thematic concerns that inform this text - and which have already been woven here in the

textual analysis - some of the persistent ones are questions of gender, modes of patriarchal
control, lack of female agency, and the importance of marriage and domesticity. Therefore,
this section shall focus on some of the other seminal ideas that are crucial to understanding
this story and the historical time that it represents.
6.1 Hysteria & “rest cure” in the 19th century Europe
The term hysteria has a long history going as far back as the Greek classical antiquity with its
etymological meaning in the Greek work ‘hystera’ or womb. Despite its long history,
understanding of hysteria remained shrouded with ignorance and prejudices. One such
misunderstanding was that it was believed to be resulting from the wandering of uterus. That
myth however was soon discarded. Dr. Sigmund Freud, the 19th century Austrian
psychoanalyst, developed an interest in hysteria whose theories however remained
inconsistent. Moreover, they were based not on scientifically proven methods but therapies.
At the core of it, hysteria was seen as symptomatic manifestations of a psychological
disorder. As a result, it was used as an umbrella term to describe mental illness, nervous
depression, a feeling of sickness etc. all of which were all viewed as hysteria. In the 19th
century the American physician, Dr. Silas Weir Mitchell, prescribed “rest cure” as treatment
for women diagnosed with hysteria which involved resting and eschewal of any work,
particularly of intellectual or creative kind. Other treatments included “talking cure” as
propounded by Anna O’ who experienced hallucinations, blurred visions and partial
paralysis.
The misogyny of the prognosis and the treatment is evident when one examines the long
history of hysteria. The myth of women as lascivious, seeking carnal pleasures have long
been in circulation. Female sexuality too has been seen as problematic. Connections have
been drawn between female hysteria and sexual repression. Perhaps this also explains why
sexual passivity and self-restraint have been valorized across cultures as hallmarks of a good
woman. The women who transgress are seen as threat and therefore labelled as mad, hysterics
and therefore in need to be put to rest (nursery/attic/death).
“The Yellow Wallpaper” however is a critical indictment of such diagnosis and
treatments which failed to account for the inner lives of women and made the female body a
site of male biases. Her criticism of the prevalent medical understanding of women and their
ailments also stems from the fact that they were more oppressive and regimental than curative
as the author had herself experienced firsthand. The ambiguity surrounding hysteria also
points to the failure of men’s imagination and reason to know and appreciate woman and her
self. Other feminists too felt the devastating consequences of such medical prognosis.
Virginia Woolf, the 20th century feminist writer, who too underwent this treatment was also
critical of such medical practices which she debunks in her work Mrs Dalloway.
The author of “The Yellow Wallpaper” argues that hysteria is a result of a boring and
inactive life. The inactive life implies not just mundane living and lack of creativity but also

7
the lack of a fulfilling sexual life. Thus hysteria and insanity seem to be inevitable for women
who are subjected to such conditions of enforced living. All this gains force in light of the
fact that the author is writing this from a deeply personal space of traumatic experience in
which she was pushed precisely because of such psychiatric care.
6.2 Infantilization
The theme of infantilization of women is one of the main themes in the story. Right from the
beginning when we find the narrator being allotted a nursery as a resting space on a summer
vacation to John’s treatment of his wife, the narrator. Like one indulges a child, John indulges
his wife without giving in to any of her demands. His calling her “a blessed little goose” is a
powerful reminder of how he treats her; not as an equal partner but a plaything. He dictates to
her every little thing as far as her everyday routine is concerned. While one might argue that
he is excessively concerned about her, it is to be noted that the author here points out how
patriarchy works on an everyday basis. It does not work by using force only but often
employs psychological devices to manufacture consent in its favour. The narrator’s imagining
of bars in the nursery as safety guards despite its prison like similarities reinforces the idea of
making it appear as psychiatric wards than reformatory.
The child like associations are further noticeable in how the narrator is completely
dependent on John and Jennie for her wants who look after her as parents would. While John
is bound to his professional duties as a doctor, and Jennie splendidly carries on with her
domestic roles the narrator who is also a mother otherwise is not expected to do anything, not
even the domestic chores. The infantilization of the female narrator is complete when she is
found to be crawling on the floor childlike.
