Finding Liberation in the Yellow Wallpaper

Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Paper” may appear a 19^th century gothic short story of wallpaper-induced psychosis upon first read; however, it has much deeper undertones that accompany the narrator’s descent into an altered state of mind. The motif of the patronizing, overbearing presence of a controlling and “always right” husband—John in this case—is a constant reminder of not only the follies of a man who is alleged to be “practical in the extreme” but also the figurative and literal dangers of denying an individual the pleasures and liberties the denier enjoys (¶ 6). The narrator’s increasing fixation on the yellow wallpaper, the trapped woman behind it, and her own defiance of her husband’s wishes is evidence of her breaking free from her claustrophobic constraints.

            Gilman’s depiction of the narrator’s increasing restriction to the sole activity of resting is representative of the commonplace limitations placed upon women—particularly upper-middle class women—by their male “superiors” during the time period. Because of her husband’s concern for health, the narrator is “absolutely forbidden to ‘work’” until she is well again (11). It is interesting to note that Gilman places work in quotation marks, suggesting a broad definition. As the reader sees, the narrator is allowed very few activities to partake in—in the end she can only rest and stare at wallpaper—despite her belief that “congenial work, with excitement and change, would do [her] good” (13). She is even discouraged from writing, facing “heavy opposition” should she attempt to engage it (15). If it seems rather “silly” to believe that writing would significantly damage the health of someone suffering from “temporary nervous depression,” that is because it is (9). Such a notion is reminiscent of the belief that becoming educated would be too cumbersome for the alleged limited mental faculties of a woman—a bit patriarchal, to say the least. Gilman creates a bit of a foil to the narrator’s character with John’s sister, whom the narrator describes as “a perfect and enthusiastic housekeeper, [who] hopes for no better profession” and a woman who likely thinks the narrator is made sick by her writing (74). Such a characterization of John’s sister suggests that the women who readily accept the duties imposed by the “cult of domesticity” are characterized by a degree of ignorance. While John’s sister is at least permitted to engage in housekeeping, however stereotypical it may be, the narrator is denied even a modicum of physical exertion. Without access to any constant companionship, it is hard to imagine how one’s mental state can remain healthy, let alone improve. The narrator’s account of her own deterioration demonstrates the dangers of isolating women, or any group of people for that matter, to a realm devoid of activity.

            Yet, the narrator’s confinement and increasing obsession over the yellow wallpaper should not solely be read as a evidence of psychosis; it is really symbolic of her self-liberation. As she increasingly stares at the yellow wallpaper and its “flamboyant pattern committing every artistic sin” due to her room confinement for perpetual resting, she notices “a strange, provoking formless sort of figure that seems to skulk about” that she comes to determine is a woman. It may sound as if she is merely becoming crazier by the day, but in reality, she is seeing a Freudian projection of herself—“the narrator’s subconscious realizing her suppressed feelings of repression and constraint by John,” to borrow a contextual definition from my colleague E.T. Fram. The narrator’s increasing defiance of her husband’s prohibition on physical exertion corresponds with her depiction of the increasingly vehement desire of the “woman…creeping about behind [the] pattern” to escape from the bars of the prison cell that is the pattern (121). The narrator bluntly tells her husband his methods are not working when she says “I don’t weigh a bit more…nor as much; and my appetite may be better in the evening when you are here but it is worse in the morning when you are” (133). Previously, she showed infinite deference to her husband’s opinions. The woman that she sees “creeping up and down” is really an image of the liberated life she seeks. Her new-found conviction that “[i]t must be very humiliating to be caught creeping by daylight” is not only external commentary on fictitious woman but also is a subconscious realization of her disgust towards her own position: she is forced to do anything that she desires behind her husband’s back because he forbids her from “exhausting” herself (198). As soon as she makes that statement, she immediately comments on her habits of creeping about by daylight, whereas before her defiance only carried over into writing. Her distance from liberation becomes smaller and smaller as she tears away at the wallpaper she sees as strangling the woman behind it, culminating in her adoption of the identity behind the pattern, signify her unleashing of her “free self” Her astonishing statement at the end of the story, “I’ve got out at last…in spite of you and Jane. And I’ve pulled off most of the paper, so you can’t put me back” is the climactic culmination of her desire to not be subject to her husband’s orders (261).

            While the reader is aware that the narrator has achieved her own sense of a liberated self and has released her suppressed resentment against the limitations her husband had constantly imposed on her before, the reader does not know if the narrator has truly freed herself from these limitations. The story ends with the husband John lying unconscious on the floor, but what will his reaction be when he awakes? Will he merely send her off to an asylum for more resting, having determined she has a condition more severe than he previously thought? The ending undoubtedly leaves several questions, yet they do not necessarily detract from Gilman’s feminist message. Even if male understanding does not follow, are not a self-realization of a desire to get out of the strangling yellow pattern of male control and an acting on that desire a necessary prerequisite? It seems that Gilman takes that first step belief to heart with her early contribution to the development of American feminism at a time when people were still not convinced males and females had the same brain size (1056). 

