The Yellow Wallpaper

By Charlotte Perkins Gilman

The Yellow Wallpaper is regarded as an important early work of American feminist literature, illustrating attitudes in the nineteenth century toward women's physical and mental health. The story also has been classified as Gothic fiction and horror fiction. The story is written as a collection of first person journal entries written by a woman whose physician husband has confined her to the upstairs bedroom of a house that he has rented for the summer. She is forbidden from working, and has to hide her journal entries from him, so that she can recuperate from what he calls a "temporary nervous depression-a slight hysterical tendency," a diagnosis common to women in that period. Her husband controls her access to the rest of the house. In the end, she imagines that there are women creeping around behind the patterns of the wallpaper, and comes to believe that she is one of them. She locks herself in the room, now the only place where she feels safe, refusing to leave when the summer rental is up.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Wilder Publications, Inc.
• Release date: Aug 3, 2014
• ISBN: 9781633842434

Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935), author of the celebrated short story "The Yellow Wallpaper," is regarded by many as a leading intellectual in the women's movement in the United States during the first two decades of the twentieth century. Michael Kimmel is Distinguished Professor of Sociology at SUNY, Stony Brook, and the author of Manhood in America: A Cultural History. Amy Aronson is a professor of Journalism and Media Studies at Fordham University.

Book preview

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Reviews for The Yellow Wallpaper

[moniquesnyman-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A creepy psychological horror with subtle feminism undertones. I truly enjoyed this one, because it showed how helpless women of the past were in certain situations, governed by their fathers, husbands, and brothers.

[readingover50 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Read this short story in 1 sitting. It is the story of a woman's descent into madness following the birth of her child and the subsequent enforced rest. She is taken to a country house to recover and spends most of her time confined to a room with horrid yellow wallpaper. The description of the room makes me think what happens to the woman has happened in the past. A creepy, thought provoking read.

[norabelle414 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A woman and her husband and young child rent a house for a few months while their house is being renovated. They stay in an attic bedroom with confusingly-patterned yellow wallpaper. The woman, already dealing with mental health problems, slowly becomes delusional due to her husband keeping her in the room with nothing to do but stare at the wallpaper every day.I was expecting this story to speak to me much more than it actually did. I know what the generally accepted interpretation of this story is - the woman's husband is controlling and abusive and she projects that feeling on to the wallpaper as she goes crazy. However, if the reader is seeing things only from the woman's perspective, and the woman is definitely delusional by the end, and thus an unreliable narrator, who are we to say when exactly she turned delusional? I'm certainly among the first to point out when a man is too controlling of a woman, but I think if the woman was delusional and paranoid from before the narration begins this story would look exactly the same.The downside of listening to this story as an audiobook is that I had no sense of time passing. There were no dates or noticeable breaks in the narration, so one minute they are moving into the house for 3 months and the next minute they are a couple days from moving back home. The lack of sense of time might have had something to do with my interpretation. I did listen to it twice but that did not seem to help.

[lisamorr · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A very quick read. The VMC edition I had included an Afterword which was almost as long as the book itself!I enjoyed this book (short story, or at most a novella). Written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, an early feminist, it recounts a wife's descent into madness. The main character is the wife mentioned above; it is told in the first person, and the reader is not entirely convinced of what is real and what is in the narrator's mind.This was a disturbing book - I felt helpless, like the narrator. A good book.

[michael8xolotl · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Even as short as it is, still too long. It would be more compelling as a paragraph or two. Probably as highly rated as it is because of its position within feminist literature, which is fine and understandable (and moderately interesting); I just didn't care for it--I found it more comical than anything else.

[elizajane_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Brilliant story of madness! Fascinating piece for its historical value as Ms. Gilman is protesting the common treatment at the time the story was written given to women who were suffering "nervous" disorders. A cautionary tale but extremely frightening because of its reality.

[theeccentriclady · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Interesting read from a different era. Not sure how I really feel even after 2 months. I like dark and books about insanity but this one was a bit out there.

[sturlington_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A woman, confined to an upper-story bedroom in a creepy house for a "rest cure" following a mental breakdown, becomes obsessed with the hideous yellow wallpaper.I have read this story a few times and I always forget how creepy and chilling it is, especially the final image. Gilman has a knack of pointing out the horrific things that society does to women. In this story, depriving the narrator of her means of expressing herself and stimulating her brain is just as terrifying as confining her to her room. I believe the narrator was suffering from undiagnosed postpartum depression.Reread in 2015.

