For the next class meeting I would like everyone to have read the short story "The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Using this story, as well as your knowledge of character following our discussion tonight on People (Stanford 32-41), please answer the following prompt:
As a result of its eerie mood and setting, Gilman's text has often been labeled as a ghost story. Do you see the woman in the wallpaper as a supernatural element? What other possibilities can you suggest?
On such suggestion is as follows... While it is clear that there are multiple characters in this short story, it may not be so clear that within the main female character exists more than one persona. In other words, the reader could make the argument that the woman in the room and the woman in the wallpaper are actually two "parts" of the same main character. If so, how are these "parts" similar? How are they different?
Explain your response using direct evidence from the short story as support.
As a foreign student, I often read carefully any literatures from which I am going to learn the use of language, some particular appliance of vocabulary, because learning a language is a kind of mimic. The author’s skillful application of words is amazing. “The color is repellent, almost revolting: a smouldering unclean yellow” (534). In this sentence, there are three adjectives which are worthy to learn. The author gives very minute descriptions to some details like the yellow wallpaper and her feelings. But I have to remind myself not to be trapped by her novel because Gilman is a patient with melancholia.
ReplyDeleteAlthough this fiction is marked as “a good specimen of one kind of literature”, it can’t be accepted by all readers because it is not read aesthetically (546). Most of the descriptions are about the symptoms that the narrator has as a patient who suffers mental or motion disorder. As a human being who doesn’t have such serious hypochondria, I can’t see the woman who hides behind the yellow wallpaper. I am not going to stand on the narrator’s point to feel like she does because it will drive me mad. Sympathetically, in that time, the narrator’s mental illness isn’t correctly treated. As a physician, her husband’s methods of treating disease leads her symptom turn much worse. The narrator tries to express her rejection for this treatment but fails. Her fancy can be focused on wallpaper or anything else. It is random.
I would rather standing on the view of reading this article is like to have a rescued patient’s memoir but not a literary work. Only person who suffers mental illness can experience that fancy which normal people don’t. It is a kind of hypochondriasis. I think the woman in the yellow wallpaper is another part of the narrator. Similarly, they are both barred by something. The woman behind the yellow wallpaper is barred by the front pattern; while the narrator is barred by her husband who makes her stuck in the old villa where she hates. In the sentence, “I’ve got out at last…I’ve pulled off most of the paper, so you can’t put me back”, the narrator thinks she is just the women herself (545). The difference between these women is the yellow wallpaper woman is silent; the narrator is able to speak. The yellow wallpaper woman is invisible for all but only the narrator can see her.
I think this novel is helpful for the psychotherapists or alienists to understand and value the patients who suffer mental illness. It isn’t worthy for normal readers putting much time inside to realize or research the woman who is behind the yellow wallpaper.
The narrator of this story also serves as the protagonist of the story. I can understand where people may think of the woman in the wallpaper as a supernatural element because as you read it seems that the main character turns out to be the woman in the wallpaper as exemplified in line 261 on pg. 545, “I’ve got out at last, said I, in spite of you and Jane. And I’ve pulled off most of the paper, so you can’t put me back!” I don’t see the woman in the wallpaper as a supernatural element, I see her as a symbolic element. I think it represented the main character being restricted as a human being from doing what she wanted to do. Her husband was a “physician of high standing” who took care of everything for her and she listened to his every word. As I was reading I got the idea that the wife had some sort of mental sickness which is why her husband had her taking so many medications and tonics and forbid her from writing. Writing stories was what calmed the wife down. It was the only outlet that distracted her from her sickness and she had to sneak around to do it. If a person is being controlled, told what to do and confined in a space where they don’t want to be they are going to feel as if they are trapped. The story says “I think that woman gets out in the daytime…she is always creeping…I creep by daylight, I can’t do it at night, for I know John would suspect something at once” (pg 542). The wife explains that she can only feel any type of freedom during the day. Why? Simply because her husband is at work; at night when her husband is home she can’t creep as she would like. The woman in the wallpaper and the wife are similar in their desire to have free will and choice to do as they please. The woman in the wallpaper can also represent the other side of the main character outside her persona as the wife of a physician. It may represent the side that’s fighting to come out but the wife will not let it nor will her husband and his sister, Jennie.
