Anh T Hoang

Sabatino Mangini
Eng 112
2/5/15

THE YELLOW WALL- PAPER

I/ Summary:
The narrator and her husband spend a summer vacation in a haunted mansion which her
husband as a doctor chooses for her treatment nervous depression under his supervision. To
treat her disease, she is advised not to work hard and overcoming this disease by her will. As a
writer, being deprived of writing, she feel as if she lost herself. When her husband goes to work,
she spends most of the time observing the mansion from inside to outside and describing it
vividly and artistically through writing. Her description is professional through the landscapes of
garden, wharf, lane shaded and the decoration of interior house such as bedroom walls,
window bars Especially, patterns of yellow wallpaper in the bedroom are noticed and
described differently in the moonlight and the daylight. She is always constrained that she cant
confide her feeling to her husband. Because of her loneliness, she imagines that the bedroom
used to be a nursery for young children by many scratches and gouges in the floor. With Jennie s
presence, it is difficult for her to write. Not expressing her feelings through writing, her disease
becomes more and more severe. She discovers a streak on the paper, running all around the
room, as if it had been rubbed by someone crawling against the wall. Also, she visualizes that
there are women trapped into the wall. At the climax of the story, the narrator traps herself in

the room, which means that she herself is the trapped woman. Her husband faints when he
breaks into the locked room and witnesses the terrible situation with her saying Ive got out at
last. And I ve pulled off most of the paper, so you cant put me back. In other words, she
wishes to have freedom.
II/ Response:
Charlotte Perkins Gilman expects to convey an important message womens equality wish
both in the society and family to everyone, especially men . Through the Yellow Wallpaper,
womens marriage life and occupational desire are restricted , which leads to nerve disorders. It
is alarming.
Theme: