The Yellow Wallpaper

By Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Edited with a new introduction by Aimee McLaughlin
"The Yellow Wallpaper" by American writer Charlotte Perkins Gilman, first published in January 1892, is regarded as an important early work of American feminist literature for its illustration of the attitudes towards mental and physical health of women in the 19th century.
What happens when a woman is pushed too far? Is she able to express her thoughts and feelings, or is she forced towards the expectation of behaving 'normally' again soon?
A woman travels with her husband to an old colonial mansion after a nervous breakdown triggered by the birth of their child. Confined to the nursery and allowed only to breathe fresh air, eat well and rest in line with a regimented 'cure', she slowly begins to unravel at the seams. Her only distraction is writing in secret – that, and the woman she begins to see trapped inside the yellow wallpaper of the room itself.
Isolated and breaking apart, she sets herself a task: to free the woman, and to become one with her temporary confinement.
Charlotte Perkins-Gilman's 'The Yellow Wallpaper' presents a harrowing, disturbing account of mental stress, confinement and female turmoil - within which the only available solace can be found inside four peeling, sickly yellow walls ...
Our new edition also features the sequence of poems "Woman" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman.
"The gothic genre offers Gilman an effective mode of diagnosing contemporary culture whilst in tandem expressing her ensuing fears and anxieties. Gilman within this novella, gothicises the domestic setting, inverting the pillars of domesticity: family, security and understanding, in turn unveiling the dangers lurking behind the familiarity of gender roles within marital relations. The intimate first-person narration of the narrative serves to enhance Gilman's exposure of the oppressive forces of a male-dominated society, as she deplores her protagonist's inferior position in her domestic arrangement. The female narrator is encumbered by masculine superiority, undoubtedly dwelling in the middle of patriarchy. Embedded within her characterisation is the subjugated role bestowed upon Victorian women. Gilman projects derangement onto a familiar literary figure ― the middle−class wife and mother ― placing the source of this madness in the inviolate sphere for dutiful women ― the home."
from the new introduction to The Yellow Wallpaper by Aimee McLaughlin

• Language: English
• Publisher: Gothic World Literature Editions
• Release date: Mar 6, 2023
• ISBN: 9781914090356

Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935) was an American author, feminist, and social reformer. Born in Hartford, Connecticut, Gilman was raised by her mother after her father abandoned his family to poverty. A single mother, Mary Perkins struggled to provide for her son and daughter, frequently enlisting the help of her estranged husband’s aunts, including Harriet Beecher Stowe, the author of Uncle Tom’s Cabin. These early experiences shaped Charlotte’s outlook on gender and society, inspiring numerous written works and a lifetime of activism. Gilman excelled in school as a youth and went on to study at the Rhode Island School of Design where, in 1879, she met a woman named Martha Luther. The two were involved romantically for the next few years until Luther married in 1881. Distraught, Gilman eventually married Charles Walter Stetson, a painter, in 1884, with whom she had one daughter. After Katharine’s birth, Gilman suffered an intense case of post-partum depression, an experience which inspired her landmark story “The Yellow Wallpaper” (1890). Gilman and Stetson divorced in 1894, after which Charlotte moved to California and became active in social reform. Gilman was a pioneer of the American feminist movement and an early advocate for women’s suffrage, divorce, and euthanasia. Her radical beliefs and controversial views on race—Gilman was known to support white supremacist ideologies—nearly consigned her work to history; at the time of her death none of her works remained in print. In the 1970s, however, the rise of second-wave feminism and its influence on literary scholarship revived her reputation, bringing her work back into publication.

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Reviews for The Yellow Wallpaper

[jldarden · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This had a creepy build up to a great ending. The insight into a failing mind projecting on to the people around her and her surroundings was captivating. Recommended

