The Culture Of The Yellow Wallpaper, By Charlotte Perkins Gilman

The Culture of The Yellow Wallpaper Through her many stories, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, developed the notion of how being a strong independent woman can be inspirational to all. The expression of her personal feelings and opinions behind the guise of a seemingly fictional story brings new life to the story itself. During the nineteenth century, there were many stereotypes of what was expected from women. In the short story “The Yellow Wallpaper” Gilman composes the story of a woman who suffers from postpartum depression and finds an infatuation with a wall covered with yellow wallpaper. Seeing that Gilman herself has experienced this form of mental illness, we can analyze the context of the text and see the reflection of her own life through
Gilman, being an active feminist, encouraged women to be independent and promoted the idea that no woman needed a man to tell her what to do and how to do it. Charlotte Gilman had quite the life growing up, in part because her father abandoned the family when she was young. Being a single mother, this forced them to move around quite a bit. As a young adult, Gilman was madly in love with a man by the name of Charles Stetson. They had two children together, however there were complications with their first-born. “Soon after her marriage to Charles Stetson and the birth of her daughter, she fell into a deeply depressed condition and consulted Dr. S. Weir Mitchell who in turn prescribed his famous rest cure. It is her experience with Mitchell’s treatment that inspired her to write “The Yellow Wallpaper” (On Feminism and The Yellow Wallpaper). Gilman was able to insert her own ideas on feminism into her story based on her real life experiences. The exception being the relationship with her husband, John. The factual exile to the upstairs of the vacation home certainly did not display the feminism to which Gilman proclaimed. Even with the added fictional aspects to her story, Gilman is able to understand and relate to the women in her story. This is clearly conveyed through her detailed and imaginative writing. She truly gives the reader an in depth, literal and figurative look
She uses a slow and steady pace to release tidbits of metaphor that clue the reader to see the wallpaper as a symbol of male authority. The main character’s fascination with the ugly paper begins as an innocent annoyance, builds to a pastime, and crescendos to an obsession. The beauty of the story, however, is that this build-up is very subtle, and only after reflection and contemplation can the symbols of the wallpaper be seen. Indeed, the character in the story cannot recognize them herself. The struggle to see what is in the wallpaper is what motivates the reader to continue along with the story. (On Feminism and The Yellow