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Mental illness within the yellow wallpaper
The role of mental illness in edgar allan poes writing
Mental illness within the yellow wallpaper
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In the book The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls, we see that the parents are ‘book smart’ and that they are surprisingly knowledgeable about certain complex subjects, for example, the father taught Jeannette binary code, a complex computer coding language. Despite their book smarts, I also stated they might have a mental illness which would explain the crazy acts. What I am wondering is if they have such good book smarts, why don’t they have steady jobs with good pay? I believe because of their different views on life and their possible mental illness that this could cause a lack of judgment and understanding of a situation. An example of this would be the father’s habit of packing up the family in the middle of the night and pulling the old
There are many events that can foreshadow the rest of one’s life for the better, or, for the worst. In Charlotte Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper”, Jane (the narrator) struggles with a mental illness that causes her to become very weak so her husband, John, takes her to a country home to heal. While at the house she stays in a room that has old yellow wallpaper. Jane is deeply disturbed yet highly intrigued and maintains her deep inspections of the wallpaper as she stays there.
The Raven and The Tell-Tale Heart comparison and contrast In the short story “The Tell-Tale Heart” and the narrative poem “The Raven” by Edgar Allen Poe, Poe used similar and different literary devices to create a similar tone. In these two short stories “The Raven” and “The Tell-Tale Heart” are about two narrators, one in “The Raven” who lost the love of his life, and another narrator in “The Tell-Tale Heart” who is telling the tale of his crime that he committed. The differences and similarities in the literary devices used to make a similar tone in both these short stories need to be pronounced.
Mental illnesses have been taken lightly since the dawn of time and even until today, the topic of mental illness is controversial. Especially during the transition from the late 1800’s to the early 1900’s, the topic of mental illnesses was considered taboo. Therefore, little literature was written about it. However, according to Dr. Lynn Alexander, a professor at the University of Tennessee, when Charlotte Perkins Gilman wrote and published her appalling short story, “The Yellow Wallpaper” in The New England Magazine in 1892, the response was a mix of horror since no one had ever dared to write about this topic, but also admirable in the way that it can be compared to the previous works of Poe and Hawthorne. The short story dared to challenge
During the nineteenth century, there were many causes of mental illness from constant pressure of their secondary role in society, lack of love, or even from childbirth. In “The Yellow Wallpaper,” Charlotte Perkins Gilman produces a short story that mirrors her past experiences of having her mental illness belittled and misunderstood by men. In “The Yellow Wallpaper,” Gilman’s protagonist, Jane, experiences the same illness Gilman suffered. Jane describes in her diary what she withstands having mental illness and an overprotective husband. The narrator undergoes postpartum depression, and her husband, who is a doctor, is unable to provide the help she deserves to recover from her illness.
Fiona Clifford-Fotopoulos Principles of Literary Analysis Honors Ms. Crawley 3/17/23 The Impact of Gender on Mental Health within The Yellow Wallpaper Death, illness, and insanity plague the minds of people across the globe, no matter their race, gender, background, or identity. The raw and human phobia of losing yourself to your own mind is a sickness in itself, which is something that people still, and perhaps always will, struggle to fully understand. This concept is showcased beautifully in Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story The Yellow Wallpaper and her interpretation of anxiety and delusion is jarring and purely eerie for readers. However, the topic of mental health does not reveal itself unscathed from judgment and classification,
Modern artists today generally use images of physical and mental illness in literature. In The Tell-Tale Heart and The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe, both short stories show the usage of illness, madness, and fear. The narrators in both stories try to convince the readers that the characters are physically and mentally ill. Edgar Allen Poe creates these vivid characters which successfully assist the building of plot and ideas. Poe demonstrates how a person’s inner turmoil and terror can lead to insanity through illustrative language.
Gilman’s narrator in “The Yellow Wallpaper” is battling several interwoven conflicts throughout the text. If one of these internal or external struggles been resolved, the conclusion of the short story could have been different from the final mental deterioration at the end. Conflicts faced by the narrator within “The Yellow Wallpaper” include her declining mental health, her husband’s dismissal and neglect of her concerns about her mental state, and her inability to perform the gender roles assigned to woman living in the early 1900s. The severity of the narrator’s mental state is developed throughout the whole of the story.
Mental illnesses were often perceived as disturbing and abnormal. Due to the fact that they were not common and lack of knowledge, society feared those who suffered from the various mental illnesses. Without a physical reason to be considered ill, many who had mental illnesses were described as crazy. If they were socially ‘lucky’ enough to not be deemed ‘crazy’, they were often shunned by their peers as shown when John’s wife wishes she had “more society” suggesting she is shunned and kept out of sight (Gilman 473). In the yellow wallpaper, John’s wife senses there is something suspicious about the house, but since she is struggling with a mental illness, John ignores her and says “she felt a draught” (Gilman 474).
Madness often occurs when somebody desires something that is not accessible to them. When somebody cannot have what they want most, they can go insane yearning for it. For example, if an individual struggling with alcoholism attempts to go sober, they will likely experience withdrawal symptoms because their body is so used to having alcohol that it has forgotten how to function without it. During this withdrawal period, the individual may crave alcohol to the point that their psychological instincts take over and they will do absolutely anything for a drink. In The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the narrator goes insane in her longing for freedom.
Gilman received much backlash for her short story by many men publishers and critics. The topic of mental illness and the effects of these illnesses if not treated properly are disturbing, and men did not want to accept the truth. Mentioned in Queering The Yellow Wallpaper? Charlotte Perkins Gilman and the Politics of Form, “The literary merit of Gilman's story was recognized by contemporary (male) readers and even by (male) publishers who nevertheless rejected it on account of its disturbing content.” This “disturbing content” is indeed disturbing, which is the reason Gilman wrote “The Yellow Wallpaper.”
Edgar Allan Poe, a man who has changed literature through his numerous pieces of writing, such as The Cask of Amontillado, The Tell-Tale Heart, and The Fall of the House of Usher. In Edgar Allan Poe’s famous work, The Raven, the main character is confronted with a raven. The character speaks to the raven, thinking it couldn’t respond, but the raven did respond, but only speaking one word, “Nevermore” (Poe 331). In some cases of mental illnesses, one can experience hallucinations, hearing voices, paranoia, and even persecutory delusion. Is it possible that the Raven could have symbolized something other than a bird.
I believe that The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman is ultimately a psychological story with the main character’s mental condition slowly deteriorating, but I also believe there’s evidence to suggest that her mental condition is caused or heightened by the wallpaper emitting toxic fumes and poisoning her, causing her hallucinations and mania. The main character is shown to have psychological problems from the beginning, likely hallucinating even from the onset of childhood, specifically when she noted that she “…used to lie awake as a child and get more entertainment and terror out of blank walls and plain furniture than most children in a toy-store” (588). She then goes on to explain how she has always seen the life in inanimate
Mental illness is the product of a combination of factors. Some people have a predisposition toward symptoms of social anxiety, but no one is born with a mental illness. Rather, a mental illness is developed from the combination of one’s environment and any predisposition he or she has toward anxiety symptoms (Social Anxiety). Doctors’ understanding of mental health has greatly progressed in the last century. In the late 1800s, society trivialized mental illness and prescribed isolation to individuals dealing with depression and anxiety; however, society today is aware of the importance of properly acknowledging and treating mental illness.
The story “The Yellow Wallpaper” written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman in 1892 shows mental illness through the narrator first hand. The theme in this story is going insane verses loneliness as well as being trapped. These themes are shown through the main character (the narrator of the story) as she works through her own mind, life, and surroundings. First, the theme of the woman’s state of mind is the main focus in this story.