The infantilization of women then serves two purposes: One, it reinforces the stereotypes
of women as weak, childish and ill-suited to take independent decisions, and therefore in
need of male patriarchs who can ensure protection. Two, the child like equation also provides
a convenient alibi to maintain gender segregation and uphold patriarchy. Briefly put, it allows
for the marginalization and subjugation of women.
6.3 The Ending
The narrator’s descent into madness is steeped in ambiguity and offers multiple readings. A
conservative reading underlines what men believed happens to women who choose to go
against men in their aspirations, especially cerebral, that are divorced from domesticity.
However, a more liberal reading interprets it as an act of liberation from patriarchal
confinement. Nonetheless, a more focused analysis of the ending of the “The Yellow
Wallpaper” calls for a nuanced interpretation as regards the possibility of freedom for
women. It is undeniable that a feminist longing for freedom informs the narrative.
In its concern with female independence, the story demonstrates the ways in which
women’s everyday lives are regulated. The idea that dominance often masquerades as love
and concern is also explored in the story through the figure of the doctor husband. The lasting
image in the story is that of the narrator tearing, crawling and moving over the unconscious
8
body of her husband. It would be perhaps a farfetched idea to read it as symbolizing an
absolutely victorious moment for the female character. If anything, it is a disturbing image
that is unsettling for its readers. While it can be read as a brief moment of tearing down of
established structures, the uncertainty that looms large as the narrative closes is even more
terrifying. One knows for sure that it is not an absolute moment of freedom. The
apprehensions that it raises are far more unnerving: What will be her fate? What will happen
when John regains his senses? Does the narrator going crazy not imply she will be put into a
madhouse? Which she be disciplined for violating John’s dictates and committing ‘sacrilege’
by trampling over her husband? Will she be condemned like the legendary madwoman in the
attic to rage and rant in a forsaken attic? Conclusively, it might be said that the story’s open
ended closure points to the long walk to freedom that feminists will have to walk.
6.4 The Wallpaper
The wallpaper can be metonymically read as a text narrating the oppression and struggles that
women face. Like a text, it is peppered with signs and symbols, and is layered with meanings
that offer multiple interpretations. As a paper, it signifies a long but troubled history of
association between women and education. The wallpaper here is a projection of many
things.
One is the male authored history that have first denied women access to education, and
by extension a denial of knowledge, authority and sources of legitimacy on which their power
rests. Two, it signifies what Gilbert and Gubar call “anxiety of authorship” that female
authors face in the absence of a recorded history of female writers. An anxiety that is
reflected in many ways in the unnamed female narrator’s struggle to write and hide the same
from the censorious eyes of John, and even Jennie who has internalized the values as
propagated by patriarchal structures of power. Thirdly, in ascribing human qualities to the
wallpaper the narrator tells us of the male gaze and surveillance that women find themselves
under. Therefore, the wallpaper with its “bulbous pattern”, “many heads” has a “vicious
influence” on the narrator.
The colour “yellow” further underlines the sense of decay, disease and gloom that
pervades the environment. It has none of the warm associations of ripeness and fragrance that
summer entails. The narrator calls it “a sickly yellow”. The sickening effect is continued in
the malodorous smell that the protagonist feels in the room. That the wallpaper pattern
“strangles them” and “suddenly commit suicide” ominously signify the terrible censorship
and repression that women have historically faced. The suffocating repression of females is
suggested in this potent image of patterns committing suicide which creative women such as
female authors and women who don’t fit the societal stereotypes experienced. The image of
the trapped woman in the wallpaper vigorously shaking the bars of the wallpaper thus
underlines the urgency of freedom for women.
6.5 ‘Madwoman in the attic’
The trope of ‘madwoman in the attic’ is a long one. Women writers are acquainted with a
long list of literature that represented transgressive women as potential threats to the fabric of
9
established social order. One finds various accusatory labels such as witch, sorceress, lunatic,
madwoman etc. being used for nonconformist women. Aware of the consequences of such
nomenclature the feminist writers have seized upon this all-too-familiar trope for deviant
women and have turned it upside down to narrate female resistance. It is for this reason that
one finds that the figure of the madwoman comes to people so many female authored texts.
