Period 3, College Literature students: please respond to the following ideas in connection with your analysis of "The Yellow Wallpaper." Comment just like you would on the Weekly Read and Respond exercises and submit your thoughts by Wednesday, December 16th.
Is there really a baby?
Is there really a sister-in-law?
Is there even a husband?
Where IS the narrator?
Feel free to add additional conspiracy theories!
I honestly believe that the narrator doesn't have a baby because any mother would say a lot about their child and how much they miss them. She is confined in a house and only talks about her child twice throughout the whole story she would have mention more about her child I believe. She talks about the wallpaper more then her child that's strange.
ReplyDeleteI don't believe that there's a sister in law I believe that the "sister in law" isn't John's Mistress either I think it's just a personality that the unknown narrator shows I believe the "sister in law" is the narrator because the sister in law is described as an "enthusiastic housekeeper that hopes for no better profession" which describes a working woman during that time.
I believe there is no husband either because at the end of the story it states ".. I've got out at last ... Have he fainted.. He did .. I had creep over him every time. I believe John was a person within her .. John was described as an average man during the time period. When she got free John escaped her.
I believe that the narrator is in a place where she is getting no help because if she was getting help she wouldn't be fixated on the wallpaper and realize she had a "child". She is free because she escaped the place she was in leaving everyone she talked about.
I believe there is a baby involved in the story, the narrator probably does suffer from post partum due to her need to take care of the baby. In the story she says she wishes she can see the baby but says she isn't right in her head to take care of the baby
ReplyDeleteI think the supposedly sister in law is actually one of John's mistresses that he says he plans to have. In the beginning of the story she sees her as a caring kind person, but towards the end she starts to realize that she isn't what she appears to be. That's when her paranoia starts to kick in and she thinks John's mistress is plotting against her.
I feel like there was a husband because it wouldn't make sense if there wasn't a husband or if the husband was any other person. The only person I feel could be the husband is the narrator's brother because he too is a musician and he also acts similar to John's ways, but I think there is a husband because it just makes the narrator's story flow on more.
Just like the women in the wallpaper was freed, that is symbolism to the narrator being free from everyone's control. I feel that she isn't in a different physically when I read the question, I feel mentally she is in a state of freedom to do as she pleases. That's probably what she meant when she said she is free and you can't trap her anymore.
I believe there is a baby, sister-in-law, and a husband. I don't believe that the narrator was born crazy or insane or depressed. Anyone in her circumstances would probably turn out the same way. The narrator suffered from depression after having her baby and the "cure" made it worse. She didnt come into the house insane it made her that way.
ReplyDeleteThe narrator might as well be in solitary confinement. She cant go anywhere she cant "work" or even write she cant do anything. That alone will drive someone insane. And in this time period woman were looked at as inferior to men so things were even worse for her. The narrator is trapped in the house, her mind, body, and soul
It's entirely possible that there was a baby at some point. Maybe the loss of the baby through the story could be marked as another tie to her sanity. I believe that while having a baby, it ended up dying a stillborn and leading to the following problems to the narrator.
ReplyDeleteThe idea of the sister-in-law could go either way that she was either 1), John's mistress or 2) just a figment of the narrator's fleeting sanity. John did force the room on the narrator on the fact that he might want to "take another" for whatever reason but there is also the fact that her character only shows after the wallpaper started it's "push" on the narrator.
I lean more so to the fact that there is a husband, not another imaginative symbol for something. He was a big problem as for the hidden theme, females v. society as for the fact that he felt that was he knew was best and that she could do nothing but, forcing her to eventually go crazy from his "knowledge" or the isolation and the lack of freedoms.
I agree with Simone in the sense that she's escaped from the manor, from all of these people or things inside her head. She finally broke through John's oppression and/or this underlying emotion locking her down at the end of the story.
First off I am a bit torn on this one. On one hand if the baby really was the cause of her stress we should have heard more about it than twice. However if there was no childbirth; What caused the narrators distress in the first place? But we need to remember that the narrator is currently "PROJECTING" her pent up emotions onto the environment so the baby could very well not exist.
ReplyDeleteSecondly I am almost certain that the sister in law is the result of the narrator expressing her pent up emotions Knowing projecting the fact she is currently failing a a housekeeper and wife at the moment, and that she has no one to talk to about these emotions leads me to believe she is projecting this feeling of failure on the setting. Resulting in the creation of a sister-in-law.
Yes I believe there is a husband; simply because this feeling of being trapped on the narrator's part had to have had roots somewhere. The main question is: "Is the husband currently with us or somewhere else?". It could be very likely that the wife was taken away at some point and put in an asylum, and that this story could be a warped recall of the events leading up to it. Which could explain the massive amount of repetition in the text. Also it is more likely that they divorced at some point (As a result of her mental state.) and the narrator is projecting the feelings she used to have towards John into the story.
Honestly I don't really know. If she is really that far along the lines of insanity she could be hallucinating under a bridge in NYC for all I know. However it is more likely that she is either: "Still in the house." or "Recalling a warped series of events leading up to her breakdown from a asylum." She could still be in the house because if we remember at the end her husband fainted and the narrator was content with "creeping" around; along with her vivid description of the house, wallpaper, and surrounding areas. And she may very well be in an asylum of some sort recalling these events if we take into account the writing style she uses.