Postpartum Depression In The Yellow Wallpaper

Mental health, specifically women’s, has been a widely fluctuating field and somewhat controversial topic for much of history. One can recount countless stories of women not being listened to or taken seriously by male doctors even in the present day. This exact occurrence is also present in the short story, “The Yellow Wallpaper.” Here, the main narrator is a young woman who has just become a mother and seems to suffer from a type of post-partum depression. This postpartum depression is a direct representation of what the author herself went through. According to historical sources, “in 1887 Gilman wrote in her diary that she felt that she was very sick with a “brain disease” in the years following her daughter’s birth. Gilman was placed

Throughout the story, Gilman illustrates different kinds of female identity and critiques the roles that women were forced into at the time. She uses imagery to both illustrate the setting that the narrator is in but also how this affects Jane, and her use of symbolism is meant to highlight the narrator’s struggles through various objects. Her serious yet innocent tone throughout the tale also highlights how the narrator is affected by her identity and experiences as a woman. In “The Yellow Wallpaper,” Charlotte Perkins Gilman uses imagery, symbolism, and tone to shows how the gender roles of her time negatively impact women’s mental health. First of all, Gilman shows how the narrator is trapped in both her physical place as well as her mental state through the use of vivid imagery showing the house, room, and wallpaper. The house is described by the narrator as being “the most beautiful place” while the garden around it is said to be “delicious” unlike any garden the narrator has ever seen before (Gilman 1). This establishes a romantic and positive tone to the setting around

The narrator is eventually driven to a point of insanity because of the neglect she faces at the hands of male physicians and women who abide by the gender roles of the time. The author’s use of imagery and symbolism work in a similar way to establish how the narrator is impacted harshly by her settings and the women in the wallpaper. The tone on the other hand is more reflective of the narrator’s identity as a women without much power who is subject to the events happening around her. This tale was meant to scare its audience and provide a warning of some sort to those who are trying to cure women from mental health illnesses. It was effective as many methods changed afterwards and the field began to show improvement. Hopefully, in the present and in the future no woman will have to suffer what the narrator did in this