The “Yellow Wallpaper” was written during a difficult time of change. During this time, nobody knew what post-partum depression was. This is a story written by Charlotte Perkins Stetson that showed how women were treated during this time. Women were not allowed to express themselves and if they did they were considered “crazy” and would have to get treated for it. Women did not have as many rights, men tended to be the doctors during this time. The main character is so obsessed with the wallpaper that she tries to find a way that is affects her directly. In the short story, the narrator has a sense of mental illness throughout the whole story from two reliable sources, her husband and her brother who are both doctors. Insanity, loneliness as …show more content…
This shows the reader the confusion she is facing with her sickness. Mary the house keeper keeps the baby because the main character cannot be around the baby because the baby makes her nervous. Meanwhile, the wallpaper plays a big role in the story. The main character cannot stand the wallpaper and insist it must be removed the longer it stays the more she goes insane. The obsession the character has with this wallpaper not only affects her mind but perception as she states, “it dwells on my mind so” (650). She lies in this bed that is literally nailed down to the ground and follows the wallpaper pattern for hours. Meanwhile toward the end of the story she states, “no one touches this wallpaper but me, ----not alive!” (655). Her husband refuses to change the wallpaper, and that causes her repressed feelings, she thinks that if her feeling can be expressed that it might be all she needs to cure her. She knows her husband deeply loves her and believes John is trying to help her, but he believes the only way she is going to get better is if she does things he thinks will help her, and she thinks by doing those things keep her …show more content…
The outside pattern I mean, and the woman behind it is as plain as can be” (653). This explains how to main character is trapped by her sickness and cannot escape. She sees herself in the wallpaper without even realizing it, “And she is all the time trying to climb through. But nobody could climb through that pattern—it strangles so; I think that is why it has so many heads” (654). This shows how the woman is trying to be free, but between her husband, the sickness, and the wallpaper they will not let her free. She said, “then I peeled off all the paper I could reach standing on the floor. It sticks horribly and the pattern just enjoys it! All those strangled heads and bulbous eyes and waddling fungus
Until she sees a woman creeping behind the pattern one night tempting her to go see if the wallpaper is actually moving which is when her husband catches her. He always seems to talk down to her treating her like a child in this particular instance calling her “little girl”. In spite of this she sees this as an opportunity to talk to let him know her concerns informing him that she is not getting better as he so adamantly believes. Nevertheless, her attempts are futile for he dismisses her once more putting his supposed medical opinion above his wife’s feelings. The story takes a shocking turn as she finally discerns what that figure is: a woman. As the story progress she believes the sole reason for her recovery is the wallpaper. She tells no one of this because she foresees they may be incredulous so she again feels the need to repress her thoughts and feelings. On the last night of their stay, she is determined to free the woman trapped behind bars. She begins to tear strips of the wallpaper and continues to all night by morning yards of the paper are stripped off. Her sister in law Jennie offers to help but at this point the narrator is territorially protective of the wallpaper. She locks herself in the room and is determined to strip the wall bare. As she is tearing the wallpaper apart she sees strangled heads in the pattern shrieking as the wallpaper is being torn off. At this point, she is furious and even
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.”
“The Yellow Wallpaper” is a story about an anonymous female narrator and her husband John who is a physician who has rented a colonial manner in the summer. Living in that house, the narrator felt odd living there. Her husband, john who is a physician and also a doctor to his wife felt that the narrator is under nervous depression. He further mentions that when a person is under depression, every feeling is an odd feeling. Therefore, the narrator was not given permission by John to work but just to take medication and get well fast. This made the narrator to become so fixated with the yellow wallpaper in the former nursery in which she located. She was depressed for a long time and became even more depressed. This ha...
The Yellow Wallpaper was written as a realism story. It showed how woman felt they had the same opportunities as men in their personal choices. In this story, the woman expressed her worries to her husband who through good intentions, required that his wife stay in bed 24/7, and not do any of the things she would normally do. In effect his wife became worse until she reached the limit. The behavior of the husband at this time was completely normal. Men were the higher power over women and women, like the one in this story, felt that they couldn?t stand count for themselves.
The narrator, already suffering from a "nervous condition," is forced to stay in her bedroom for most of the story. Her husband does not let her do anything that may take the least bit of energy because she needs to concentrate her energy on getting well. Her mental condition quickly deteriorates from the original "nervous condition" to complete insanity due to this isolation. As the narrator begins to see figures behind the wallpaper, the reader realizes that the wallpaper is a manifestation of her condition.
