Reflection On The Yellow Wallpaper Essay Research

Reflection On The Yellow Wallpaper Essay, Research Paper

The Yellow Wallpaper

In the short story .The Yellow Wallpaper. by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the narrator and her husband move to a colonial mansion for three months in order to help the narrator get better. She moves upstairs in this horrid room with yellow wallpaper. Throughout the story she studies the wallpaper because she isn.t allowed out of the room that much because her husband, John, a physician, says that it is best that she stays inside. As she learns more about the wallpaper she realizes that she sees a woman inside it and she spends a lot of time plotting how to free the woman. She locks her room and tears off most of the wallpaper and frees the woman. At the end John comes into the room, sees what she has done and faints.

Everyone deals with their personal obstacles differently and .The Yellow Wallpaper. is a perfect example because there are many different obstacles throughout the story. The narrator and John both handle them differently and a result of which, is an essential change by both of them.

First of all, John handles everything to an extent but he doesn.t solve the problem at hand. He tends to run away from it. For example, when the narrator asks, .why the house had stood so long untenanted,. he just laughs at her and doesn.t even investigate about it, which proves that he just let it go and does nothing about it. And that is what he does throughout the whole story. Also he .scoffs openly at any talk.. This means that he doesn.t talk about his problems and he would prefer to keep things bottled up then to express how he is really feeling. He is also always .going into town for more serious cases.. This is another way in which John deals with his problems, he runs away from them. He also avoids the actual subject by calling his wife a cute name like, .bless her little heart,. and, .my blessed little goose.. These quotes just make it so he doesn.t have to answer the question and then he has relinquished himself from the situation. Another thing that he does to handle obstacles is he lies. When the narrator says that she doesn.t feel any better, and this happens often, then he just says, .you are getting better, you are eating more and you have more color today.. So john handles his obstacles in an inefficient and ineffective matter.

The narrator however handles things in a much more precise manner. The number one thing that made her relaxed and that calmed her down was her journal. She would write about everything that happened not to read it later but so she was more relaxed and could think a little clearer with whatever she wrote not in her mind. The whole story is her journal and she writes mostly about the wallpaper and how her husband is always gone. This journal idea is essential because we know what she is thinking and that really helps understand the story and her character better. Also, in order for her to forget about her surroundings she studies the wallpaper. This method, not unlike her husbands, just shows that she is avoiding the problem as well. She spends hours on end following the pattern of the wallpaper. The curves and patterns that go along it mystify her. This is avoidance from the obstacle at hand and she doesn.t deal with them directly sometimes. However, unlike John, she always wanted to talk about her condition and other problems that they had. Her problem was when he just avoided the problem she just let it be when she should have persisted. Also, if she has an obstacle to get around, she focuses on that obstacle until she can clear it. This is shown with the lady in the wallpaper. All she thought about was the lady and how she could get her free from the wallpaper. She spent days plotting how to do so. And she persisted on it until the task at hand was completed. So although she has some traits that are the same as John.s when dealing with obstacles, she also has some effective ones in which make her a little better in dealing with the problems.

There are many different obstacles that are to be found in .The Yellow Wallpaper.. The main obstacle is of course the narrator.s health. She obviously knows when she is feeling worse or better, however her husband seems to think that he knows but he is afraid of the truth so he always says she is doing fine. She knows better but she does not contest what he says because he is a physician and she doesn.t want to insult him. The author indicates through the narrator.s state of mind that she is obviously getting worse rather than better. Another obstacle is also with the narrator.s state of mind. Her obstacle is the lady in the wallpaper. However she must develop a way to release her from the wallpaper and also to do it when neither John nor Jennie are around. She eventually completes this task but she lost her sanity in the process. Another obstacle is a physical one between the narrator and her husband John. He has her pretty much confined to her bedroom and she doesn.t like that. She wants to have friends over and he won.t let her see anyone. She isn.t even allowed to see her baby at all, John won.t let her do anything that could be remotely stressful and in the end that is what pushes her over the edge. He always leaves town and avoids her to avoid communicating about her condition and therefore she feels as though she has done something wrong. Another minor obstacle for the narrator is bet