English 102: A Critical Analysis of The Yellow Wallpaper's Themes

This essay provides a critical analysis of Charlotte Perkins Gilman's 'The Yellow Wallpaper', focusing on the themes of oppression, mental illness, and the constraints imposed on women in the 19th century. The essay examines the narrator's descent into madness, the symbolism of the wallpaper, and the impact of the 'rest cure' prescribed by her husband. It explores the literary elements used by Gilman, including the first-person narrative, characterization, and imagery, to convey her message about patriarchy and the suppression of women's voices. The essay also considers the themes of deception, irony, and the conflict between appearance and reality, as well as the portrayal of the narrator's relationship with her husband and the societal expectations that contribute to her deteriorating mental state. The analysis highlights the story's relevance to feminist literature and its critique of the medical and social attitudes towards women's health during that period. The author successfully uses various literary devices to convey the theme of the story. The essay is a comprehensive and well-structured analysis of Gilman's work.

Running Head: CRTICALLY ANALYSING THE YELLOW WALLPAPER
Crtically Analysing The Yellow Wallpaper
Name of Student
Name of University
Author note

1CRTICALLY ANALYSING THE YELLOW WALLPAPER
Introduction
The taboo that mental disorders were in the 19th century, post-natal depression was yet to
be explored by doctors and psychologists of the time. The author Charlotte Perkin Gilman’s
objective behind writing The Yellow wallpaper was largely provoked by the ignorance of the
common mass and the dalliance of clinical treatment in handling patients, especially women
suffering from depression. The plot explores multiple themes concerning the oppression of the
‘weaker’ gender, the need for self-acknowledgement and the nature of depression that is
susceptible to paranoia. This essay intends to critically analyze the theme of Gilman’s story by
identifying the literary elements she uses to inform the reader of her objective. The paper
presents a psychoanalytical perspective of reading the piece and elaborates how the plot,
characterization and symbols are integral for a better understanding of the story’s theme.
Discussion
The story is written in the form of daily journals and the confidential tone of the narrator
suggests that she is attempting to reach out, or rather to create an audience she cannot otherwise
fine in the confined, dingy room. Deception is one of the major themes in the story; the
narrator’s relationship with her husband is based on deception since she cannot divulge her secret
to him while John is deceiving both himself and his wife with the oblivion that prolonged rest
will cure her of the ailment. It is only in the journal that the narrator can confess to her deceit,
reasoning the necessity. She can explain though writing what she cannot to the society and her
husband, hence she makes it her only resort. Irony is another potent theme of the story since it is
replete with ironical circumstances. The journal is both her greatest testimony to deception and
her only attempt at honesty. Contradictions like these may be experienced as personal failures
but the narrative expresses them as inevitable consequences of prescribed gender roles, in this

2CRTICALLY ANALYSING THE YELLOW WALLPAPER
case the role of a wife and a mother. Women are conditioned to conform to the socially-
designated role of being the ‘angel of the house’ and making them the only avenue to self-
fulfillment. This process creates a moral conflict between personal and social perceptions of the
‘Self’, a conflict the results in a tendency towards self-deception and also that towards honesty.
The narrator gets exhausted with deceiving herself about the true nature of her treatment and thus
the dramatic irony in her descriptions as the reader comprehends things by piecing together her
details, these are things she herself cannot understand. For instance, the description of the room
she is made to stay in appears a nursery to her but to an analytic reader it will strike as a room
designed to confine violent mental patients. This gap between the details and her individual
perception of them indicates her desire to believe in the things her husband tells her and her
growing disability to do so. This reveals her entrapment in a conception of herself which is
largely derived from John and the patriarchal society she is subjected to.
Like the narrator, John too is a victim of the patriarchal society. The ‘cruel’ treatment of
her wife is after all inspired by love since he cannot find any alternative to forcing her into the
adherence of the gender roles prescribed for her. The mental and physical entrapment is imposed
by the society where a women must conform to the ‘wifely patterns’ (Lanser 415). The story
hints no communion between women apart from the narrator’s crazed vision of the ‘creeping
women’ and the imaginary woman who is imprisoned behind the patterned wallpaper, like the
narrator who is imprisoned in the pattern of her social roles (Treichler 61). She is liberated at the
end but the freedom she experiences is only the need to deceive herself and others about the true
nature of her role. Sloughing off the trappings of being mother and wife, she is left only with her
madness and her insight into the true workings of the society.

