Theme in The Yellow Wallpaper Essay

The short story Yellow Wallpaper centers around a central theme that a persons physical surroundings have a direct impact on their mental state. This is highlighted in the film as the yellow wallpaper in the room, not only has an impact, but is an indicator of the narrators deteriorating mental state. The narrator who goes unnamed is hinted at recently giving childbirth and is showing the signs of postpartum psychosis and postpartum depression, both of which lead to the deterioration of her mental state later on in the story. This mental state is revealed early on in the story, yet it is downplayed and not exposed to the full extent of its severity to the reader.

If a physician of high standing, and ones 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 76),

Her mental condition starts to deteriorate due to her surroundings when she is first placed in a room covered in yellow wallpaper, with barred windows. She makes note of her distaste for the room, and how she is in no way fond of it.

...the windows are barred for little children, and there are rings and things in the walls (Gilman 77),

I dont like our room a bit. I wanted one downstairs that opened on the piazza and had roses all over the window, and such pretty old-fashioned chintz hangings! but John would not hear of it (Gilman 76),

This room is symbolic of a prison, holding her in against her will. She also makes note that she is in no way fond of the yellow wallpaper that coats the walls of her prison. Yet because of her high regard for her husband and her unwillingness to acknowledge that she is unhappy, she simply thinks that it is for the best, if her husband thinks so. This aids in leading to her mental condition deteriorating even further due to the fact that she must simply put up with her prison.

As the story progressives and the narrator spends more of her time in the room the more she becomes accustomed to her prison. Her obsession with the yellow wallpaper that surrounds her constantly grows to an unhealthy addiction.

Im getting really fond of the room in spite of the wallpaper. Perhaps because of the wallpaper. It dwells in my mind so! (Gilman 80).

Her obsession with the wallpaper surrounding her is leading to her become accustomed to her loneliness, which starts to affect her mental state. The room is becoming her obsession and her only true passion. Her husband is becoming less of a focus and she is not as uncomfortable with the inside of her prison as before, and longs less and less to leave. Her relationship with the outside world is becoming skewered, but her initial interpretation of the room as a prison with yellow walls remains the same.

Her visualization of the women within the wallpaper, is her subconscious recollection of her initial state of mind before her mental deterioration. Her current self, that is removed from her previous, more sane state, is becoming confortable in the room and feels she can do what she wants in it, however her recollection which still hangs with her drives her to feel the need to rip down the yellow wallpaper. This wallpaper which she feels symbolizes her prison when she was first shut off in the room, hypothetically imprisoning her former self.

I really have discovered something at last.Through watching so much at night, when it changes so, Ihave finally found out.The front pattern DOES move--and no wonder! The woman

behind shakes it!Sometimes I think there are a great many women behind, andsometimes only one, and she crawls around fast, and her crawling shakes it all over. Then in the very bright spots she keeps still, and in the very shady spots she just takes hold of the bars and shakes them

hard. And she is all the time trying to climb through. But nobody could climb through that pattern--it strangles so; I think that is why it has so many heads. (Gilman

She feels in order to reconcile with her former self that felt a need to get out of the room she must in fact help the women behind the wallpaper out. She proceeds with the ripping of the wallpaper strips in an attempt to let the women out of the wall.

I pulled and she shook, I shook and she pulled, and before morning we had peeled off yards of that paper. A strip about as high as my head and half around the room (Gilman 85)

This not only symbolizing her internal conflict, as she is fighting to hold on to her sanity, and past memories, yet at the same time the action itself is a accumulation of her insanity and mental deterioration. At this point it can be seen that she is completely obsessed with the wallpaper, and it has lead her to have a mental breakdown. When the wallpaper is torn down and she says,

I wonder if they all come out of that wallpaper as I did? (Gilman 86)

It is illustrative of her obvious hysteria, and delusion. It is also an indicator that the wallpaper has become a central pillar to her madness, and after ripping down the wallpaper, and the memories of her original regrets with the room, her former self is completely gone, and she has deteriorated so much that she is clinically insane, and transformed into a new person, which is a shell of her former self. When she yells at her husband

Ive got out at last, said I, in spite of you and Jane! And Ive pulled off most of the paper, so you cant put me back! (Gilman 87)

Her mental state is confirmed to the reader, of being completely demolished and destroyed. It also represents her former interests embodied through her new person, as she once wanted to get out of the prison, which was built with these yellow walls. Since the yellow walls are torn down, her previous interests satisfied, the new person believes that she is truly free from any oppression or imprisonment and her husband cant do anything about it. The rooms state, stripped of wallpaper clearly has a direct impact on her mental state at this point, since she clearly believes that the wallpaper is what was keeping her from leaving the entire time.