ReplyDeleteThe story "The Yellow Wall Paper" was very interesting. The story could be interpreted and analyzed in many ways. I saw the women in the wall paper as the same charater as the main character telling the her story. I felt the main character told her story in a soliloquy form. As, I continued to read the story I thought it did take on a supernatural element.When I continued to read the story I saw a resemblence between the women in the painting behind bars compared to the way "John" treated the main character. I started to compare the painting and it stood out to me the similar behaviors of the women in the painting and the main character. I then realized that the women in the painting was the main character as shown on page 545 when she states "I've got out at least,said I,in spite of you and Jane and I've pulled off most the paper,so you can't put me back!" This showed that the main character was free and speaking from her past experience of being imprisoned in the wall paper.I found the characters to be alike in feeling captive all the time as the women in the wall paper was behind the bars. The main character had her husband "Jonh" TO dictate her every move only during the day was she free during the day unless his sister was near. The relationship between the two character was an protagonist (main character) and the antagonist (the women in the wall paper). The main character the whole story was describing her battle to be come free. The differences I felt between the two characters was the main character was controled even when she thought she was free. She was still confined by her husband who was this great doctor and his sister who watched her every move as much as he did when he was out. Where as the women in the wall paper was free during the day to creep and walk freely without any restrains and she waited until it was her time to be totally free which happened at the end. Now she can creep over "Johns" body continuously
ReplyDeleteFrom my reading of the Yellow Wallpaper it seems to me as John is very protective of his wife to an extent. He believes her depression is in her mind and is curable.The colonial mansion that they was staying in the wife felt was a depressive place.. It was colorful it was gloomy and not homely.John had them there because he figured she could relax there and he had business here as ell.. The wifes deppression was in her head to me and her husband felt the same. Jon is a doctor so he payed clothes attention to his wife and her medication that she was taking for her depression. He wanted her to rest and that was his major concern. His wife was a writer and a very good one from whhat i read. While being at the driery house she had wanted to start writing from the moment they arrived but John would be upset if she did because he wanted her to just rest. Mean while john is away all day attending to his patients. So his wife is bored to know end. The wife really suffers with her illness of nervous conditions and he doesnt want to believe so. It depresses his wife deeply. John felt that the wallpaper being so ugly was a help to her nervous illness because she shouldnt let such a small thing get to her. That means that anything minor would be able to send her into a state of depression as well. Even though she suffered with depression anyway.John always trys to keep her safe mentally..It's a love story with a nice setting ..
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ReplyDeletealthough John was very over protective over his wife life a father over his daughter and a brother over his sister and she knew this all along but Jennie would giver her the space she needed if she asked her for it.. Behind that wallpaper nobody knew things about her and they never would as far as she was concerned..Alot of deep thoughts and feeling lyed behind the wallpaper.
DeleteJohn loved his wife so much that it was hard for her to talk to him about how she really felt about the wallpaper and she understood but she still tried.
ReplyDeleteYes, I agree that the woman in the wallpaper is a supernatural element. The woman is ill however her husband does not think she is. He feels she is having temporary nervous depression. Furthermore, he figures if she stops working and rest her body she will get better. Since her husband is a prominent physician of high standing she decided to listen to him. After all her husband is man who loves her and takes good care of her. He gives her medication and tonics and would read to her to make her feel better. She likes to write but her husband forbids her from doing it until she gets better. However, her illness would get the best of her regarding the yellow wall paper in the rental house. She thought it was ugly, dull and confusing. She compared herself to the wall paper trapped in the house with no way out. She was not allowed to do anything not even take care of her own child. I feel that she was suffering from postpartum depression. The most common symptoms are changes in work and social relationship, having less time and freedom for yourself, lack of sleep and worries about your abilities as a mother. These are symptoms that she was showing throughout the story.