3CRTICALLY ANALYSING THE YELLOW WALLPAPER
The theme of appearance and reality is equally interesting to consider. The narrator
discovers two different layers of reality: an artificial pattern of regular, everyday details and a
subdued yet violent world of psychic repression existing beneath the placid surface-reality. The
contrast between the open garden view and the closed room strengthens her sense of restriction
(Fetterley 147). As her views become more subjective and personal, she blurs the lines between
reality and illusion; the figure in the garden becomes the figure in the Wallpaper. The narrator
finally merges with this figure and even if this identification permits her to release the pent-up
frustrations and anger, the price she has to pay for such freedoms is too high, since the ensuing
madness is another kind of imprisonment. She can discover this hidden self only by identifying
with the figure in the wallpaper. The paper she uses to write her journal is replaced by the
wallpaper as her subjective observations are replaced by subjective imaginings (Shumaker 251).
She loses her sense of ‘self’, loses all bearings with the world and descends into the pit of
paranoia. Gilman skilfully conveys her themes through the characterization. If John represents
patriarchy, his Jenny is representative of all women who are perpetrators of patriarchy since she
acts as a puppet in the hands of her brother, denying another woman the liberty, space and
empathy she required for recovery.
The intimate first-person narrative Gilman chooses for her story helps her to intensify the
theme of madness and the helplessness of a woman suffering from depression (Gillman 265).
The narrative no only reveal certain truth about the narrator’s internal suffering but also helps to
showcase a candid transition into insanity in the narrator. The simplest way for the reader to
anticipate the narrator’s mental breakdown is her unreliability of perceiving the reality. In the
absence of proper mental stimulation the narrator breaks down and fixates all her attention and
energy in the wallpaper (Johnson 521). Her psychosis is confirmed when the narrative informs

4CRTICALLY ANALYSING THE YELLOW WALLPAPER
that she is completely unaware of the fact that she has been gnawing up the bed and tearing up
the floorboard. The narrative further makes use of macabre imageries (Haney 113) throughout
the story to arrive at its unsettling denouement , this is another way of expressing the dark
thoughts that torture the narrator into madness. Shortly within entering the house, the narrator
notices “a recurrent spot where the pattern lolls like a broken neck and two bulbous eyes stare at
you upside down” (MacPike 286). This suggests the narrator’s obsession with inanimate things
and her hyper-imaginative nature; the kind that propels her vulnerability to insanity. The author
has interestingly drawn a parallel between the intensification of her psychosis with the jarring
imageries of her actions and hallucinations. Her ripping out the wallpaper to free the woman
trapped behind its patterns shocks the reader enough to infer that the adverse effects of rest cure
have to be endured by the patient herself and the stakes are too high.
Conclusion
Gilman wanted to lay bare the loopholes of clinical treatment of mental disorders, she
uses a rather uncanny plot for her objective. It (the plot) is brad enough to include matters like
patriarchy women oppression; issues that required urgent attention back in the time. The bleak
imagery of the setting along with the dismissive attitude of the other characters towards the
narrator renders a recipe for catastrophe to the tormented mind. So poignant is the message that it
will even stir the least conscientious of readers. Written in a time when mental disorders like
post-natal depression were still topics considered too off-limits, The Yellow Wallpaper is a
groundbreaking portrayal of women’s position in the 19th century and their vulnerability to
developing psychotic disorders.

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