While they abound in fictional texts, it visually comes alive in the Charlotte Bronte’s novel
Jane Eyre where Bertha Mason is a quintessential madwoman. Using that as a reference
point, Gilbert and Gubar’s The Madwoman in the Attic (1979) is an extensive study of female
writers and the literary tradition. It also examines the gender and sexual anxieties that are
embedded in the figure of a madwoman in the 19th century Victorian literature. For many
intellectuals, the trope of a madwoman offers exciting possibilities; here, madness being a
sign of woman’s intelligence and fecund creativity of mind that must be channelized towards
aesthetic and intellectual purposes. As such it liberates the image of a raging madwoman
from its deeply misogynistic context. However, in taking the argument further, Gilbert and
Gubar argue for the importance of moving above such dichotomy. Gilman’s “The Yellow
Wallpaper” is one example of such complex treatment that disrupts the dichotomy of the
angel and the madwoman.
6.6 “The Yellow Wallpaper” and Jane Eyre: An Inter-textual Reading
The uncanny similarities between the narratives of Charlotte Perkins Gilman “The Yellow
Wallpaper” and Charlotte Bronte’s novel Jane Eyre are striking. Both share commonalities in
their depiction of women who face resistance in their intellectual pursuits and Victorian
notions of woman as ‘angel in the house’ or the ‘madwoman in the attic’ figure. The binary
of the angelic women and disheveled madwomen embody the 19th century categorizations
that sought to fit women into patriarchal framework.
Talking of the inter-textual parallels between the two texts in question, the nursery in
Gilman’s story bears a striking resemblance to the sequestered ‘Red room’ and the gothic
Thornfield Hall with its haunting quality. The similarities are carried forward in the image of
a neurotic woman who has been confined to a room (nursery/attic) by a man; Mr. Rochester
confining his creole wife Bertha Mason in the case of Jane Eyre. Though Gilman makes no
specific mention of the novel, the similarities are far too many. Both these narratives have
domineering men who call their wife/lover with pet names suggesting affection but it soon
becomes clear that they are more tools of infantilization and containment of women. That it
oppresses women even more is obvious in the fact that women in both these texts make their
displeasure at being controlled by men clear to the readers. Their repression by male
dominated society is thrown into sharp relief when one finds Gilman’s narrator “securely
fastened now by [her] well-hidden rope” and crawling in the room just as Bertha Mason in
Jane Eyre is bound to a chair with rope is “snatch[ing] and growl [ing] like some strange wild
animal covered with clothing”.
Further, they both seek to escape and escape they do but in different ways. While Bertha
Mason sets the mansion on fire the unnamed narrator does not burn down the house but she
10
does entertain such a thought. It is also important to stress here that the unnamed narrator in
“The Yellow Wallpaper” is an amalgamation of both Jane and Bertha Mason. The final
utterance by the narrator where she exclaims to have escaped “in spite of you and Jane” is
perhaps one more strong reason for intertextuality. However, if a point of departure were to
be highlighted, one could say that unlike Bronte, Gilman gives us not just a glimpse of a
‘madwoman in the attic’ figure. It rather evocatively describes the exilic conditions that drive
women insane pointing to the psychological effects of stringent control of women’s behavior
and thoughts.
6.7 Self-Check Questions
1. How does hysteria figure in the story “The Yellow Wallpaper”? Discuss its
ramifications.
2. How does infantilization of women play a role in the subjection of women?
3. The ending of the “The Yellow Wallpaper” prises open more questions than
resolutions. Do you agree?
4. What does an inter-textual reading of “The Yellow Wallpaper” and Jane Eyre tell
you about representation of women in the 19th century?
5. Discuss the significance of the wallpaper in the story.
7. Characters
7.1 John: The doctor-husband
John comes across as an idealized husband who is excessively caring and protective about his
wife. He forbids her from working, writing and exercising her imagination. He is patronizing
in his tone when he calls her “a blessed little goose” only to dismiss her request for a change
of wallpaper that could make her feel better. He laughs it off condescendingly. His refusal to
believe his wife when she tries to apprise him of her sickening condition is a marker of men’s
willful blindness towards women. His recourse to the argument that he is a doctor and
therefore knows better only adds to the silencing of his wife. He thus contributes to the
worsening of her emotional and psychiatric condition.
John being a doctor and yet unable to understand his wife’s sufferings heightens the
irony. It also represents the larger inability of men to understand women and their difficulties.
