., 9 June 1999. Web. 21 Feb. 2011. .

    Read More

  • Treatment of Mental Disorders Exposed in The Yellow Wallpaper

    1986 Words  | 4 Pages

    Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. “The Yellow Wallpaper”. The Story and Its Writer. Ann Charters. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2011. 462-473. Print.

    Read More

  • Gender as Portrayed in “The Yellow Wallpaper”

    1338 Words  | 3 Pages

    Gilman, Charlotte P. "The Yellow Wallpaper." The story and its writer: An introduction to short fiction. Ed. Ann Charters. Compact 8th ed. Boston: Bedford/St. Martins, 2011. 340-351.

    Read More

  • Insanity in The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

    1189 Words  | 3 Pages

    In seeing the story through the wife's eyes, we can see that her mental illness in "The Yellow Wallpaper" is inevitable. Between society's view of women at that time, the husband's attitude towards her, and his ineffective remedies, the wife's mental instability can only grow worse. The wallpaper lets the reader follow the woman's regression into insanity as the story progresses. Only with the first person point of view (the wife's) can the reader follow this regression of the mind. All in all, this is a sad story of a woman's struggle for sanity in an indifferent society.

    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 The Yellow Wallpaper, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Open Document