Theme of "The Yellow Wallpaper"
The author of the short story “The Yellow
Wallpaper,” Charlotte Perkins Gilman, filled the story with multiple themes. Gilman wrote the story in eighteen ninety
two, an era where women were supposed to be fully obedient to their
husbands. If their husbands supported a
candidate for office, they supported him too.
If their husbands wanted to make any family decisions, they supported
their husbands and did not dare to voice their own opinion. The two themes I will write about from this
story are ones that highlight the inequality shown toward women in that time
period. Themes such as passive behavior
in the household and the importance of women’s self expression convey this
overall theme of women taking charge, and no longer being subordinate to men in
life.
The first message Gilman is trying
to convey in “The Yellow Wallpaper” is that the then current domestic role of
women in a marriage was imprisoning. At
the time, the status quo was that the husband was the “active” member of the
family. He went to work, made family
decisions, etc. The wife’s role in the
marriage was “passive” i.e. follow the leadership of her husband because “he
knew best.” At the beginning of the
story, the narrator is happy to take the passive role of the relationship. She comments on how John is kind to her and
takes such good care of her. However,
towards the middle of the story, she begins to change from the passive
housewife to the active, independent woman we see at the end of the story. This change culminates when, at the end of
the story, she calls her husband, John, “little boy.” The seemingly demeaning title she calls John is
unheard of for the time period where husbands were treated with utmost respect
by their wives. Another example of her
change to an independent woman is when she locks herself in her room and doesn’t
open the door, despite the fact that John tells her to open it. The author is trying to convey that women no
longer must be submissive to their husbands. They should be able to speak their mind and
make their own decisions. Whether that
is calling your husband “little boy” or locking yourself in your room because
you don’t want your husband to come in, it is now acceptable for a woman to
make that decision.
The next idea conveyed by author is
the importance of self expression in women.
The irony of the story is that John’s treatment for his wife, the “resting
cure,” is supposed to help cure her of her illness by forcing her to keep her
brain idle. However, the fact is, the idleness
from the resting cure is actually the cause of the narrator’s descent into
insanity. For example, at the beginning
of the story, the narrator expresses herself using her journal. During this time the narrator is the most
cognitive. However, after her journal is
taken away and her thoughts suppressed, we begin to see her crazy behavior such
as gnawing on the bed and imagining a woman in the wallpaper. Gilman is trying to convey that being
submissive, having your brain be idle because you allow your husband to make
all of the decisions, causes women to become crazy. Only when women, like the narrator, become
outspoken do they become free. Gilman is
saying that women must begin thinking actively, thinking for themselves and not
for their husbands, and not just idly submitting to whatever their husband
commands.
