Over the years, women have been commended for being brave and fighting for their rights. The Yellow Wallpaper shows how women can overcome the power held by men over them. It is a story of an unnamed woman confined by her doctor husband in a room with barred windows and a bolted-down bed. The woman is also forbidden to write, which leads to her obsession with the room’s wallpaper. At first, she finds the wallpaper repellant but later finds it riveting. Through the wallpaper, she finds out that she is an imprisoned woman whom she attempts to liberate by removing the wallpaper from the wall (Lanser 421). The story shows how a patriarchal society can lead women to madness as men control women for their own good.
The yellow wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins shows the degree to which feminists have transformed the study of literature. It has led to many scholars working to honor the great work of such feminist writers who, despite facing a lot of criticism, are not afraid to let their views known. To better understand where the criticism for feminist academic literature begun, it is important to consider the theoretical positions that have shaped women’s position in society. In the late sixties, scholars began taking note of women’s work. Some of the works include Kathryn Rogers’s The Troublesome Helpmate (1966), Mary Ellmann’s Thinking about Women (1968), Kate Millett’s Sexual Politics (1970), which were against new criticalities that literature is political in nature and steeped in patriarchal ideology (Lanser 426). Feminists argued that the ideologies made what seemed cultural to be natural and inevitable. What was natural and inevitable came to transcend ideology.
The yellow wallpaper also shows how women have traditionally been considered weak and sick beings. It also symbolizes the oppressive state subjected to women in society. Early feminist readings such as the Yellow Wallpaper were important as they helped rectify the behavior of enclosing women’s achievements in their own abnormal psychological state. Many critics criticize the story stating that it represents the unhealthy relationship between women and the medical language. Others state that it represents what happens to literature when defined as feminine, implying that it is weak. Academic women have also been characterized as being literally bound by oppressive structures that are self-imposed. The unnamed woman’s attempt to be free in the story shows how women can liberate themselves from the identity given to them by the patriarchal society as weak (Davison 49). The Yellow Wallpaper can be interpreted as the narrator describing the unhappy state in which she is in and is inherent in women due to being in the western world patriarchal condition.
Although the Yellow Wallpaper was criticized as being feminist, new criticism on the use of language and writing style has emerged. It is being used as the tools of social and literary analysis. New scholars have described it as being either metaphorical or literal. Gilman is described as doubtful of her own language and conventional means of storytelling, which is a challenge that prevents her from presenting women’s experiences more authentically. There is no way of showing that the narrator manages to escape from the masculine construction meaning.
The Yellow Wallpaper also shows the abuse of patriarchal authority in society, which makes it hard for the protagonist to distinguish between fantasy and reality. Although the narrator in the story is described as psychotic, it is not realistic to enclose her problems within her abnormal psychological state. It is not also appropriate to describe jane’s submission as acquiescence to social order. The Yellow Wallpaper is also described as a gothic allegory as Gilman’s achievements are described as awaiting recognition and the story itself being still under-read and waiting to be part of the American literary canon (Suess 84). The story shows how women in the nineteenth century were subjected to suffering under their male counterparts’ leadership. Gothic themes such as confinement and rebellion, irrational fear, and forbidden desires are well illustrated in the story.
The feminist project is about deconstructing the male-dominated social practices and patterns of thoughts and reconstructing female experiences that were previously overlooked or hidden. Feminist works such as the Yellow Wallpaper were seen to reconstruct literary theory and history and offer respite from unladylike assaults on patriarchal practices discouraging women from literature. The fact that such works that feminists consider as being powerful and exciting had been ignored, denounced, and suppressed are proof that criticism, literature, and history had been politicized. Editors of the yellow Wallpaper had refused to publish it as they considered it miserable in 1920 (Suess 96). Dean Howells described it as being “terrible and too wholly dire” too terribly good to be printed.
The yellow wallpaper has also been examined as a female gothic work. It has been described as shedding light on nonpolitical and horror tales and as a feminist piece that brings forth the ideology of femininity. It is different from other traditional gothic stories as it is centered around women and the challenges they face in marriage and motherhood. The fear of power build in women in the nineteenth century is described as a social force and supernatural power so impersonal and vast that it makes men seem to have supernatural strength. Women are not allowed to have power over themselves and are under the control of powerful men. Given that the narrator’s husband in the Yellow Wallpaper is a physician with the power to declare his wife’s illness as psychotic, the wife fears him more. She is worried that there is a conspiracy between him and his sister.
The generic choice of Gilman in the Yellow Wallpaper can also be linked to her disregard of her tale’s national characters. The female gothic takes different forms and shapes in the story with different national and historical contexts. The Yellow Wallpaper can be described as an American classic as it focuses not only on Gilman’s artistic achievements but also offers a radical to the traditional gothic society in America. It shows that although the story haunts the traditional male-dominated American society, it is also haunted by the same traditions.
The question of gender and genre is constantly evaluated in the Yellow Wallpaper to analyze the American gothic. American literature is described as supporting men while it despises women and is marked by a flight from the domestic and the feminine. Men and women tend to be judged differently for their achievements in society. The theoretical achievements of the Yellow Wallpaper have contributed significantly to the triumphant conclusion despite the unhappy life of the narrator. In many instances, the narrator is considered to be mad and doomed, as she could not write her way out of the patriarchal prison house (Davison 68).
Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s Yellow Wallpaper should be given privilege among the rediscovered feminist works. It offers a lot of insight into gendered practices as it gives the narrator the power to assert herself against her husband John’s authority. Although this has been criticized, it is a good way of showing that the powerless in society can also raise their voice and be heard. The story also challenges various theories against women based on their position in society as economic, psychological, and literally leaders. Such aspects make writing impossible for women as they are judged based on their past achievements.
Works Cited
Lanser, Susan S. “Feminist criticism,” The Yellow Wallpaper,” and the politics of color in America.” Feminist Studies 15.3 (1989): 415-441.
Suess, Barbara A. “The Writing s on the Wall: Symbolic Orders in The Yellow Wallpaper.” Women’s Studies 32.1 (2003): 79-97.
Davison, Carol Margaret. “Haunted House/Haunted Heroine: Female Gothic Closets in “The Yellow Wallpaper.” Women’s Studies 33.1 (2004): 47-75.