The Yellow Wallpaper By Charlotte Perkins Gilman
Triggering the Hidden Part of the Human Subconscious Through Inanimate Objects Many individuals fear where the line between sanity and insanity blur together as an amount of trauma creates hallucinations in the subconscious. During humanity’s earlier days, mental illness could not be determined by a physical diagnosis. The concept of how a sane person can turn insane brings wonders, yet curiosity into the subconscious. These possibilities were expressed through the works of literature where little to no knowledge could burst into bountiful amounts on the subject of insanity. In Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s story “The Yellow Wallpaper”, the main character goes through an experience that causes her to reach her breaking point from a caged fragile creature to a free animal. Gilman explores the hidden parts of the mind where illusion and reality collide as one by using the wallpaper as both a trigger and curse in allowing the main character reveal her inner self that was locked away from society. As the plot of the story finally
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blossoms, Gilman expresses a variety of themes within reality and illusion by using the narrator as a vessel in finding a means to escape what she is confined to in the real world. The wallpaper acts like a trap or an abstract piece of art to the main character due to the way she is deeply intrigued by it. For instance, “ ̶ places where it isn't faded and where the sun is just so ̶ I can see a strange, provoking, formless sort of figure, that seems to skulk behind that silly and conspicuous front design”(Gilman 6). This sentence from the text provides background information on how the main character starts to visualize shapes and figures within the wallpaper leading her to engage in the fantasy appearing before her. To see a figure behind the wallpaper ̶ in no clear resolution of what she saw – indicates that the starting point the narrator’s reasoning between sanity and insanity becomes muddy. According to Barbara Hochman’s article titled “The Reading Habit and The Yellow Wallpaper”, she states “At times she reads the design as one might read a tale of adventure, throwing herself imaginatively into the midst of the action”(Hochman 97). With this critical piece of evidence and the works of Gilman’s story “The Yellow Wallpaper”, we can illustrate that the narrator is slipping from reality by creating an illusion for herself and/or allowing the illusion to come towards her. Either she is physical tired of being in the real world or falls into the wallpaper’s trance as it slowly takes ahold of her, misleading herself into thinking which is real and a hallucination of the mind. Another primary example of the main character confusing illusion from reality would be in the following sentence that involves one of the five senses ̶ smell. “But there is something else about that paper--the smell! Even when I go to ride, if I turn my head suddenly and surprise it--there is that smell! Such a peculiar odor, too! I have spent hours in trying to analyze it, to find what it smelled like”(Gilman 11). To state that the main character can give the wallpaper a distinctive smell indicates that she is giving the wallpaper human characteristics. By allowing the wallpaper to appear more human to the narrator causes her to have a more intimate relationship with the fantasy she is creating. She also states that she can smell it on herself even when she is not in any proximity of the wallpaper. According to Hochman, “This story line centers upon a figure that takes on human features, motivations, and finally a specifically human shape. Soon the narrator identifies herself with both the figure and the plot. Toward the end of the story, she merges with that figure and enters that plot”(Hochman 97). Connecting these two texts provides a story board on how the narrator notices human characteristics within the wall. By giving the wallpaper a more personal humane interaction to relate with, she sees the figure behind the wallpaper with her five senses ̶ sight and smell ̶ as a bridge to interact with the fantasy she is slowly crossing into. This interaction not only confuses her mind, but her body as well on which reality is fake or real. Upon further examination, Gilman includes parts where the main character has already mix illusion and reality as she slowly frees herself from society.
“The woman behind shakes it! Then in the bright spots she keeps still, and in very shady spots she takes hold of the bars and shakes them hard. And she is all the time trying to climb through. But nobody could climb through that pattern. I think that is why it has so many heads”(Gilman 11). Gilman’s inclusion of the heads symbolizes high authority of society as a lock on the traditions and ideals on how everything should be from social rank to actions. During the day the narrator is oppressed by society’s regulations, compared to the night where no prying eyes could see her try and break free from the chains society had laid out for her. Moreover, the day symbolizes the reality the main character is in where she follows society’s constitution with no freedom of expression. Whereas in the night, she has the freedom to be who she is and allow her fantasy to liberate her from
being someone she is not and/or to escape the harsh reality she lives in to be in a better place. In further exploration of the text, a possible reason of adding this sentence is similar to the idea where society defined the women of Gilman’s time to stay hidden in the background and not bring much attention to themselves when around company and be well behaved: “While twentieth-century critics have almost universally read the wallpaper in Gilman's famous short story as symbolic of the narrator's psychological state, a more thorough reading of Gilman's own oeuvre sharply indicates that she conceived of the connection between environment and the body- even between home furnishings and one's state of mind-in physiological, rather than psychological, terms”(Thrailkill 541). Because of society’s rule over everything in the narrator’s life she felt trapped even when she was alone in the bedroom with the yellow wallpaper. With nowhere to turn where she could feel free and to be at peace alongside herself, the idea of creating a fantasy where everything was to her liking seemed like the only hope she had to survive in the reality she was stuck in. With this in mind, as the narrator indulges into her fantasy more and more throughout the plot, she starts to forget what is real and made up as the illusion merges with reality. Throughout the story, Gilman illustrates key notes on how the main character was held back in order to keep her mental stability in control. In “The Yellow Wallpaper”, the main character’s