Grace Steward
Examine The Way Which Charlotte Perkins Gilman Is Concerned With The Ill-Treatment And Isolation Of Women In The Yellow Wallpaper.
The writer Charlotte Perkins Gilman suffered from postnatal depression in the late 1800’s in America. She was given a “rest cure” which was not to do or have any creativity. This led to a more severe depression. In the story of The Yellow Wallpaper, the central character shares the same situation and predicament as the writer. Therefore we read the story as though it were autobiographical: a writer suffering from depression, given little real help by a patriarchal society. The story is written in first person in a diary form, and in present tense, which gives us, the reader, a sense of being there and sharing the experience.
“It is quite alone…. the place has been empty for years”. The house where the narrator stays is somewhat dim and isolated. Her husband John has put her in this house to “get better” as she clams she is mentally ill and no one was to see her, just because John could not face being condemned in society for his wife’s behaviour. The narrator is physically imprisoned “Windows are barred”, there is also a nailed down bed. She is also mentally imprisoned as she is without company and writing. The narrator believes that the house in which she is staying was a nursery but the reader senses that perhaps this place has been inhabited by mentally ill people previously, “ The floor is scratched…. and this great heavy bed…. looks as though it has been through the wars”. But the narrator wanted a different room, she wanted a view. “I wanted one downstairs that opened onto the piazza and had roses all over the window, and such pretty old-fashioned chintz hangings”. This is one of the first signs that John is repressing her views. She has no say.
