Table of Contents
The Yellow Wallpaper
The short story named “The Yellow Wallpaper” was written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. In this story, the author underlines the situation of the women that, how women were facing the society. The author also shows that women had no right to take their own decision as a society think that they are not capable to take any decision. This story is running around the narrator’s life who was facing depression and just because of these reasons she was not allowed to do anything or to go out and to contact some other people. So, most of the time she was living alone in her room which makes her feel lonely. Some other characters were also discussed in this story like Jennie and John. John in this story played as the role of husband whereas Jennie played as the role of sister in law. As the narrator spends her whole time in the room which is colored with a strange yellow color that indicates that how society binds the women under rules which make them feel low and alone. Some other things are also discussed like plot which I will discuss in upcoming paragraphs.
Firstly, we will start talking about the characters. So, mainly there are three characters which are Narrator, John, and Jennie. The narrator is the one who mainly runs the story as she is the central idea of the story. She was facing the problem of post-partum depression after her birth of the baby. In the story, firstly she thinks that her husband loves her so much but sometimes she realized that people like John are not good for society as he binds her with a lot of social rules. She spends most of her time in a single room which colored with a strange yellow color (Gilman 2008). After the narrator, the second character who runs the story is John who was a physician and handle her wife, who was facing the problem of depression. He was doing every possible thing for his wife. He had no bad intention for her wife as he just wants to make her feel well. For this reason, he did not allow her wife to do anything. He was doing everything with a positive intention which shows his love towards his wife but in the end things go against him as her wife considers it as a binding (Gilman). The third and last character of the story is Jennie. She played as the role of sister in law of the narrator. She used to do the household stuff also she is caring for their newborn baby, but the narrator was not feeling comfortable with her as she(narrator) does not consider her as a good caretake (Gilman, 2008).
The setting of every story is based on its location. This story has happened in a rental house. Most of the story is situated in the narrator’s room because she was feeling depressed and she spent most of the time inside the room. It is a big, airy room, the whole floor nearly, with windows that look all ways, and air and sunshine galore. It was nursery first and then playground and gymnasium, I should judge; for the windows are barred for little children, and there are rings and things in the walls (Gilman 2008). The yellow color of the room gave the strange look and by looking at its windows she was pretty sure that this room is for children’s. which makes her feel uncomfortable.
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Symbol has its significance in the story as it shows some message in the story. In this story, the main symbol which affects the whole story is the Yellow wallpaper in the narrator’s room. “The color is repellant, almost revolting; a smoldering, unclean yellow, strangely faded by the slow-turning sunlight. It is a dull yet lurid orange in some places, a sickly sulfur tint in others” (Gilman 2008). It shows that the yellow wallpaper was acts like a symbol and after watching it narrator feels scared and felt like as she was in the cage. So, here yellow symbol act as disturbance and cage for the narrator.
The point of view of the story is clear as the author used a clear description as he used past and present tense together. Also, he used a clear description of the house and used past tense which identify the situation.
Conflict always shows all sides of the topic and make it more interesting for the readers. In this story we can easily identify the conflict between john and his wife. John in this story put restrictions on the narrator as he was not allowing her to do any work. These things maker her feel down. Also, she likes to do writing but john even did not allow her to write and take her pen and paper away from her. By facing all these things, the narrator considers john as forcing her to be behind the cage of society where men dominate the society. No doubt John was caring for her wife but for wife it acts as a punishment. Which creates conflict between them.
Finally, the plot always tells the whole impact of the story. In the yellow wallpaper, the narrator was facing the problem of post-partum depression after her delivery of the baby. Then all three (John, Jennie, and Narrator) planned to stay in the rented house for 3 months. Where the narrator used to stay in the room which is covered with the yellow wallpaper. John did not allow her to do anything which makes her feel trapped in that room. So, always try to escape her from there and on the very last day she locked herself and started peeling the yellow wallpaper which gave her a strange look. John also came over there and note down the situation and suddenly fell and her wife start crushing him as she felt that she got power and will not face any restrictions anymore.
References
- Gilman, C.P. (2008, November 25). “The yellow wallpaper”. The Norton anthology of short fiction, www.gutenberg.org/files/1952/1952-h/1952-h.htm