husband –John – is a key factor in keeping the main character in check with reality by trying to convince his wife to take certain procedures such as relaxing, not doing physical work and taking medicine to ease her nervous weakness. “-- but John has cautioned me not to give way to fancy in the least. He says with my imaginative power and habit of story-making, a nervous weakness like mine is sure to lead to all manner of excited fancies, and that I ought to use my will and good sense to check the tendency”(Gilman 5). As she battles an internal battle within herself, John persuades her to not give into her personal desires and focus on what is in front of her. However, in keeping with the era in which the story was taken place, many medical professions didn’t know any comprehend on the human brain. “No one had ever cured a hysterical symptom by such means before, or had come so near to understand its cause”(Thrailkill 533). Since John is a doctor combined with his logical and realistic approach at situations, he believes he can control the nervous weakness his wife is suffering through. Yet reality and fantasy are two different things that most individuals do not understand: As Thrailkill noted, “With the advent of physiology, bacteriology, and cellular pathology in the second half of the century, diseases primarily in there terms of a patient’s character’s traits, personal history or social circumstances became instead rooted in the body and somatic terms”(Thrailkill 530). In other words, a cause towards the narrator letting reality and illusion collide could be from the pressure she withstood from outside sources. Since it is slightly hinted that the narrator recently gave birth could of cause a trigger to occur in her mentality as she started to notice the oddities in her life. Gilman writes this story through the main character’s point of view, giving the reader an insight on her thoughts as the plot slowly reveals itself. As the story progresses, Gilman provides primary examples within the story such as differences in her thought process that illustrates changes of the main character. “I'm really getting quite fond of the big room, all but that horrid paper”(Gilman 4). In this sentence, the main character settles into her temporary home and enjoys the room except for the presence of the wallpaper. This shows that at the start she had a general hatred towards the wallpaper. “But I know she was studying that pattern, and I am determined that nobody shall find it out but myself!”(Gilman 10). However, in this sentence the main character had grown to like the wallpaper as it piques her interest as she notices the figures behind the paper. It also shows that the main character has become possessive over the mystery the wallpaper has and does not want anyone to interfere with her chances of discovering the secret. Comparing these two sentences from the text, there is a drastic change in the character’s thoughts about the wallpaper as she grew to live with it. Mental illness is an invisible force that not even science can break down into chemical equations to cure one’s sanity. The thin line between reality and illusion, sanity and insanity is a puzzle within the human mind. Gilman provides a possibility through the eyes of the main character in “The Yellow Wallpaper” to allow entry into the mind when the line between sanity and insanity blur into one. Overall, “The Yellow Wallpaper” explores the line between sanity and insanity through first person to show a deeper concept of society and freedom from conformity.
blossoms, Gilman expresses a variety of themes within reality and illusion by using the narrator as a vessel in finding a means to escape what she is confined to in the real world. The wallpaper acts like a trap or an abstract piece of art to the main character due to the way she is deeply intrigued by it. For instance, “ ̶ places where it isn't faded and where the sun is just so ̶ I can see a strange, provoking, formless sort of figure, that seems to skulk behind that silly and conspicuous front design”(Gilman 6). This sentence from the text provides background information on how the main character starts to visualize shapes and figures within the wallpaper leading her to engage in the fantasy appearing before her. To see a figure behind the wallpaper ̶ in no clear resolution of what she saw – indicates that the starting point the narrator’s reasoning between sanity and insanity becomes muddy. According to Barbara Hochman’s article titled “The Reading Habit and The Yellow Wallpaper”, she states “At times she reads the design as one might read a tale of adventure, throwing herself imaginatively into the midst of the action”(Hochman 97). With this critical piece of evidence and the works of Gilman’s story “The Yellow Wallpaper”, we can illustrate that the narrator is slipping from reality by creating an illusion for herself and/or allowing the illusion to come towards her. Either she is physical tired of being in the real world or falls into the wallpaper’s trance as it slowly takes ahold of her, misleading herself into thinking which is real and a hallucination of the mind. Another primary example of the main character confusing illusion from reality would be in the following sentence that involves one of the five senses ̶ smell. “But there is something else about that paper--the smell! Even when I go to ride, if I turn my head suddenly and surprise it--there is that smell! Such a peculiar odor, too! I have spent hours in trying to analyze it, to find what it smelled like”(Gilman 11). To state that the main character can give the wallpaper a distinctive smell indicates that she is giving the wallpaper human characteristics. By allowing the wallpaper to appear more human to the narrator causes her to have a more intimate relationship with the fantasy she is creating. She also states that she can smell it on herself even when she is not in any proximity of the wallpaper. According to Hochman, “This story line centers upon a figure that takes on human features, motivations, and finally a specifically human shape. Soon the narrator identifies herself with both the figure and the plot. Toward the end of the story, she merges with that figure and enters that plot”(Hochman 97). Connecting these two texts provides a story board on how the narrator notices human characteristics within the wall. By giving the wallpaper a more personal humane interaction to relate with, she sees the figure behind the wallpaper with her five senses ̶ sight and smell ̶ as a bridge to interact with the fantasy she is slowly crossing into. This interaction not only confuses her mind, but her body as well on which reality is fake or real. Upon further examination, Gilman includes parts where the main character has already mix illusion and reality as she slowly frees herself from society.