What Turns a Man into the Misfit?

“The Misfit” in Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” poses as a dangerously ambiguous character. While at numerous times he appears to be rational in his decision calculus, he simultaneously seems devoid of the very essence of humanity. How can a man refer to his parents as the “finest people in the world” and then later effortlessly remark that he had killed his daddy ( 90)? The Misfit’s inhuman ability to unproblematically feel guiltless and not responsible for his actions conveys an existence so far removed from humanity that one cannot help but doubt the possibility of his ever being “reached.”

The most difficult aspect to grasp of the Misfit’s being is his capacity to remove himself from any notion or sense of responsibility. Although he states he “never was a bad boy that [he remembers] of,” he simultaneously remembers that “somewheres along the line [he] done something wrong and got sent to the penitentiary” (112). His statement not only reveals his convenient case of selective memory—it would have been helpful at his trial—it also demonstrates his complete failure to associate himself with his actions or their consequences. There is this strong disconnect between his recollection of the past and what others have informed him of it. In response to the grandmother’s comment “[m]aybe they put you in by mistake,” the Misfit affirmatively denies that possibility by asserting “[i]t wasn’t no mistake…they had the papers on me” (115-116). To a functioning observer, the inherent problem of the contradiction in the Misfit’s concurrent denial and affirmation of his guilt would be obvious, but to the Misfit, no problem exists. The Misfit’s flawed logic does not stop there; he even has a back story to explain his father’s death—he “died in nineteen ought nineteen of the epidemic flu” (118). Yet, only moments before, the Misfit stated he did something wrong. If his train of thought makes no sense, that is because certain concepts—responsibility and guiltiness, primarily—do not exist for him. The reader is almost led to believe that the Misfit has disassociative personality disorder, considering his affectionate characterization of his father—“my daddy’s heart was pure gold” (90)—on the one hand and his nebulous recollection that he did something wrong—probably murdering his father—on the other. This mental illness would explain rather well his lingering insinuation that he done nothing worthy of the punishment that he has received. Thus, his “good” identity that he variably displays feels no connection to the crime his “bad” identity allegedly has committed and been punished for.

However, if the Misfit’s character is not a composite of identities, then new problems arise concerning his ability to be “reached.” The grandmother repeatedly, and to no avail, attempts to remind the Misfit that he is a “good man at heart,” and does not look like he has a bit of “common blood”—whatever that may be—in an attempt to spare her own life, and perhaps those of her family too (89-91). While it is uncertain if the grandmother is actually attempting to rekindle the slowly dying ember of “goodness” that she thinks is left in him or merely trying to buy her survival through flattery, the responses her attempts elicit reveal insight into the Misfit’s understanding of his own character. Although he states, “Nome, I ain’t a good man,” he clarifies his position by elaborating “but I ain’t the worst in the world neither” (100). Does that mean he still can be the good man the grandmother reminds him he can be? The probability is slim, at best, considering the Misfit’s extensive rationalization of behavior that is implicitly linked with him. His resignation to the belief that “sooner or later you’re going to forget what it was you done and just be punished for it” is further evidence of his failure to associate punishment as the logical consequence of killing a man or taking a tire off his car (124). The Misfit’s response poses two problems: (1) how can he be a good man if taking a human life is something he can forget so easily and (2) how can he be a good man if he cannot grasp the true nature of right or wrong? He is aware that he has committed some offense that everyone else deems wrong; yet, he does not understand how wrong his actions really were. The Misfit’s flawed concept of punishment combined with his view that one ought to “enjoy the minutes you got left the best way you can—by killing somebody or burning down his house or doing some other meanness to him” seems to serve as an inherent barrier against his ever being good man (135).

Yet, knowing his current disposition towards life, however sick and perverse it may be, does not provide the same degree of reassurance in condemning him to a final characterization as knowing the source of his disposition. The Misfit exists in such flawed and grotesquely misanthropic ontological state that ambiguity over his history is not acceptable to the reader. Did he suffer some form of abuse as a child that caused him to release his harbored hatred of his father in the form of killing him? Does he suffer from a mental illness that induces him to think there is “no pleasure but meanness” in the world (135)? Or is he merely an incarnation of “evil”—if there is such a thing? Although the question of his being remains an unsolved mystery, despite its central importance in understanding what turns a man into the misfit, it is rather certain that his reflexive shooting of the grandmother, regardless of the theological significance of her final actions, reaffirmed his conviction that he “ain’t a good man.” (967)

The Tragedy of Self-Consciousness

Throughout “Teenage Wasteland,” Anne Tyler depicts Daisy as constantly concerned with her perceived appearance. Despite the absence of others’ direct commenting, Daisy manages to silently identify nearly everything—her attire, her weight, her degree of concern as a parent—that could portray her negatively. Amidst the chaos of events influencing her views on her relationship with her son, Donny, her publicly unknown self-criticism influences her behavior as if someone had directly told her she ought to have “worn nylons instead of knee socks” (¶ 8). Although characters like Cal and Miss Evans directly instruct her how to act, her weakness of rarely ever being resolved allows this damaging exploitation to occur. This unfortunate Achilles' heel proves potentially fatal at a time that requires firmness and resolve.

