The Yellow Wallpaper -- essays research papers

In "The Yellow Wallpaper", by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, there is a dominant/submissive relationship that exists between an oppressive husband and his submissive wife. This oppressive husband leads his wife from a state of depression to a state of insanity and finally, to a state of isolation. Had the husband not been so oppressive upon his wife, he could have realized her problem and resolved it without tearing himself away from her. The woman does not become insane because of the wallpaper alone; rather, it is the strict guidelines her husband sets for her that prompt her eventual insanity and isolation. As the story begins, the woman -- whose name we never learn -- tells of her depression and how it is dismissed by her husband and brother. "You see, he does not believe I am sick! And what can one do? If a physician of high standing, and one's own husband, assures friends and relatives that there is really nothing the matter with one but temporary nervous depression -- a slight hysterical tendency -- what is one to do?" (Gilman 658). These two men, both doctors, are apparently unable to admit that there might be more to her condition than just stress and a slight nervous condition. Even when a summer in the country and weeks of bed-rest don't help, her husband refuses to accept that she may have a real problem. Throughout the story there are examples of the dominant/submissive relationship. She is virtually imprisoned in her bedroom, supposedly to allo...