The Yellow Wallpaper -- Literary Analysis, Gilman

Charlotte Perkins Gilman 1892 gothic and horror short horizontal surface The Yellow Wallpaper traces the mental decline of a woman patch undergoing a rest cure. This captivating story illustrates the conquer troth of the protagonist in a patriarchal society. Her husband, John, a physician, has taken the narrator, a new mother, to a rented country home for the summer in found for her to rec everyplace from postpartum psychosis. He isolates her in an upstairs nursery, a mode with barred windows, a nailed down bed, and odious yellow paper, and forbids her to write, in pact with the philosophy of the rest cure. Although the constraints placed on the protagonist be to be repressive, it leads her to an intriguingly dangerous obsession with the yellow wallpaper that causes her to triumph all over societal oppression and constraints within her marriage, giving her a heroic identity. The author conveys all this through her ingenious usage of the image of the yellow wallpaper, whic h functions as a part of the setting, an object correlation to the narrators physical and mental repression, and lastly as a symbol of her life. jibe to one critic The subjection of women originated in prehistoric times when the males stolon monopolized all social activity and women were confined to motherhood and domesticated duties (Degler 178). During the 19th century these societal traditions were still imposed on women. Quawas confirms this statement when she states In the nineteenth century, women, as agent of moral influence, are expected to maintain the domestic sphere as a cheerful, pure haven for their husbands to return to home each evening (A New Womans Journey into Insanity). Because of these expectancies the protagonist is a power... ...lpaper Gilman clearly illustrates by the use of symbols, imagery, characters to display how women were treated in a patriarchal society. The writer appears to have semi-melancholic mood throughout the story. Gilman clearly shows how the stifling plight of the narrator who was kept in isolation becomes defiant and accessions a deeper understanding of her life and role in society. The woman in the wallpaper does not only represent the narrators own carve up self but all women who are overly restrained and start by a society that deem these women incapable of self-actualization. As a result of her preoccupation with the the yellow wallpaper she descends into madness, which ultimately enabled her to triumph over marital and societal constraints. Therefore the writer demonstrates that in order to gain liberty one suffers immensely before change is accomplished.