"The Yellow Wallpaper"

"The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte P. Gilman

The narrator, or the wife, seems to be kind of sarcastic in the beginning. She described John, her husband, as practical and impatient and who's a physician. I sense that she is in an unhappy marriage also. I noticed that at the beginning the wife is writing about the house and how she says it's "haunted", then after talking to her husband and how he's so controlling and seems to know what's best for her, she goes back and writes how the house is "beautiful" instead of haunted. I got the impression that she contradicts herself often.

She feels like she should get "permission" from her husband all the time. "John says this....and John says that.." When she was describing the nursery she was talking about how unattractive the wallpaper was. Why does she dislike this wallpaper so much? she considered it as "unclean." Towards the end of the story, I started to think that the wife was mentaly ill or something, or that maybe John is convincing her that she is ill, when she probably isn't. Everything that the wife suggests, he shoots it down. It's like he's selfish, but acting like he's looking out for his wife's best interest. I noticed that when the wife asked about moving her resting room downstairs where it was more attractive, he instisted that she will go into he cellar.


I kept wondering what was it that John was hiding from his wife? Why couldn't she go downstairs or see her family? John was keeping her locked away and she longed to get out.