Ángela Ucero Diego

2º Estudios ingleses
Grupo 6.2

THE BIRTH OF FEMINISM AND ITS PREVALENCE OVER PATRIARCHY

THROUGH THE FIGURE OF THE WISTARIA IN GILMAN´S “THE GIANT
WISTARIA”

Could a simple tree be an unequivocal symbol of a social movement such as feminism?

In Gilman´s story a family tries to uncover the shame in her daughter´s pregnancy out
of wedlock. A hundred years later, a group of friends rent the house for the summer.
After seeing the haunted status of the house, they decided to search for ghosts and after
a couple nights, they end up finding the corpses of a baby and the mother who was the
girl who got pregnant out of wedlock. From the bones of the woman a giant wistaria
was born and took over all the house. Emerging from the woman and covering the
building at the same time, the tree is a symbol of the birth of the feminism and the fall
of patriarchy being crushed by it. All of this during a time where women were severely
abused by chauvinism and try to fight over it.

The principal interpretation of the wistaria would be to identify the tree with a powerful
feminist symbol. Gilman wrote, “And there, in the strangling grasp of the roots of the
great wistaria, lay the bones of a woman”, stating that the tree was born directly from
the corps of the abused woman (40). In a posterior essay, Madelyn A. Miller stated,
“The new woman of the twentieth century, empowered by the pain and suffering of
women of the past”. This analysis of the wistaria collocates the tree as a renaissance of
the dead woman as a symbol of the feminist fight. Trough the experiences and the fierce
of women who suffered the oppression of the patriarchy in the past, the feminist
continues existing, and the empowering does not cease to exist. The wistaria grows
strongly and covers everything in its path in the same way the determination for change
and pain of the mistreated women cover every aspect of the feminist fight.

The symbol of the wistaria also offers a figure of power over the patriarchy. As Gilman
indicates in the story, “A huge wistaria vin covered the whole front of the house […]
waving sheet of purple from roof to ground”, showing how the giant tree covered all the
house with is entirety (43). Charlotte P. Stetson claims in her essay, “Wistaria vines are
the women breaking through the patriarchy for their own good”, and at the same time,
Madelyn A. Miller agrees, “The house, a symbol of traditional family and gendered
relationships, is overtaken by the giant wisteria, symbolizing the new definition of
womanhood at the turn of the century”, indicating that the wistaria as a symbol of
feminism takes over the complete house. These statements show the way in which the
fight of the feminist ideas and individuals during the century affected to the start of the
fall of patriarchy or at least some of its ideas. The house represented the traditional
values of a chauvinist and abusive society, and the way the giant tree invades and covers
it represents the imposition of the feminism that was achieved with the suffering of the
dead woman over that dreadful mindset.

As a conclusion, the giant wistaria in Gilman´s story symbolizes the feminist fight
during a chauvinist and patriarchal time where women had no right to stand up for
themselves and showing how this pain could cover and fight the traditional values in the
same way the tree invaded the entire house. The story is a great feminist symbol and a
statement of the renaissance of a mistreated woman in order to continue fighting for her
rights as the tree is born from her and continue it growing over the patriarchy with her
sustain, past pain, and determination for change.

WORKS CITED LIST

Gilman, Charlotte P.S. “The Giant Wistaria”. Legacy, vol. 5, no.2, 1988, pp. 39-43.

Anonymous. "The Giant Wistaria by Charlotte P. Stetson Gilman " Wordpress. 09 2017.
03 2022 https://jennajj22.wordpress.com/2017/09/15/the-giant-wistaria-by-by-charlotte-
p-stetson-gilman/

A. Miller, Madelyn. "The Giant Wistaria and women in the home (literally)"
Wordpress. 05 2018. 03 2022 https://floratofauna.wordpress.com/2018/05/10/the-giant-
wistaria-and-women-in-the-home-literally/