Sunday, April 17, 2011
Reflection: The Yellow Wallpaper
Charlotte Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper" is a story about a woman's confinement and her journey to get better from her temporary nervous depression. In the beginning it was rather confusing to understand because the story was written in a journal entry format. The narrator mentions names and events that I don't exactly recall, so I usually assume that this or that happened. But later on the story was easier to understand as the woman became more psychotic. Throughout the story I became angry at the doctor husband. He treated the narrator more like a patient than a wife, and he seemed to convince her that he knew what was best for her simply because he was the doctor. It was frustrating to see how her train of thought changed because of John. She would write about what she thought about herself, then what John told her about her condition, then she would change her mind about herself, making it seem like John is always right about his diagnoses. I think that Gilman's writing style helps her message (that resting will not cure her condition) get across to the audience. The story is written in first person, so the audience reads the story as if he/she is the one going mad in the room and imagining the woman behind the wallpaper. The journal entry style shows us step by step how the woman's mental condition progressively changed over time since it is told in her perspective.
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Hey Tiffany,
ReplyDeleteAlthough I did not read this short story your post makes me interested in reading it. The fact that it is written as a journal entry is a unique style. Also, the dependence of the narrator's own emotions and images of herself being so dependable on her husband's words really caught my attention in your post. There are a lot of relationships where people are overly dependent on their significant others thoughts. Feeling like a sociologist, maybe because I just left SOCY100 :)
Although i haven't read this story, your summary makes it look quite interesting. I personally have gone through her type of ordeal, where when i was sick, my mother a doctor, would treat me as a patient and tell me what to do, as if that was the only cure. Also, i found it interesting that she would contradict herself in her own journals and that i think was the ultimate cause of her psychotic behavior.
ReplyDeleteHi Tiffany! :]
ReplyDeleteI also didn't read this short story but it seems interesting reading what you said. Kind of thought it was funny how you said that you better understood the story as the character became more psychotic. This story was kind of the opposite of the "The Pura Principle" since the character's views were changed throughout the story due to outside opinion. This is quite a sad story, to see the woman being treated as a patient and not as a wife by her own husband.