"The Yellow Wall-Paper"

Charles So

English 48A

Jan. 6 2011

Journal for Gilman

Author Quote:
"Jennie wanted to sleep with me the sly thing! but i told her i should undoubtedly rest better for a night all alone. That was clever, for really i wasn't alone a bit! As soon as it was moonlight and that poor thing began to crawl and shake the pattern, i got up and ran to help her" (818)

Internet Quote:

"Much more significantly, Gilman wrote fiction for the same reason she wrote everything else and for the same reason she spent years on the lecture circuit. She wrote and she lectured in an effort to convert people to her ideas. She used fiction, for example, to illustrate her deeply held belief that the home and domestic life as currently constructed are the source of the oppression of women" (The Charlotte Perkins Gilman Reader by Ann J. Lane found in Googlescholar.com)

Summary:

Because the narrator has been forced to stay in the room to cope with her illness, she has become infatuated with the yellow wall paper which she sees everyday. Even though the narrator believes tells her husband the "rest cure" he believes in, is not working for her and is actually contributing to her illness, he ignores her, for he believes her illness is causing her to act this way. The misdiagnosis pushes her madness and the narrator writes her frustration and she becomes disillusional.

Personal Opinion:
Gilman's intents on writing the story is powerful, she uses her experiences to write a psychological story of misdiagnoses and mis-remedy. This ultimatley dooms the poor woman to her disillusioned state. As you follow the descent of madness of the narrator, it is clear that she was not crazy or seriously ill from the start. It is the isolation and loss of control around her which pushes her to the edge, because of her misdiagnoses and mis-remedy she is deprived of the essentials which keeps her sane. She is pleaded not to stimulate or express her creative and intellectual urges, in order to help herself. This makes her go even crazier for she is distraught by the whole fundmental aspect of her treatment. Beyond the ultimate message of womens oppression i feel this story is also great psychological thriller.