[amydross · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Never read this as a kid, realized I probably should. An interesting perspective on interior decorating.

[janemarieprice · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I am glad I read this during the day. It is quite frightening on a lot of levels. The narrator is struggling with depression stemming from the pressure of being a ‘good wife’ by society’s standards and possibly also from the recent birth of her child. As I’m sure was common at the time, she is assumed to have some sort of non-medical exhaustion by her doctor husband and brother. The cure is extended rest and absolutely no work whatsoever. Trapped in a room (of her husband’s choosing of course), she descends into a sort of madness through obsession with the wallpaper. There is a lot going on in the short story, most disturbing to me is the narrators seeming ignorance of the cause of her own depression. While she does fight in a way against her husband’s diagnosis, she doesn’t seem to feel sure about her condition herself.

[mmwiseheart · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

** spoiler alert ** This is a fantastic insight into the mind of someone who has been suffering from undiagnosed post-partum depression. Her husband believes she just needs rest and confines her to a room with yellow wallpaper. The result of this isolation is a mental breakdown.

[ahooper04 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Very moving story about a woman who slowly loses her mind because of the way society treats women during the 19th century.

[serenity_tigerlily · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I first read this piece for an English class a couple years ago and it’s been with me ever since. It’s a fairly short read but when it’s over it still haunts you and leaves you chilled to the bone. I think that this story depicts how someone with a mental illness could feel when their illness isn’t validated and properly cared for.

[sullwyn · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This was shorter than I expected.. But interesting.. I loved the visuals I got from her description of the creeping woman behind the pattern in the wallpaper... And to learn ultimately that it was herself she saw trapped behind it.. Creepy.. And sad.. I enjoyed it!

[yougotamber · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This story is interesting because it has many depths. This woman is trapped by something… Is she trapped by some illness? Or could it be her husband and those around her? What about her psyche? Or by the tiny room, with the ugly and haunting wallpaper, where she spends the majority of her time in?

Those around her only make this situation worse. Her husband, the head of the household is also a Doctor, making her situation even more pitiful. I’m slightly curious to see this story from the perspective of her husband, would it show him in the same light or would we see another side? You can see his love for her, so why then does it look like he is trapping her in this house.

The wallpaper is another interesting aspect of the story, the obsession behind the ugliness of it. This woman has strong observation skills that have been with her since childhood. This could be telling of extreme intelligence or autistic/OCD traits which would explain the unexplained “sickness”. I also think that when someone is depressed it can escalate by staying inside and being inactive. Sometimes the best cure is actually forcing yourself to do the things you don’t want to. All the people involved in her caretaking only placate her.
It only gets more interesting when she sees a woman trapped behind the pattern in the wallpaper. Is this a reflection of how she feels in her current condition? Is the trapped by those around her or just getting more paranoid?

This story ended up giving me the creeps. The description of the wallpaper woman crawling and shaking the pattern in front of her seemed right out of a horror movie. The descriptions gave me some very ghostly images and the idea of being trapped in a room days on end is the perfect setting for horrific imaginings. I really love it because it’s not the typical scary story, almost like the creepy parts are underneath and need to be dug up. The story really plays with reality, what is real and what is merely imagination. What is real to someone could be a trick of the mind and the start of crazy thoughts. How easy it is to lose ones sanity.

[darthdeverell · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

In The Yellow Wallpaper, Charlotte Perkins Gilman explores the rest cure through a story in which her unreliable narrator slowly unravels like the wallpaper on which she fixates. The tale begins with the narrator entering a gothic manse fallen on hard times as part of her physician husband John's prescription, "absolutely forbidden to 'work' until" she is well (pg. 3). Locked in a room with only the curling patterns on yellow wallpaper to occupy herself, she slowly begins imagining that they move and ascribing personalities to the patterns. The narrator looks out the window and offers insight into her life, but this fades as the wallpaper comes to dominate her world, until she must climb inside it. The story offers useful historical insight into the rest cure while also serving as a good example of nineteenth century gothic fiction.

[ajbraithwaite_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Wow, this is a great short story. Creepy, sinister and unbearably sad.