ReplyDeleteJose Desilva
I Read “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. The narrator of this story serves as the protagonist of the story. The women in the story had a nervous breakdown and her husband thought he was helping her get better I don’t see the wallpaper as being a supernatural element. This is because the only time she saw the woman in the sun and the moon was reflecting on it. I believe that the woman was imagining it because she didn’t want to be stuck in the room. The woman in the wallpaper represented how she wanted to get out of the room and it could be the way she was thinking of life outside of the room. With her being alone for such a long time in the room, the patterns in yellow wallpaper created images when the sun and the moonlight was in the room and it inevitably drove her crazy. The different reflections on the wallpaper of a woman trying to get out captured her attention. “ I think that the women gets out in the daytime” (Gilman 542) because she thought that she had seen her “In that long shades lane creeping up and down I saw her in those dark grape arbors, creeping all around e garden” (Gilman 542). At this point she thinks that she is part of the wallpaper. She locked herself in the room with a rope in her possession to tie up the women if they try to get out. She can now identify herself as one of the those women in the wallpaper, that’s why when her husband John came in the room he fainted at the site of her creeping around the room
ReplyDeleteI Read “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. The narrator of this story serves as the protagonist of the story. The women in the story had a nervous breakdown and her husband thought he was helping her get better I don’t see the wallpaper as being a supernatural element. This is because the only time she saw the woman in the sun and the moon was reflecting on it. I believe that the woman was imagining it because she didn’t want to be stuck in the room. The woman in the wallpaper represented how she wanted to get out of the room and it could be the way she was thinking of life outside of the room. With her being alone for such a long time in the room, the patterns in yellow wallpaper created images when the sun and the moonlight was in the room and it inevitably drove her crazy. The different reflections on the wallpaper of a woman trying to get out captured her attention. “ I think that the women gets out in the daytime” (Gilman 542) because she thought that she had seen her “In that long shades lane creeping up and down I saw her in those dark grape arbors, creeping all around e garden” (Gilman 542). At this point she thinks that she is part of the wallpaper. She locked herself in the room with a rope in her possession to tie up the women if they try to get out. She can now identify herself as one of the those women in the wallpaper, that’s why when her husband John came in the room he fainted at the site of her creeping around the room
ReplyDeleteWow! Wow! When I first started reading the text “The Yellow wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman I disliked it immensely, it made no sense. It still does not make sense because when I think I have finally gotten it, I see a different point of view. However, I will say I loved the way she mastered the play on words. I never saw the woman behind the yellow wallpaper as a supernatural element I change my point of view she was supernatural. Supernatural in the sense that she was able to cure herself with no credit to her husband and the doctor. Who both wanted to lock her up and throw away the key. This is the missing piece she willed her self mentally on her recovery. I felt sad at times but never a ghost story.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree that there is more than one person in the main character. The woman behind the yellow stained wallpaper and the narrator suffering from melancholia are one and the same alright. After following the main character, I was able to see the many personas within the main character. They are similar in the sense that they are both locked up and wanting to be free. The narrator is trapped mentally and the other woman is trapped behind the yellow stained wallpaper. The difference between the woman behind the yellow wallpaper and the narrator, is that the woman behind the yellow wallpaper is able to able to express her views on treating a mental disorder and the narrator is not able to, due to her state of mind. No one believes that she is ill including her husband who is a very prominent doctor. All normal activities were taken away from her; she was never allowed to be herself and to express her opinions. The husband treated as if she was just one-step from being committed to a mental hospital. She felt that she was always watched in everything that she did. This would make anyone paranoid. On page 543, the woman behind the “The Yellow Wallpaper” felt that she was not able “to trust people too much”. I believe this is one of the reasons the narrator took on a different persona. As she got better, she hid that part of her.
It is ironic that the husband who is a prominent doctor does not believe his wife suffers from a mental disorder. Yet he does everything that is totally opposite to making her well. Or is it just what the narrator wants us to see umm? The husband rents a beautiful mansion, yet he places her in a room, which is very dilapidated, with bars on the window and notches in the floor, as if that room was occupied before, by someone who was demented. She is being deprived of the only thing that could make her normal and calm her raging thoughts. That of her writing. The manner in which the husband treats the wife is very disturbing. “What is it, little girl?” Don’t go walking about like that - you’ll get cold” (539). I see a woman whose only desire is to be normal and independent, yet she is being controlled, treated as a child and being told what to do by her husband.
