Introduction
The short story The Yellow Wallpaper is a key story that revolves around mental and physical well-being, more so that of women. Written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman in 1892, it is regarded as one of the exemplary works that demonstrate the art of literature through the illustrations and narration found in the story. The story’s plot shows a young woman who is enclosed in a house for bed rest due to depression issues that she had, and her husband wants her to recuperate. The husband restricts her from working or doing any chore so that she can recover from the temporary nervous mental disorder. Due to her limitation in terms of movement, everything she sees around her appears to be a complete nuisance, and she gives anything an adverse reflection. The narrator’s characters include contradictious, brave, and feminist because the versions of life from the illness make her strong and bold to act in a manner that suggests women can triumph in male-dominated societies.
There was a peeling yellow wallpaper that was put on the wall of her room. She describes it as disgusting every day; she gazes at it. The wallpaper appears ‘sickly,’ smelly and shows patterns of an unending string of toadstools as described by the narrator (Gilman 255). There is nothing positive about the yellow wallpaper, and that gives the foundation of the entire narration from the person who is not clearly disclosed in the story. The wallpaper mutates by the day as long as one stays in the bedroom and smears yellow colors on anyone who leans on it. The young women begin to see a woman creeping into the design of the wallpaper and start to strip the wallpaper from the wall to free the woman. The narrator declines to unlock the door upon her husband’s arrival. The husband, known as John, manages to get in the room and finds his wife creeping around the floor while rubbing the wallpaper at the wall. John faints and the narrator continues to creep all over, believing she is the woman trapped in the wallpaper figure.
Characteristics of the Narrator
The Narrator is Contradictious
The narrator gives her view of many objects in the room and translates what she perceives. To many readers, a wallpaper lying on the wall with a woman’s figure may be a normal subject, but that is not the case for the author. At first, she is given mandatory bed rest by her husband to recover from depression. Instead of the narrator understanding the essence of getting healthy, she begins to see John’s punitive restriction, which is why nothing positive comes from her. In one of her statements, she says, “It is very seldom that mere ordinary people like John and myself secure ancestral halls for the summer. A colonial mansion, a hereditary estate, I would say a haunted house, and reach the height of romantic felicity—but that would be asking too much of fate! Still, I will proudly declare that there is something queer about it.” (Gilman 652). That means the narrator knows she has a precious environment and a loving husband, but there is something with their life. The narrator has lost touch with the outer world, which is why she has understood the inner reality of the matter, that the disorder and her husband might enslave her. Koseman (p. 2) says, “Reflecting the existence of a strong inner/outer world distance in this short story, this article highlights that as the narrator alienates herself from the outer world, she comprehends her inner world realities better in her loneliness.” Her suffering makes her absurd, whereby she is not consistent with the positive and negative aspects of her life. Natural situations such as illness and the presence of a wallpaper appear to be bizarre, and she sounds to depict oppression from what she is going through. The fact that her husband had recommended bed rest as a cure for her illness meant that she was supposed to refrain from intensive thoughts (Kolich 267). Thus, thinking about the wallpaper and taking details of negativity makes her inconsistent, which allows her condition to deteriorate.
She is Brave
The inner fascination with life in terms of objects surrounding her makes the reader think of the narrator’s brave escapades. At one point, the narrator writes about their early life when she was a girl when she used to imagine nighttime ghosts visiting her and how she used to chase them away. The narrator is bold about her knowledge, so she translates all situations according to the contemporary lifestyle. She decides to keep a secret diary of moments in her life to relieve her mind. However, that does not apply to her character since she has hidden thoughts that seem abnormal, controlling her to an extent where she cannot reason rationally (Kolich 278). The predicament of suffering person in the wallpaper is a version of herself. Still, she does not intend to leave that thought which brings adverse outcomes from her bravery, such as disobedience to her husband and causing him to faint. The narrator has a long gaze at the yellow wallpaper and sees a design figure that shows a woman trapped in oppression. Part of her bravery is when, she decides to lock the door for her husband and throw keys downstairs. The narrator later says, “I’ve got out at last, in spite of you and Jane! And I’ve pulled off most of the paper, so you can’t put me back! Now, why should that man have fainted? But he did, and right across my path by the wall, so I had to creep over him every time!” (Gilman 656). That occasion shows the narrator’s boldness in revealing the charisma women should have to force a stop to oppressive patterns of life.