            Daisy’s insistency on being self-conscious permeates every aspect of character. After she is called into Mr. Lanham’s, the principal, office, she automatically assumes that he perceives her as “a delinquent parent” and “unseeing and uncaring” (3). Moreover, her fixation on “looks” drives her to torment herself over her and her husband’s respective appearances as “an overweight housewife in a cotton dress” and “a too-tall, too-thin insurance agent in a baggy, frayed suit,” despite the fact that their attire is entirely irrelevant to the quality of her and her husband’s parenting (8). Her ability to infer that her apparently ill-chosen clothes and her lack of a gym membership are obvious indicators of her character is a sad reflection of her emphasis on superficiality. While Daisy’s distress over her conjecture of Mr. Lanham’s assessment of her parenting is reasonably justified—her son has lousy grades and has been caught smoking and breaking into another student’s locker—her jump to the conclusion that she is a terrible mother is excessive, to say the least. It seems reasonable to say that Daisy’s utter fixation on appearance drives her to interpret Mr. Lanham’s comments of Donny as “noisy, lazy, and disruptive” as being directed at her, building up her personal shame as a fourth-grade teacher now turned parental failure—or so she feels (2).

            In a depressingly humorous manner, Daisy’s obsession with appearances induces her to serially “flip flop” on positions concerning how to treat her son. When Cal calls Daisy to forcefully suggest she “ought to give him more rope,” Daisy throws her defense of “he’s still so suggestible” to the wind upon hearing Cal’s retort, “Don’t you understand how [not trusting him] hurts?” (36-37). While not textually explicit, Cal’s response implies an understanding of Daisy’s “vulnerability” in the sense of a figurative battle of persuasion. Daisy greets his reply with a 180-degree turn by not only acknowledging that he is right but also by elaborating that “she saw Donny suddenly from a whole new angle” (41). Her fear of looking ignorant—another negative quality she actively seeks to avoid—induces her abandonment of what may be best for her son. More egregious, her reaction to Miss Evans’s, the history teacher, reminders—“you are the parent” and “you should still be in charge”—causes her to become furious at the thought Cal was only serving as a “talisman” to her troubled son (49-50). Leniency for her sudden change of heart is due, however, considering the short-lived realization that all her “luxuries” had been foregone in vain. But that justification is not applicable to Daisy’s reversal of the anger she had only felt seconds before at Cal. What starts as a call to Cal demanding an explanation of his tutoring Donny to get F’s turns into another episode of his “sweet talking.” Why should Daisy want to look “foolish” to a man the reader is told has extensive psychological training? His knockout line, “you and I both know there’s more to it than grades,” hits Daisy’s fatal flaw with nearly perfect accuracy. When she first called she was angry at Cal, but “[w]hen she hung up, it was Miss Evans she was angry at” (54-55).

            If a degree of comical illogic seems rampant in Daisy’s speech and actions, it is because she repeatedly fails to put the needs of Donny before her own. When she ought to be concerned about what is in Donny’s best interests in terms of resolving his behavioral issues and poor academic performance, she instead actively seeks to avoid incurring the disapproval of Cal and others. In response to Donny’s retort that she is “feeling competitive…and controlling” over her concerns of Cal’s efficacy as a tutor, “she bit her lip and said no more” rather than press the matter (62-63). What are the direct consequences of her failure to be the parent Miss Evans tells her to be? Nothing besides the mere infraction of her son’s expulsion from school over “five cans of beer and a half a pack of cigarettes” found in his locker—the principal says it so effortlessly (64). 

            However, Tyler’s presentation of Daisy should not be viewed as satirical. While numerous times she is deceived by the “smile of hunger” emanating in Cal’s words, it is hard to dismiss the notion that her serial flip flopping does not also originate in a desire to desperately help her son (106). One cannot excuse Daisy from the predicament of finding a solution to Donny’s troubles while at the same time maintaining her sanity. If Daisy already has a predisposition to be self-conscious, her chaotic situation only exacerbates it. Her desire to be a perfect mother seems to distort her best intentions when in reality she only yearns for her son to be successful. The true tragedy is that Donny’s situation could not have been more perfect to maliciously exploit her flaw so as to delay an appropriate response before it was all too late. (945)