As I read the story “The yellow wall paper” , my mind struggled to understand the emotional anxiety that the main character was going through. However ,as the narrator describe the scenery and setting of each twist and turn of the story, the more fascinating the story became. The woman in the room was initially relating her self to a supernatural element, which in this case was the women she imagine behind the wallpaper. Therefor the women in the room and the women in the wallpaper are actually two parts of the same main character. They are similar because the women in the wall paper was described as creeping when no one was looking and trapped behind bars in the patterns of the wallpaper at night. This is how the main character felt due to the fact that she felt trapped in the room she dread being in and so desperately wanted to get out of. For example she stated in line 240-245 “I wonder if they all come out of the wallpaper as I did?”, this entailed that she did fell trap in a certain way and had no freedom to do as she please, because her husband John and his sister Jane would be watching her every move. The difference between the two was the main character was very determine to get out and wanted to obtain self liberation. She expresses this by saying “I’ve got out at last…I’ve pulled off most of the paper, so you can’t put me back”line (545). On the other hand the woman in the wallpaper was just a character in her mind, so she was freed by the main character destroying most of the wallpaper.
ReplyDeleteThe short story “The Yellow Wallpaper” has different characters. Starring with the narrator that is a first-person narrator because she is also a character in the story. As part of the story she presents herself as a woman that is sick with some kind of nervous disorder. She is not able to have a normal life and cannot even do what she enjoys, writing. Her husband John, who I considered to be a flat character in the story, is a physician that put her in a rest therapy. John put her in a nursery room that had ripped yellow wallpaper so she can relax and rest. The narrator does not like this room because of the yellow wallpaper. She feels annoyed and anxious towards it, “This paper looks to me as if it knew what a viscous influence it had!” (Perkins, 535) Slowly, she becomes obsesses to the point that she starts having hallucinations. She sees figures of heads, necks and a woman behind bars. She is totally into the yellow wallpaper that she gives it a special smell that is all over the house. “The only thing I can think of that it is like is the color of the paper! A yellow smell.” (541) She considers the woman behind the yellow wallpaper a ghost. But I considered it to be the reflection of her frustration. Been indoors is was easy for her and not been able to write was driving her crazy that she creates this super natural world. In the last sentences of the story after she ripped off the yellow wallpaper, she says: “’I’ve got out last’, said I, ‘in spite of you and Jane. And I’ve pulled off most of the paper, so you can’t put me back!’” (545) In these lines she express how upset she was in that room and by pulled off the yellow wallpaper she felt relief from her husband and sister in law.
ReplyDeleteReading the Charlotte Perkins Gilman, “ The Yellow Paper “ Before reading this story I imagine the story line to be as a physician with hunted house patient. After reading to the end of the story I was not far off from my prediction. The main character in this story believes the house she lives in with her husband(john) and sister in-law (Jennie) was been haunted. However her husband a physician who thought otherwise did not believe her and actually diagnosed her sick. John was one of the top physicians which made it difficult for her wife to challenge him. As john thought he trying to get her better, she was disturbed about a yellow wall paper in her room. I don't see this wall paper as a super natural element, because art can be interpreted in a lot of ways, and in this case, the main character interpreted what she saw on the wall paper according to how she felt. Which was trapped in a room and been watched over by Jennie. Which is exactly how she see the woman behind the pattern in daylight on page (540) “I didn't realize for a long time what the thing that showed behind, that dim sub-pattern, but now I’m quiet sure it's a woman. By daylight she is subdued, quiet. I fancy it's the pattern that keeps her still. As the main character tries to confront her husband, which doesn't go well I think she projects the feeling to what she see on the wall paper on page 542.And she is all the time trying to cut through. But nobody could cut through the pattern- it strangles so; I think that's why it has no heads. As the last day approached the main character takes down the wall papers and brings a rope for the woman in the wall paper to get out represented her leaving out of the house.
ReplyDeleteThe woman in the short story “The Yellow Wallpaper” appears to be a protagonist character. It seems as though she captures the sympathy of the audience, while she suffers from a state of depression. Her condition becomes worst as her husband John and his sister Jennie are in denial and she is forced to get through it on her own. She begins to hallucinate and believes that there is someone living within the wallpaper, becoming obsessed with the texture, color and even scent. As I continued to read the story I began to notice that the woman is not only the narrator but is also the woman in the wallpaper. Considering that both women are the same person I do believe that the woman in the painting is a supernatural element, becoming a figment of her imagination. I don’t see much difference between the two except for the fact that one character is human and the other is a supernatural element. We learn that the woman in the wallpaper is supernatural when narrator begins to rip down the paper and she disappears. The narrator states “I’ve got out at last said I, in spite of you and Jane.”(Gilman, 545) Of course there are many similarities especially when dealing with behavior. For example, the narrator states “It is the same woman, I know for she is always creeping and most woman do not creep by daylight.” (Gilman, 542) Along with “I always lock the door when I creep by daylight.” (Gilman, 542) From these two statements you can assume that the woman in the wallpaper may appear as a shadow rather than a ghost and that explains why the woman in the painting has the same behavior or actions. In the story we can see that the woman in the wallpaper only appears when the narrator is also awake. We see that whatever daily pattern one has the other will have the same as well.
