Dylan Hakala

March 13, 2017

Critical Analysis of The Yellow Wallpaper

The story of The Yellow Wallpaper was a psychological horror story that points out

critical problems in society in order to reform. The story was written by Charlotte Perkins

Gilman in 1892 and shows a glimpse into the mind of a woman on her downward spiral into

complete insanity. The story has many underlying themes and symbols that paint a whole new

view of the story and create a new meaning thats not stated simply in the plot. Not only is the

story creative and horrific but also is based on events that has happened in the authors life. The

author uses themes and symbols in order to shed light on the terrible oppression of women in

society.

Gilman had her own experience much like the one the narrator had in the story of The

Yellow Wallpaper. She wrote in an article that she was diagnosed with depression by a

neurologist after three years of suffering through nervous breakdowns. The doctor told her that

the rest cure was the best option for her to help her get through her disorder. The doctor was

later found to be very objectifying towards women believing that they were inferior and docile

creatures with a weak mind, the doctor would later be portrayed as the husband in the story

making the narrator suffer through the rest cure. The rules of the rest cure were much like the

rules in the story, she was told to stay in isolation, get a lot of bed rest, to live as domestic of a

life as possible and to never touch a writing utensil. Gilman would later see this as an act of

patriarchy against women attempting to revert them to an infantile state of mind and helped
advocate male control and authority. Gilman much like in the story felt as if she was on the

brink of insanity and had to quit the rest cure for good. Gilman wanted to bring attention to the

oppression of women from doctors as well as husbands by creating a character that is both in the

story. Through all this, Gilman uses her own experiences with oppression to help other women

learn from and to advocate for women who are free thinkers in a society ruled by men.

Gilman was a strong advocate for social, economic, and religious reform movements and

placing many of those themes and ideas in her short storys. She was called by many to be an

optimist reformer because of her belief in many different reform movements and that they

could change social structures in society very quickly. Her essays and short stories are very

notable today in the feminists movement and earned herself the title as one of the mothers of

feminism because of her leading role in the movement. She used her stories as an entertaining

way to spread the ideas of feminism and womens rights to mainstream audiences. In the story

The Yellow Wallpaper she shows the idea of a woman breaking out of the wallpaper as a

symbol of women breaking from oppression they were facing in society. She uses symbolism to

help spread the ideas of feminism without directly saying or writing about it to make the stories

more interesting and also to reach audiences that wouldnt have read it otherwise. She spreads

her ideas as themes and symbols through all her short stories and was a major role in the

beginnings of the feminist movement.

Gilmans main focus for reform was womens rights, and she believed that women cant

just be equal in the work force and other public areas, but also equal when it comes to personal

relationships and marriage. Her idea was that women could never be equal in things like the
work force and the economy if they couldnt even be equal to their boyfriend or husband in their

own personal life. This idea of women being equal in the relationships is shown in The Yellow

Wallpaper because her husband is the one that has all of the power of the in the marriage. In the

story her husband controls everything she does in her life as a part of the rest cure that he told her

she needed. He oppresses everything that makes her an individual to the point where she ends up

going insane. The story shows the theme of oppression of women in relationships to show that if

a woman has no equality in the relationship then they will go crazy. She wants women to break

free of oppression in society and relationships for any chance of equality.

The story is full of symbolism and themes that all relate to feminism and the oppression

of women caused by patriarchy in society. The main character of the story is shown as the

stereotypical average wife back in the 1800s where oppressing women was the social norm and

was expected of society. Because she is what a woman was stereotyped as back in the 1800s,

she is shown and portrayed as obedient to her husband and weak minded according to doctors.

The author uses symbolism to show what problems occur when a husband has all the power of

the relationship, and when the wife is just obedient to him. She also points out the major problem

in society that many doctors believed women were weak minded and had far less brain function

and control than men. She brings this issue to light by showing that the doctor in the story, who

is also her husband, was wrong about her mental illness and how to treat it to where in the end

she is far worse off because of him. The story shows the narrators downward spiral into insanity

caused by ignorance of the medical field and obedience to her husband to show the problems of a

patriarchal society.
 Almost all critics and people that read the story now see the story is about the

empowerment of women and has anti-oppression themes. Back in the time of the storys initial

release, the story was seen as a psychological horror and not making any big observations on the

problems of society. The story became more associated with the feminist movement once

feminism became more popular in the mid 1900s and the mainstream ideas of feminism that we

have today began to form. Now the story is synonymous with the feminist movement and has

been embedded into history as an important story that lead to the mass growth of the feminist

movement. The late 1800s was a very oppressive time for women with strict control of moral

ideas and a womans behavior. This story was an early push for the equal rights of women and

helped people look more closely at the unfair social norms of the 1800s and even now.

All of these reasons create the purpose and ways in which she created the story in order

to show the oppression of women. The more you know of the symbols and themes the more the

story makes the oppression of women look like a horrible and scary thing in society and thats

exactly what Gilman wanted. She wanted the story to show the awful ways in which the

oppression of women affects women everywhere and how awful it can really be. This story has

become a feminist story through the years and cements Gilman as a true mother of the feminist

movement. What once seemed as just a short horror story suddenly has a new meaning once the

themes and symbols become apparent to the reader and make it a whole new story. Gilman

created an amazing story to show that the real horror in society is the oppression of women.