[pepperwings · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

It's fascinating and also mystifying how people handled mental stress, or mental disorders years ago, what things helped some people, and drove others further into madness. From what I understand, this story is partially true, based on the author's experience and hallucinations, and the frustration from people who largely had good intentions. Of course, from a feminist point of view, it's terrible how little people listened to what she wanted, or worked to truly understand and help.

[t_k_elliott · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The Yellow Wallpaper is short but powerful. It’s written in the first person, as a diary by an unnamed woman. She has some unspecified mental health issue after giving birth, and her husband has whisked her away to a country manor. The husband (John) has insisted that they sleep in what appears to be the old nursery, as it has bars on the windows and the horrible yellow wallpaper has been damaged.

The writer is prevented from doing anything much by her husband (who insists that she needs rest) and spends increasing amounts of time staring at the wallpaper, becoming convinced that there is a woman behind the pattern, trying to get out.

I can identify with this, because I remember having some curtains when I was a child that terrified me. When you looked at the pattern, the pattern seemed to look back…

The ending is ambiguous; has the narrator finally gone over the edge or is it something else?

Apparently, the reason Gilman wrote this was to protest at the treatment of women who, kept from any kind of intellectual pursuit, were essentially driven mad with boredom. The story itself is written in a cheerful, unconcerned style which manages to convey to the reader that the narrator has no insight whatsoever into what is happening to her mind, underscoring her mental disintegration.

It’s also quite clear that John is calling the shots, and is ignoring his wife’s protests that the enforced inactivity is making her worse, not better. But the narrator accepts that there is nothing she can do about this, because she’s only a woman and of course the men in her life know best…

What must it be like to be in a situation where, no matter how often you tell people that you have a problem, nobody will believe you, because they all think they know better than you? It’s for your own good…

[thefallingalice · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

John und seine Ehefrau mieten sich über den Sommer auf dem Land ein kleines Haus. John verordnet als Arzt seiner Frau Ruhe, denn sie hat eine stressige Zeit hinter sich. Doch in dem ihr zugewiesenen Zimmer findet sie diese zunächst nicht. Die Tapete macht ihrem Geist zu schaffen. Die Farbe ist nichts für Auge und das Muster sorgt für Verwirrung, denn es erschließt sich ihr nicht vollständig. Nur in der Nacht scheint es sich zu verändern und ein Geheimnis zu offenbaren.Charlotte Perkins Gilman verarbeitet in dieser Kurzgeschichte ihre eigenen Erfahrungen im Zusammenhang mit einer Nervenkrankheit. Die Frau in dieser Geschichte schreibt ihre Gedanken nieder, doch tut sie das heimlich, denn ihr Mann sieht es nicht gerne, wenn sie schreibt. Sie soll sich vollständig erholen. So erfährt der Leser nur auszugsweise aus der Gedankenwelt der Frau, die sich immer mehr in das Muster der Tapete steigert.Eine Geschichte über Wahnsinn, Einsamkeit und dem Unverständnis anderer Menschen. Sie kann mit niemandem darüber reden und so verstrickt sich ihre Welt immer mehr in den Wahnsinn.Eine großartige Geschichte. Man sollte sie genießen.

[lesliehurd · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The Yellow Wallpaper is a short story published in 1892. It is presented as a collection of journal entries written by a woman whose doctor husband has confined her to the upstairs bedroom of a house they’ve rented for the summer so she can recuperate from what he calls a “temporary nervous depression – a slight hysterical tendency,” a diagnosis common to women in that period.

This early piece of feminist literature reflects 19th century male attitudes toward women's physical and mental health. What she seems to have is post partum depression. Rather than help her recover, her confinement in the room with the peeling yellow wallpaper has a very bad effect indeed on her mental health.

I found myself outraged at the condescending attitude of her husband, as well as her acceptance of his decree. I also found the story of her mental decline deliciously creepy. The short story is definitely worth a read.

[laneliterati · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Excitingly creepy in every way.

[eclecticdodo · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A short story chronicling one woman's descent into madness, poorly understood by those around her, and tormented by the ghastly yellow wallpaper in her bedroom. Very well told. I only wish it were longer.