ReplyDeleteAs I was reading the text “ The Yellow Wallpaper” by Gilman, I was going through a lot of stuffs in my mind. At first, I thought it is a story of a ghost and a haunted house but later I realized it has nothing to do with ghost or house but yellow wallpaper. The narrator starts her story by describing the house in a contradictory way, which she and her husband just rented. She thinks that there is something queer about the house facing the fact that it has stood so long untenanted. As she suffers “nervous depression” she complains that her husband “John” cares a lot of both her illness and her thoughts and concerns. As the story proceeds, she finds her self disturbed with particular wallpaper in her bedroom with strange patterns visible on it. She thinks there is a woman behind who comes out and creep day and night. As a reader I think the woman in the wallpaper was not a supernatural element it was just an imagination and reflection of a fear and anxiety she had regarding house when she first walked in. In last when she rips the yellow wallpaper she thinks that she has finally gotten out herself of what she was really fearing, she thinks she is relieved and now no one can put her back in same nervous situation.
ReplyDeleteThe women in the wallpaper I see has the main character’s crazy side, in a way it can be seen as a supernatural element because it’s not physically there but mentally there. It’s something that was grown over time rather than already existing. Her crazy side manifested in that yellow wallpaper, it grew more and more apparent and concrete as time strolled by. It developed within the main character until they eventually merged into one that day the main character pulled off the yellow wallpaper an example of this would be when the main character describes ”I Pulled and she shook” (543) insinuating that the wallpaper was an actual person she was struggling with. The wallpaper is a metaphor for the main character’s internal struggle with herself. The two sides of the main character found in this story; the one that is sensible and one that is more reckless. These two sides are similar and different because they both yearned to escape and find freedom. The sensible one wants freedom from being labeled as sick and unable to do as she pleases. The reckless one wants to find its freedom from the yellow wallpaper itself it wants to be seen and this is through the main character herself.
ReplyDeleteI see the woman in the wallpaper as a figment of the wife’s imagination not a supernatural element. Attempting to ignore her husband’s prescribed treatment for her mental illness contributed to her ill-fated fantasies. His misdiagnosis of his wife’s condition allowed her to escape reality by focusing her emotions and feelings of frustration on other objects. She became dissociated with her surroundings and started imagining someone behind the wallpaper.
ReplyDeleteThe Yellow Wallpaper” symbolizes something that affects her directly. After constantly looking at the ripped and dirty wallpaper under different lighting she sees a “dim sub-pattern…. .I am quite sure it is a woman” (pg.540), she says, and realizes the woman trapped in the wallpaper is herself. A person forced to hide her true self from others. John tried to help his wife but ended up patronizing her instead. Having no say in her life, John’s wife decided to exercise her mind through fantasy. The woman behind the wallpaper was trapped and caged just like her and needed rescuing. She decided to break the control of her family in her life and said to her husband,” I’ve got out at last, in spite of you and Jane” (pg. 545).
The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman is indeed a very twisted story. The story actually does seem like a ghost story with the type of context being used and by viewing the story through a horror perspective one might actually believe it being a ghost story because of how the women in the wallpaper is creeping around everywhere. Usually in a ghost story there is an unnatural cause or accident which makes the story come to life. In this case the narrator seems to notice a women creeping through the windows, as if someone has trapped her in the wallpaper through a sign of punishment. I certainly do not think of this as a supernatural element, instead I would view this as a case of mental disorder. Because some people have the ability to see stuff others cannot, for instance some can do astro projection, the ability for the spirit to wander out of the body and roam around during their sleep. Also, Gilman states “There are things in that wallpaper that nobody knows about but me, or ever will” 538. This explains that the narrator has an ability that is only present in a few people, the ability to see what others cannot see no matter how hard they try.
