Charlotte Perkins wrote The Yellow Wallpaper in 1892. Women did not have the basic right to be responsible for their lives and well-being at the time. Men were the ones to decide what a woman should do or say. The author wrote her story to claim women to be independent and their voices worthy of attention.
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The author based her story on her own experience with postpartum depression and the traditional ways of treating it. In the author’s times, women who suffered from nervousness and depressive state were given rest cure and complete exclusion from ordinary life. The narrator’s husband decided the best way to fight her mental illness was to isolate her from the world. He made her rest and sleep for the majority of the day. The author’s message is clear – such an approach does not work.
The story’s primary purpose is to explain how harmful it is to neglect a woman’s striving for self-growth and development. The narrator has nothing else to do but lay down all day and stare at the yellow walls in her room. There is no mental activity other than analyzing their patterns and reflections. This leads to the woman’s insanity. Charlotte Perkins Gilman uses this example to show the tragic outcome of neglecting women’s rights. Women need to be free, independent, and autonomous. Men should not be the ones dictating women how to live – this is what women have a right to decide for themselves.