She faces her husband despite her mental and physical incapacities to ensure that she starts a long journey of rescuing her fellow females trapped like her from decisions made by men. She does not fear her health getting worse, nor does she feel intimidated by her condition. Rather, she seeks to identify herself as a person who untangles patterns of adverse lifestyles women have. The horror part of the story is that the narrator is ready to lose herself to have self-definition and represent others with similar problems. The elements seen in this part represent a brave person ready to face the challenges of a broken marriage and the stigma from society to make efforts that repress her mind regardless of the cost. When John is out in town over a certain night, the narrator makes a calculative move that marks the last day in the room. The caregiver, Jennie, shows interest in sleeping near the narrator to ensure that she is well. However, the narrator refuses and starts to destroy the yellow wallpaper. Her bravery is seen when she commands everyone that she does not want to see anyone around her until John comes. She says, “I’ve got a rope up here that even Jennie did not find. If that woman does get out and tries to get away, I can tie her!” (Gilman 655). This shows her staunch decision, regardless of the dangers around it. When her husband comes, she discloses the matter but keeps herself determined to show different colors of her life, which makes John faint. The narrator does not feel to help him but creeps while looking at him over her shoulder. These moves show a brave woman determined to show her feminist character.
Possession of a Feminist Behavior
The narrator is more of the role of women in a patriarchal society and the determination she has to rescue them from primitive oppression. In the Yellow Wallpaper, the narrator shows her mental incapacity as a way of protesting against women who have been on the receiving end of society’s negative approach to the female gender. The aspect of John discouraging her from writing symbolizes that women are limited to showing defiance or expressing their minds in a male-dominated society. The narrator has many suggestions to help her recover, such as working, exercising, or interacting with people, but John denies her all that (Kolich 282). That reveals the narrator’s character as a feminist, where she shows the condemnation women have regarding their decisions in life. The end of the story shows the culmination of women’s triumph over men, and that is the idea that the narrators put in readers’ minds.
The emphasis the narrator shows regarding reading and writing means the same was a gendered practice. Instead of adhering to the societal setting, she decides to read the yellow wallpaper until she finds the escape route through the interpretation of the figure. That aspect is important in showing her feminist character as she strongly suggests that women can use matters they are restricted from to find a way of winning against a male-dominated society. The narrator mentions having a female caregiver known as Jennie and covers part of her mental incapacity after their daughter’s birth. While reading, the audience will see that the narrator has to mention their daughter’s birth, which is a feminist perspective as well. Priya (p. 42) says, “Because she does not feel free to speak truthfully ‘to a living soul’, she confides her thoughts to a journal- ‘dead paper’- instead.” The narrator writes a private journal instead of telling her husband the level of her condition. The last part of the narrator astonishing John with her actions sends a message to the reader that despite women being intimidated, they always seek solutions that work for their desires. Thus, the narrator has a feminist character from these parts covered in the story.
Conclusion
The Yellow Wallpaper is a short story about a young woman who undergoes a series of hard times while recovering from a mental illness. The narrator is contradictory since she views objects from her perspectives without considering nature and general reality. Due to the challenges encountered, she becomes brave to show her bold interest in championing the freedom of women trapped by oppressive culture. Her husband, John, makes the narrator think she is the person represented in the yellow wallpaper with a trapped woman. The narrator shows feminist character by showing her victory over men when she discarded the wallpaper and is confident enough to tell her husband; she has managed to come from the struggles. The narrator shows how women are tied in puniovercometive measures in the male-dominated society but manage to triumph. All these occasions show she champions the freedom of females for a better living.
Works Cited
Gilman, Charlotte P. “The Yellow Wallpaper.” New England Magazine, vol. 42, no. 26, 1892, pp. 423–428.,
Kolich, Tomáš. “Haunting or Hallucination? Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s ‘the Yellow Wallpaper’ and Contemporary Theories of Decorative Art and Psychiatry.” Gothic Studies, vol. 22, no. 3, 2020, pp. 266–284., Web.
Koseman, Zennure. “The Secret Diary Recording the Depression of the Imaginative Woman Narrator in Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s ‘The Yellow Wall Paper.’” Journal of Literary Subjects vol. 3, no. 5, 2021, pp. 177–183., Web.
Priya, G. “‘Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s The Yellow Wallpaper: An Assertion of Gender Equality and Liberation.” Language in India, UGC, Web.