ReplyDeleteBy reading the text multiple times, the reader starts realizing that the woman in the wallpaper is actually the women in the room. The women in the room is always telling her husband how she wants leave as soon as possible, and no matter how hard she tries to convince John (her husband) her idea is always rejected. She explains how she is not feeling better and how she is instead of getting as much rest as possible, she is getting barely any sleep at all, and how her appetite is still not improving. She believes by leaving that wretched “haunted” house one could say, her health will get better in no time and nervous disorder will be gone as well. But John says the opposite, “of course, if… but you really are better, dear … I am a doctor, and I know. You are gaining flesh and color, your appetite is better, I feel really much easier about you” (Gilman 539). Just like how the women in the room wants to leave the house, so the does the women in the wallpaper, just like how the narrator explains. “’I’ve got out at last,’ said I…And I’ve pulled off most of the paper, so you can’t put me back!’” (Gilman 545). This explains how the women in the wallpaper is now free and that no matter how hard one will try she will never get back in that wallpaper and since it was the last day for the lease, both the women in the wallpaper and the room are now free, even though they were one person. However I believe that the women in the room let her fancies take over her and had avoided John’s advice which use your “will” and overcome these fancies.
In the Yellow Wallpaper, I see the woman behind the wallpaper not as a supernatural event, but as a figment of the woman’s imagination. The woman was ill, and John always wanted her to rest and basically not do anything to avoid any strain on her. However, the woman did desire to do more than just mope around and I believe that desire is represented by this other woman creeping around. One half of her wants to listen to John, and the other half wants to be free from this restricted lifestyle. In the last lines of the story the woman says to John, “I’ve got out at last … in spite of you and Jane. And I’ve pulled off most of the paper, so now you can’t put me back” (545). The ugly yellow wallpaper can represent her undesired lifestyle she is currently putting up with, and underneath that can represents her alternate personality that has been dying to get out. Her saying the yellow wallpaper is gone and that John cannot put her back shows a change in her and it is obvious she cannot be put back under the wallpaper if the wallpaper is already torn off. The two halves of the woman are the same in the sense they both have a desire to be fulfilled by the woman. Those desires differ being that one half desires to keep John happy and the other desire is to be free from the boring lifestyle John is making her subdue.
ReplyDeleteThe Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman is indeed a very twisted story. The story actually does seem like a ghost story with the type of context being used and by viewing the story through a horror perspective one might actually believe it being a ghost story because of how the women in the wallpaper is creeping around everywhere. Usually in a ghost story there is an unnatural cause or accident which makes the story come to life. In this case the narrator seems to notice a women creeping through the windows, as if someone has trapped her in the wallpaper through a sign of punishment. I certainly do not think of this as a supernatural element, instead I would view this as a case of mental disorder. Because some people have the ability to see stuff others cannot, for instance some can do astro projection, the ability for the spirit to wander out of the body and roam around during their sleep. Also, Gilman states “There are things in that wallpaper that nobody knows about but me, or ever will” 538. This explains that the narrator has an ability that is only present in a few people, the ability to see what others cannot see no matter how hard they try.
ReplyDeleteBy reading the text multiple times, the reader starts realizing that the woman in the wallpaper is actually the women in the room. The women in the room is always telling her husband how she wants leave as soon as possible, and no matter how hard she tries to convince John (her husband) her idea is always rejected. She explains how she is not feeling better and how she is instead of getting as much rest as possible, she is getting barely any sleep at all, and how her appetite is still not improving. She believes by leaving that wretched “haunted” house one could say, her health will get better in no time and nervous disorder will be gone as well. But John says the opposite, “of course, if… but you really are better, dear … I am a doctor, and I know. You are gaining flesh and color, your appetite is better, I feel really much easier about you” (Gilman 539). Just like how the women in the room wants to leave the house, so the does the women in the wallpaper, just like how the narrator explains. “’I’ve got out at last,’ said I…And I’ve pulled off most of the paper, so you can’t put me back!’” (Gilman 545). This explains how the women in the wallpaper is now free and that no matter how hard one will try she will never get back in that wallpaper and since it was the last day for the lease, both the women in the wallpaper and the room are now free, even though they were one person. However I believe that the women in the room let her fancies take over her and had avoided John’s advice which use your “will” and overcome these fancies.