Although both protagonists in the stories go through a psychological disorder that turns their lives upside down, they find ways to feel content once again. In Charlotte Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper," a nervous wife, an overprotective husband, and a large, damp room covered in musty wallpaper all play important roles in driving the wife insane. Gilman's masterful use of not only the setting, both time and place, but also of first person point of view, allows the reader to process the woman's growing insanity. The narrator develops a very intimate relationship with the yellow wallpaper throughout the story, as it is her constant companion. Her initial reaction to it is a feeling of hatred; she dislikes the color and despises the pattern, but does not attribute anything peculiar to it. Two weeks into their stay she begins to project a sort of personality onto the paper, so she studies the pattern more closely, noticing for the first time “a strange, provoking, formless sort of figure that seems to skulk about behind that silly and conspicuous front design” (Gilman). At this point, her madness is vague, but becoming more defined, because although the figure that she sees behind the pattern has no solid shape, she dwells on it and
She is left with no choice but to stare at the wallpaper endlessly and begins to see things within the pattern. She insists there is a woman behind the paper "and she is all the time trying to climb through. But nobody could climb through that pattern-it strangles so" (667). This is representative to women's power being "strangled" by man and that there are women everywhere trying to escape and break free from the suppression and she sees herself as one of those woman behind the wallpaper creeping around trying to get out.
Although the physical confinement drains the narrators strength and will, the mental and emotional confinement symbolized in the story play an important role in her ultimate fall into dementia. By being forced to be her own company she is confined within her mind. Likewise part of the narrators mental confinement stems from her recognition of her physical confinement. The depression the narrator has experienced associated with child bearing is mentally confining as well. "It is fortunate Mary is good with the baby. Such a dear Baby! And yet I cannot be with him, it makes me so nervous"(675). Specifically, she cannot control her emotion or manage her guilt over her inability to care for her child. These structures of confinement contribute to the rapid degeneration of her state of mind.
Although on the surface The Yellow Wallpaper, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, is a story about one woman’s struggles with sanity it is not. In truth, it is a story about the dominant/submissive relationship between an oppressive husband and his submissive wife. The husband, John, pushes his wife’s depression to a point quite close to insanity. The narrator seems to destroy herself through her overactive imagination and her urge to write. When they arrive she seems well in control of her faculties, but by the time they are readying for departure, she has broken down. Flawed human nature seems to play a great role in her breakdown. Her husband, a noted physician, is unwilling to admit that there may be a real problem with his wife. This same attitude is mirrored in her brother, also a physician. While these attitudes, and the actions taken by the two doctors, seem to have certainly contributed to her breakdown, it seems that there is an underlying rebellious spirit in her.
Her tense mind is then further pushed towards insanity by her husband, John. As one of the few characters in the story, John plays a pivotal role in the regression of the narrator’s mind. Again, the narrator uses the wallpaper to convey her emotions. Just as the shapes in the wallpaper become clearer to the narrator, in her mind, she is having the epiphany that John is in control of her.
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...
“The Yellow Wallpaper” is the story of a woman descending into psychosis in a creepy tale which depicts the harm of an old therapy called “rest cure.” This therapy was used to treat women who had “slight hysterical tendencies” and depression, and basically it consisted of the inhibition of the mental processes. The label “slight hysterical tendency” indicates that it is not seen as a very important issue, and it is taken rather lightly. It is also ironic because her illness is obviously not “slight” by any means, especially towards the end when the images painted of her are reminiscent of a psychotic, maniacal person, while she aggressively tears off wallpaper and confuses the real world with her alternative world she has fabricated that includes a woman trapped in the wallpaper. The narrator of this story grows obsessed with the wallpaper in her room because her husband minimizes her exposure to the outside world and maximizes her rest.
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.
...lor that made the woman despise it so very much. By being able to understand the various meanings behind the wallpaper the reader is able to fully comprehend the narrative behind the entire story and why her mental health keeps diminishing. The ending of the story reveals that the woman no longer only saw the woman in the walls at night; she began to believe that she actually was said woman.
(Gilman 312) And as she gets even worse she begins to see this woman in the wallpaper. I think that this woman is her and that she is “trapped” in the “wallpaper.” She is trapped in this room, and this illness and is confused on all that is going on with