For all his apparent concern for his wife, he doesn’t give much space to accommodate her
suggestions. He is blinded by his masculine sense of superiority that he imposes upon her and
regulates her life in every aspect. It may be argued that John’s inability to see beyond his
traditional gender role despite his sympathy for his wife mirrors how gender binaries and
patriarchal norms are internalized by men as well. It is not only women but men too who find
themselves trapped by societal expectations to conform to gender norms. However, this does
not exonerate them when viewed in terms of the consequences of their behaviour and attitude
towards women.

11
 Consequently, men’s carefully crafted image of themselves as strong and mature, and
therefore capable of protecting women is challenged by Gilman in the figure of John. Thus,
she has John whose confident self comes undone, almost satirically, at the end of the story.
Though he persists in treating and dismissing his wife as a child, he cannot bear the sight
when he finally sees her being reduced to a crawling infant. The shock of being faced with it
is such that he collapses on the floor. In a reversal of roles, it is him who finally comes across
as a “weak” and “sick” “young man” with the female narrator wresting a position of
dominance, no matter how unfeminine and unpalatable it might seem. For all patriarchal
projection of women as infant or mad the men cannot withstand such a reality when
confronted with it. This is expressive of the instability of gender norms and the cultural
exclusion/demonization of women to bolster patriarchy.
7.2 Protagonist: The Unnamed Female Narrator
It is perhaps significant that the female narrator is denied a proper noun which mirrors the
denial of female selfhood. It also signifies the patriarchal denial of individuality to women.
That she lacks a name also points to the long history of erasure of women whose voices have
gone unheard. Such is the case literally with the narrator whose pleas are not granted by her
husband John who ends up imposing his own version of reality and choices upon her.
Consequently, the unnamed female narrator represents women who are bound by patriarchal
impositions, and her story mirrors the toll it takes on women who seek to resist society.
Women struggles as they strive to free themselves are similar. The narrator imagining
the woman crawling on the main road and the narrator struggling to write her journal despite
being forbidden to do so are to be read in the same light. Towards the end that the narrator
behaves literally like the woman trapped in the wallpaper and accordingly crawls and seeks
escape corroborates such a reading.
7.3 Jane: Who am I?
“I’ve got out at last in spite of you and Jane. And I’ve pulled off most of the paper, so you
can’t put me back!”
An odd mention of Jane in the concluding part of the story has most readers of “The
Yellow Wallpaper” struggling to identify as to whom the appellation “Jane” refers to. One
might contend that the name “Jane” is a corruption of the name “Jennie” or that it is a slip of
tongue as Jane is diminutive of Jennie. However, both these readings do not hold water. To
argue for a case of linguistic collapse in this context is a futile one because the narrator’s
speech even when she is reduced to an infantile state is neither incoherent nor reduced to
gibberish. Furthermore, to think that the narrator, in the given mental state that she is in,
would call a person by any other name except what she is normally used to is asking for
much. Hence, both these suggestions that equate Jane with Jennie are invalid.
Therefore, though not an established theory it can be argued that Jane is the narrator
herself though she remains unnamed for a large part of the story. Given the narrator’s

12
psychological condition which deteriorates as we move into the story, it is perhaps
understandable that she does not introduce herself with her proper noun.
Further, the format of a journal - implying a self-enclosed intimate zone where naming of
the self does not matter focused as it is on the interiority - could be another reason.
Nevertheless, it most likely refers to the narrator herself though she names it only in the
moment of its rejection. The reasons for her rejection of her identity as Jane could be many.
The name even in its moment of anonymity is a marker of an identity that was ascribed
to the narrator by the patriarchal order. It is the same order that refuses to allow her an
expression of her feelings and does not accommodate even a small choice of hers which is
suggested in the figure of her husband John. Perhaps this is why she identifies with the “faint
figure” of “the woman behind” the yellow wallpaper – an identification that gradually
intensifies such that the two become interchangeable. The narrator tells us, “I pulled and she
shook, I shook and she pulled, and before morning we had peeled off yards of that paper.”