After reading “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman I do not see the woman in the wallpaper as a supernatural element. I believe that the woman believes she is seeing a woman in the wallpaper due to a mental illness she has. Yet from the woman’s perspective I can understand why people would label “The Yellow Wallpaper” as a ghost story. I believe that the woman in the wallpaper represents how the woman actually feels, which is trapped. The woman is also always being watched by John and Jane due to the fact that she is ill. “The faint figure behind seemed to shake the pattern, just as if she wanted to get out” (Gilman 538). The figure the woman sees is another woman which in my opinion represents her own personal desires to be free to not constantly feel as if she is watched. She sees the woman as being trapped in the wall paper just like she is forced to remain in her room for her own wellbeing according to John and Jane. Which is why I believe figure she is seeing is a reflection of herself in the sense that both woman are trapped. She wants an escape, freedom which is why she tore down the yellow wall paper “I’ve got out at last” (Gilman 545). In my opinion I believe she tore down the paper to show that now she is free as is the woman in the wallpaper.
ReplyDeleteI do not see the woman in the wallpaper as a supernatural element. I would say the woman in the wallpaper is who the woman in the room would like to be. The woman in the wallpaper is like and expression of the woman in the room. The woman in the room is stricken to the bed and the woman in the wall is like who the woman in the wall is yet at the same time it is who she would like to be. The patterns in the walls that she finds is an expression of what she feel at that moment. At the end of the story on page 544 she doesn’t like to look at the windows because “there are so many of those creeping women, and they creep so fast.” Then on page 545 the woman in the room starts creeping. The woman in the wall is who she would like to be yet it reveals her inner thoughts.
ReplyDeleteThe narrator of the short story “The yellow wallpaper” is the protagonist. From reading the beginning part of the short story, one may be inclined to believe that the woman in the wallpaper is a supernatural element, but as you get into the storyline you realize that the woman in the wallpaper is an expression of her inner feelings and self. On page 544 line 243 when she said she wondered if the women came out the wallpaper like she did, and also on page 545 line 261 when she said I got out at last, you can realize that the woman in the wallpaper and her are one person.
ReplyDeleteThere are definitely two “parts” of the main character. I believe that the main character due to her illness, felt overwhelmed and trapped. She did not have much freedom to do as she pleased. She had to write in secret, because her husband discouraged her from doing so since it would tire her out faster and interfere with her recovery process. She wanted to go visit some of her relatives, but could not do so because of her illness. Also, she could not talk to her husband about her unrealistic feelings regarding supernatural things. Even her brother who was also a physician agreed with her husband’s view of her situation, so she did not have much support to rely on for agreement with her. To express her feelings she developed a story about the woman in the wallpaper by making a connection with herself and the “made up” woman who was just a pigment of her imagination. I believe this was how she felt and she expressed this through her writing by painting a picture of the woman in the wallpaper being behind bars, since she also was in a room that had bars on the window.
The similarity among the two “parts” of the main character is noted in her description of the woman in the wallpaper trapped behind bars just as she was confined to a room with bars on the window all day. She mentioned on page 538, line 118 that there are things in the wallpaper that nobody knew about but her, which could mean she knew how she felt but never shared it with anyone. I believe the main character was seeing a reflection of herself on the wall because she mentioned how she would sleep in the day and stay up at night to watch the wallpaper. During the night, where dim lights emphasize reflections more, she mentioned at night in any kind of light the bars appear (page 540). She was seeing her own shadow as she lay in bed at nights staring at the wall.
There were many similarities among the two which clearly allows the reader to make the connection between the narrator and the woman in the wallpaper being the same person.
In the yellow wallpaper, much as the woman in the wall seem like some kind of supernatural being, I feel she is just a creation of the the protogonist, who has several issues of her own, no wonder she is often locked up by her husband John who wishes the best for her.
ReplyDeleteIn more than one way, I strongly felt that the woman in the wallpaper was a figment of her imagination and kept her trapped in her state of illness. Given the fact that she talked of thoughts of the woman moving as if she wanted to come out of the wall (538). Given that the woman in the wall would only appear at certain times especially durring the night in bright moon light,and not other times, I belived that she represented the crazy sick part of the protogonist who was always entrapped and crawling aganist the wall.
To release herself of her entrapment and illness, the protoganist felt that she had to move away from the house especially from that room with the yellow wallpaper and kept begging her reluctant husband to take her away (539). Eventually, one night when John was not around, the protoganist went on to destroy the wallpaper and embrace herself (545).