“The woman behind shakes it! Then in the bright spots she keeps still, and in very shady spots she takes hold of the bars and shakes them hard. And she is all the time trying to climb through. But nobody could climb through that pattern. I think that is why it has so many heads”(Gilman 11). Gilman’s inclusion of the heads symbolizes high authority of society as a lock on the traditions and ideals on how everything should be from social rank to actions. During the day the narrator is oppressed by society’s regulations, compared to the night where no prying eyes could see her try and break free from the chains society had laid out for her. Moreover, the day symbolizes the reality the main character is in where she follows society’s constitution with no freedom of expression. Whereas in the night, she has the freedom to be who she is and allow her fantasy to liberate her from
being someone she is not and/or to escape the harsh reality she lives in to be in a better place. In further exploration of the text, a possible reason of adding this sentence is similar to the idea where society defined the women of Gilman’s time to stay hidden in the background and not bring much attention to themselves when around company and be well behaved: “While twentieth-century critics have almost universally read the wallpaper in Gilman's famous short story as symbolic of the narrator's psychological state, a more thorough reading of Gilman's own oeuvre sharply indicates that she conceived of the connection between environment and the body- even between home furnishings and one's state of mind-in physiological, rather than psychological, terms”(Thrailkill 541). Because of society’s rule over everything in the narrator’s life she felt trapped even when she was alone in the bedroom with the yellow wallpaper. With nowhere to turn where she could feel free and to be at peace alongside herself, the idea of creating a fantasy where everything was to her liking seemed like the only hope she had to survive in the reality she was stuck in. With this in mind, as the narrator indulges into her fantasy more and more throughout the plot, she starts to forget what is real and made up as the illusion merges with reality. Throughout the story, Gilman illustrates key notes on how the main character was held back in order to keep her mental stability in control. In “The Yellow Wallpaper”, the main character’s husband –John – is a key factor in keeping the main character in check with reality by trying to convince his wife to take certain procedures such as relaxing, not doing physical work and taking medicine to ease her nervous weakness. “-- but John has cautioned me not to give way to fancy in the least. He says with my imaginative power and habit of story-making, a nervous weakness like mine is sure to lead to all manner of excited fancies, and that I ought to use my will and good sense to check the tendency”(Gilman 5). As she battles an internal battle within herself, John persuades her to not give into her personal desires and focus on what is in front of her. However, in keeping with the era in which the story was taken place, many medical professions didn’t know any comprehend on the human brain. “No one had ever cured a hysterical symptom by such means before, or had come so near to understand its cause”(Thrailkill 533). Since John is a doctor combined with his logical and realistic approach at situations, he believes he can control the nervous weakness his wife is suffering through. Yet reality and fantasy are two different things that most individuals do not understand: As Thrailkill noted, “With the advent of physiology, bacteriology, and cellular pathology in the second half of the century, diseases primarily in there terms of a patient’s character’s traits, personal history or social circumstances became instead rooted in the body and somatic terms”(Thrailkill 530). In other words, a cause towards the narrator letting reality and illusion collide could be from the pressure she withstood from outside sources. Since it is slightly hinted that the narrator recently gave birth could of cause a trigger to occur in her mentality as she started to notice the oddities in her life. Gilman writes this story through the main character’s point of view, giving the reader an insight on her thoughts as the plot slowly reveals itself. As the story progresses, Gilman provides primary examples within the story such as differences in her thought process that illustrates changes of the main character. “I'm really getting quite fond of the big room, all but that horrid paper”(Gilman 4). In this sentence, the main character settles into her temporary home and enjoys the room except for the presence of the wallpaper. This shows that at the start she had a general hatred towards the wallpaper. “But I know she was studying that pattern, and I am determined that nobody shall find it out but myself!”(Gilman 10). However, in this sentence the main character had grown to like the wallpaper as it piques her interest as she notices the figures behind the paper. It also shows that the main character has become possessive over the mystery the wallpaper has and does not want anyone to interfere with her chances of discovering the secret. Comparing these two sentences from the text, there is a drastic change in the character’s thoughts about the wallpaper as she grew to live with it. Mental illness is an invisible force that not even science can break down into chemical equations to cure one’s sanity. The thin line between reality and illusion, sanity and insanity is a puzzle within the human mind. Gilman provides a possibility through the eyes of the main character in “The Yellow Wallpaper” to allow entry into the mind when the line between sanity and insanity blur into one. Overall, “The Yellow Wallpaper” explores the line between sanity and insanity through first person to show a deeper concept of society and freedom from conformity.