The Yellow Wallpaper

In The Yellow Wallpaper, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the narrator becomes more depressed throughout the story due to the recommendation of isolation that was prescribed to her. In this short story, the narrator is detained in a lonesome, drab, room in attempt to be freed of a nervous disorder. The narrator’s husband, a physician, follows this belief and forces his wife into a treatment of solitude. Rather than heal the narrator of her psychological disorder, the treatment only adds to the effects driving her in a severe depression. Under the orders of her husband, the narrator is moved to a house far away in the country. Here she is locked in an upstairs room. This, to me, does not serve as an inspiration for someone in her condition but as an element of repression. The narrator is affected not only by the physical restraints, such as the windows barred and the door locked, but also by being exposed to the yellow wallpaper in the room. The wallpaper is dreadful looking and gives off only negative creativity: the windows are barred for little children, and there are rings and things in the wall. All through the story the wallpaper acts as an antagonist, causing her to become annoyed and disturbed. The narrator describes the wallpaper as having no pattern or organization. This causes the narrator much distress since she is always looking at it. During her isolation, the narrator becomes obsessed with the wallpaper: I determine for the thousandth time that I will follow the pointless pattern to some sort of conclusion. The narrator did not believe isolation would cure her disorder. Social contact and outside stimulation was what she desired: I sometimes fancy that in my condition if I had less opposition and more society and more stimulus, but John says the worse thing I can do is think about my condition. She was cut off from society and forbidden to see her baby. It is not natural to be confined to little social contact for large amounts of time. To live without outside contact would be living against nature s way for man. To satisfy her social need, she invents a person she thinks she sees inside the wallpaper: I didn’t realize for a long time what the thing was that dim sub pattern, but now I am quite sure it is a woman. The image of the woman is obviously a sign of the effects caused by prolonged