This identification is complete when she becomes the creeping woman. In fully inhabiting the
space of the once-trapped-woman who is now ostensibly free, she maps her own longing for
such a space. But such space of freedom also entails a rejection of previous identities that
patriarchy binds her with. It is this rejection of patriarchy and everything that it demands that
is emphasized in her disdainful rejection of Jane. In vocalizing her name, she calls out
patriarchy and its manifestations. Therefore, she names and repudiates the imposed identity
that she so far attempted to ignore. Such a reading is also validated when seen in light of the
fact that Jane’s double is mirrored in Jennie. The conventional ideal that the latter represents
seems to have been already rejected by the narrator. Though, according to patriarchal
standards, Jane and Jennie are expected to be alike – in marriage, domesticity and
motherhood – Jane is not the same as Jennie. The rejection of patriarchy in the form of her
acquired name takes us back to the point of original discussion which is to say that Jane is in
all likelihood the narrator herself.
7.4 Jennie and the narrator/protagonist: woman as a mother
Jennie’s happy embracing of her domestic role is in contrast to the protagonist. Unlike Jennie,
she is excited not by home but by writing which is seen as a male forte. Her inability to fit
herself in the role of a typical woman is suggested in the idea of her not being able to mother
her child. Further, her not being able to live up to her role as expected of a woman is
underscored in the fact of her guilt that she finds herself grappling with. The guilt is
accentuated in the same degrees in which Jennie seems to fulfill her womanly duty. However,
that she does not carry out domestic duties as Jennie does not mean she is without maternal
instincts. In fact, she feels glad that her child does not have to live in the “atrocious nursery”
with the horrible wallpaper in which she finds herself in.
Further, it may be argued that Jennie is everything that the narrator is not except that of
being a mother. However that does not matter since Jennie seems to compensate for that lack
by taking upon herself the maternal role of looking after others. In opposition to her, the

13
narrator herself is unable to fulfill the role of a mother despite having a child of her own who
has been left in the foster care of Mary, the nursemaid. Their relationship to
mothering/motherhood leaves us with questions: why such an expectation from women only?
Is motherhood the ultimate validation of a woman’s identity? What becomes of women who
can become anything but do not fit into the mould cast by patriarchy?
7.5 Mary, the nursemaid
Mary is the nursemaid to the baby of the narrator-protagonist. She, a minor character, appears
when the narrator expresses her own inability to take care of the baby. However, she feels
glad that her child is with Mary which is expressive of the latter’s importance and the kind of
person she is. Since “The Yellow Wallpaper” is imbued with symbolism, it would be helpful
to locate the nursemaid and her function in light of the associations that her name brings to
mind. Moreover, the author’s use of generic names such as Jane, John, Jennie allows for such
a reading as well. The name of the nursemaid echoes Virgin Mary who is an epitome of
motherliness. As someone whose name resonates with idealized motherhood, Mary as nanny
represents the best care that the narrator could provide for her child.
The pangs of motherhood are well known to most women who constantly suffer from a
sense of insufficiency as regards the fulfillment of their maternal responsibilities towards
their children. Likewise, the narrator too suffers from the guilt of not being a hands-on
mother. Following the post-partum depression which has resulted in her being prescribed
resting cure, the narrator’s confinement in a nursery in a different mansion has effectively
rendered her incapacitated to take on her motherly duties. Moreover, in the face of the
narrator’s imminent insanity portending a probable lack of mother for the child, Mary is the
best that the child can possibly have. The narrator’s utterances - “It is fortunate Mary is so
good with the baby. Such a dear baby! .... And yet I CANNOT be with him, it makes me so
nervous.” - are prophetic. Mary thus despite her marginal presence in the narrative would
come to occupy a prominent position by virtue of her childcare services.
The character of Mary also signifies the kind of professions that were conventionally
seen as amenable for women. According to conservative men, women were fit for nursing/
babysitting governess; jobs that were essentially connected with the idea of care and
nourishment at domestic level. These professions were seen as requiring emotions but no
intellect. Any intellectual engagement as suggested in the act of reading, writing or reasoning
was actively discouraged as happens in the story since it was seen as exciting mind and
passions, arguably the cause for hysteria. It is no wonder then that many women writers were
diagnosed as hysterics since they engaged in intellectual pursuits. Effectively, Mary also
serves to provide a useful benchmark to the limits of professional aspirations for women until
the 19th century.
7.6 Self-Check Questions
1. Do you agree with the opinion that John has internalized the gender codes of
patriarchy? Give a reasoned answer.

14