Self-destructive Self-expression in The Yellow Wallpaper

Self-destructive Self-expression in The yellowed paper In The Yellow Wallpaper, a story by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the conflict centers around the protagonists inability to maintain her sanity in a society that does not select her as an individual. Her husband and brother both exert their own depart over hers, forcing her to conform to their pre-set impression an appropriate code of behavior for a sick woman. She has been given a schedule prescription for each time of day in the day John takes all care from me (155). This code of behavior involves most no exertion of her own free-will. Rather, she is expected to passively accept the concomitant that her own ideas are mere fancy, and only the opinions of the men in her flavor can be trusted. She is expected to take their own uninformed opinions on her mental pronounce over her own. While Wallpaper presents a effective argument in favor of the feminist movement, the true issue buns the conflict is even more fundamental t he resiliency of human will in the face of social negation. Obviously, it is impossible to maintain a intelligent mental state in the oppressive environment surrounding the woman. passim the story, the author traces the womans mental deterioration from a having a normal moreover weakened sense of self, to a complete inversion of her ego. She slowly inverts her orientation course of her place in society, turning away from society completely in order to create a world where she can act on her own volition. In order to represent the stages of her gradually worsening state of mind, the author represents the womans struggles through a parallel with her view of the wallpaper. The wallpaper is at first a seeming inversion of the womans mind, but it is gradu... ...leasantville Readers Digest, 1977. 195-206. Golden, Catherine, ed. The Captive Imagination A Casebook on The Yellow Wallpaper. newfangled York Feminist Press, 1992 Kasmer, Lisa. Charlotte Perkins Gilmans The Yellow Wallpap er A Symptomatic Reading. Literature and Psychology. 36, (1990) 1-15. Kessler, Carol Parley. Charlotte Perkins Gilman 1860 -1935. Modem American Women Writers. Ed. Elaine Showalter, et al. New York Charles Scribners Sons, 1991. 155 -169. Owens, E. Suzanne. The Ghostly Double behind the Wallpaper in Charlotte Perkins Gilmans The Yellow Wallpaper. Scharnhorst, Gary. Gilman. Reference Guide to Short Fiction. Ed. Noelle Watson. Detroit St. pack Press, 1994. 209-210. Wagner-Martin, Linda. The Yellow Wallpaper. Reference Guide to Short Fiction. Ed. Noelle Watson. Detroit St. James Press, 1994. 981- 982.