A Visual Style Charlotte Perkins Gilman wrote The Yellow Wallpaper in 1890 (Showalter). After suffering from depression herself and being given prescribed the “Rest Cure” for treatment, she decided to write this story to expose the cure for what it really did- made the people being prescribed it going mentally insane (Charlotte). The lack of medical knowledge about mental illness issue at the time contributed to Gilman’s purpose of writing this story. Gilman uses visual writing and structure to communicate how she feels about the issue in the story and how this issue contributes to the meaning of the body of work. Gilman, in her story, writes with a specific writing style, visual. The style gives a visual representation of the deterioration of the woman’s mind in the story. Gilman chose to write with this style because she, like the woman in the story, was depressed and prescribed the “Rest Cure” as treatment so Gilman knows what the mind does when prescribed this cure (Charlotte). She uses her knowledge and experience to her advantage and provides a visual representation of the …show more content…
Gilman’s visual writing style in communicated through the structure of her story. In the beginning of her story, Gilman uses sentences like “The color is repellent, almost revolting; a smoldering unclean yellow, strangely faded by the slow-turning sunlight” that are very lengthy, complex, and descriptive. This structure of the sentence shows the original state of the woman’s mind and how complex her author-like mind was. Towards the end of the story, Gilman uses sentences like “This bed is fairly gnawed” and “But I must get to work” that are short and choppy. This different sentence structure –compared to the sentences in the beginning of the story- show the deterioration of the woman’s mind. The structure of the story communicates the visual writing