[bale_5 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The Yellow Wallpaper is a dark and powerfully written tale, first published in 1892, about a woman's descent into madness. Her psychosis is brought on by the social restrictions of the time, a controlling husband and the deteriorating yellow wallpaper that covers their bedroom.

[john257hopper · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is an interesting short story about the psychological disintegration of a woman, seeing images in the eponymous object around her as she lays in her sickbed. Too short to exert a really powerful impact, though, for me. 3.5/5

[flanneryac · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Originally published in 1899, the slight, 30-odd page story is one of the creepiest glimpses into the process of a mental breakdown I have ever read. Republished by The Feminist Press in 1973, the afterword of the edition I read spoke of the author’s prolific career as a writer, poet, publisher, and academic. She wrote several textbooks, opened her own school, and for several years of her life wrote, published, and edited her own magazine, which amounted to about 21,000 words per month. (Hedges, Afterword to the 1973 Feminist Press edition, 38.) In other words, Gilman was a total badass. However, the short story captures the prisoner-like aspects of the submissive role that many women lived at the time of publication, both in terms of marriage and societal expectations overall. The protagonist of the story is left in a room, with little to no social contact and no medical treatment. As the story progresses her mental condition worsens and those around her coddle her but do nothing proactive to alleviate her situation. It is scary, realistic, and her lack of choices and the guilt she is made to feel are heart-wrenching. Gilman's writing draws you right into the story and right down the slide of sanity in a way I will never forget. I absolutely recommend this work to anyone who enjoys short stories, people who like to read about mental illness, and anyone interested in 19th century feminism.

[anawkwardreader · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

On the surface, it's a creepy, intriguing story about a woman and the wallpaper in her room, but it goes so much deeper to address how women were treated by their husbands and by doctors at the time. It's partially autobiographical and appalling and groundbreaking, especially for 1892, yet not as unrecognizable as one would hope for being well over 100 years old, which added to the disturbance level of this story for me.

It's in the public domain and a really quick read, but I liked this edition for its introduction and afterword that set the historical context and gave a lot of information about Charlotte Perkins Gilman and her own experiences with the "rest cure." But the afterword does spoil "The Awakening" and "The House of Mirth," just FYI.

[frozenplums · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

One of my favorite short stories of all time! Beautifully haunting psychological thriller!

[rumpeltje · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Although this is a short story it is very powerful. You pick up on the slow deterioration of the main character, but like with the wallpaper it isn't that clear in the beginning.

What the attic room has been used for in the past is also up for discussion. I personally believe that although it might once have been used as nursery its previous function might be totally different.

[austinmeurer · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

“Yellow Wall-Paper” Review“ It is a dull yet lurid orange in some places, a sticky sulphur tint in others.” This quote, from the “Yellow Wall-Paper”, written by Charlotte Gilman in 1891, describes the wallpaper in Jane's room. John and Jane are a married couple and are renting an isolated country house. Jane is mentally ill, and she is locked up in her room for most of the day. John is a doctor and he thinks this is the best way for her to recover. While she sits in her room, she becomes insane. She is confused about the wallpaper, and eventually she gets the idea that a woman is trapped inside of the wallpaper. Jane’s condition is continually becoming worse. John denies it, and tells her she is improving. If you wish to learn more you should read this story. Charlotte Gilman was born on July 3, 1860 in Hartford, Connecticut. She died August 17, 1935 at the age of 75. When Charlotte was five years old, she taught herself to read because her mother was ill. Her father left her and her mom when she was young. “ For many years I suffered from a severe and continuous nervous breakdown tending to melancholia.” After writing the book, Charlotte said, “ It was not intended to drive people crazy, but to save people from being driven crazy, and it worked.” This quote from Charlotte explains why she wrote this short story. I liked reading this story, but it was very confusing. “ 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.” This is one quote that made this text so confusing. Overall, I enjoyed reading this piece. Many parts of this book were hard to understand, and that made me want to keep on reading to try to figure out what was happening. I was really confused when she talked about Jane because I didn’t know who she was talking about until the very end of the story. After reading the end of the book, and thinking about it for awhile, I then understood what the plot was all about. I would recommend this story to anybody who likes reading mystery books and books that are hard to follow. I also think any adults who like reading quick, short stories might enjoy this story. I would not recommend this book to people younger than high school students, because they may not be able to understand what is happening throughout the story.