[ionas_7 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I hadn’t any previous experience of this author. When reading the story I felt that it was the most horrifying piece of writing I had ever read, though when looking through it I didn’t feel that it was so bad. Reputedly, the story was based on the author’s own experience of her psychosis We’re not given the name of the woman recounting her experience, and I will call her the protagonist, or the P. Two of the first things that meet the eye are the protagonist’s negative comments about marriage, that the P’s husband John laughs at her (which is to be expected in marriage) and also negative comments about doctors. The P remarks that one reason she is not getting well faster may be because her husband is a physician. He does not believe she is “sick””, and what can one do? Both her husband and brother are doctors “of high standing” and both think there is nothing the matter with her except “a temporary nervous depression” or “slight hysterical tendency”. Perhaps at some level, then, the P feels obliged to prove them both wrong, that there really is something wrong with her; thus the need and “satisfaction” at some level to develop a full-blown psychosis. She is forbidden to work or write; but she is a woman with her own opinions and she herself feels that congenial work would do her good. She feels that if she had less “opposition” and “more society and stimulus”, she would feel better. We’re warned from the start that strange things are about to happen; she feels there is something queer, something strange, about the house. And otherwise, how had they been able to rent it so cheaply, and why would it have “"stood so long untenanted”? John is “very careful and loving” but he does not listen to his wife’s objections to the room he has chosen for them to sleep in. John is absolutely controlling; he chooses the house and the bedroom they’ve to sleep in and dictates what the P is permitted to do. When the P tells her left-brained husband what she feels about the house, he has so little understanding of what she’s talking about that he claims what she felt was a draught! She would have preferred to use as a bedroom a downstairs room with roses all over the window, but John wouldn’t hear of it. John has a “schedule prescription” for each hour in the day – the utnost control. Is this a general criticism of the control of all, or most, husbands of the times? At least the P is permitted to eat that which her appetite dictates, at any rate, “somewhat”. The room John chose for the bedroom was the former nursery that had bars on the windows. This is metaphoric for the P’s feeling of imprisonment when confined to the room. She had never seen worse wall-paper in her life. The colour of the wall-paper is a “smoldering unclean yellow”. John hates her to have to write a word. The P tells us that she is suffering, whereas logical John says there is no reason to suffer. (This is his subjective opinion.) She says her baby is “so dear” but she cannot be with him since it makes her so nervous. She supposes John was never nervous in his life. I will not cite any more details but will talk in a general manner. The author discloses in a gradual and subtle manner the start of the psychosis. First, she becomes convinced there is a woman or several women behind bars in the wall-paper, trying to get out. Later, she fails to distinguish between herself and the woman/women. She begins to display a slight paranoia, in that she gets a little afraid of John and Jennie (John’s sister), and feels they both give her strange looks. She projects her own problems onto John, and she thinks that he is getting queer now. She doesn’t like the look in John’s eyes and feels he is only pretending to be loving and kind. Now she. sees many creeping women outside, creeping so fast. Finally, she talks about she herself having to get back behind the pattern. She thinks she is the woman or one of the women behind the pattern. Eventually, John comes in the room and sees her creeping on the floor, realizes something is very wrong and faints. To sum up, I felt this to be an excellent and superbly written story and may read some of the author’s other stories.

[bookslesstravelled · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Another story about he slow process of loosing one's mind, it had a major twist and it took me a while to understand what really happened, but a great read.

[villemezbrown · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I originally read this story in 1994, and I welcomed the chance to revisit it with Sara Barkat's 2020 graphic novel that uses GIlman's full and complete text.Such a creepy bit of psychological horror. It reminded me of the Lovecraftian works I've read recently, and it got me to wondering how much Gilman might have influenced Lovecraft. Sure enough, his mother knew her while she was a governess in Providence and Lovecraft is on record mentioning the story on several occasions.Barkat's art is not as polished as I prefer, but it certainly adds a wonderful new dimension to Gilman's most unsettling prose.

[gypsysmom_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Interesting piece of short fiction about a woman living in a rented house. She seems to be suffering from depression, perhaps even post-partum depression because there is mention of a baby. Her physician husband alternately coddles her and dismisses her complaints. At his insistance they made their bedroom the old nursery at the top of the house which is papered with a hideous yellow paper. The paper has been torn off in spots. The narrator thinks the room must have been used by young boys but it becomes clear that someone else was confined here before the narrator came. As the days go by she becomes fixated on the design in the wallpaper. She believes there is a woman behind bars who tries to get out, especially at night. Is this a hallucination or is she projecting her own self on the design? And is her husband imprisoning her or is she imprisoning herself? There are no answers just more questions.

[jim53_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The Yellow Wallpaper is a brilliant late nineteenth century novella/short story by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. The story is told in the first person by a woman who is apparently suffering from post-partum depression; her husband, a doctor, has rented an estate for the season and prescribed a rest cure for her "nervous illness." He dictates every detail of her existence, from choosing the room where they will sleep to forbidding her to exert herself by writing. She describes the hideous yellow wallpaper in the room, developing a fixation with it. She comes to see a woman behind the wallpaper, struggling to escape it.The story is a perceptive portrayal of the gender roles of the time, the husband's dominance and certainty of his correctness, the wrongness of the treatment, and the narrator's gradual descent into madness. Coming several years earlier than The Awakening, Gilman's story treats similar themes of the limits that societal expectations place on women. The story is formally an easy read but emotionally challenging. 4.5 stars.

[crazymamie · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This was a reread for me. I listened to this one in 2018. The audiobook was narrated by Jo Myddleton, and I gave it the full five stars. For such a short story it packs a punch, and it is one that has stayed with me. Last year, when I saw that they had made a GN version of it, I ordered it right away. I was really impressed with how well the illustrations captured the growing tension and the main character's descent into madness. This horror classic is considered feminist literature, too, because it does a beautiful job of depicting how few choices the main character has just because she is a woman. I just can't recommend the story itself highly enough, regardless of what format you prefer. I loved that the GN is unabridged - all of the text from the original story is there beautifully brought to life by the illustrations of Sara Barkat.

[merlucito · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I listened to the audiobook and when I finished, I ran to read the ebook as well. This story is creepy and fascinating, its incredible how in just a few pages you can be invested in this woman mind, her life, her obsession.

A great story and definitely something to re-read multiple time to analyze in deep.

[quondame · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

True horror is what people do to each other, meaning well or not, or what they do to themselves. But the wallpaper does sound gruesome.

[basilsbooks · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I have been meaning to read this for such a long time and I finally did and it leaves me wishing I could read it again for the first time again, I really enjoyed this one

[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.

[m.belljackson · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

With still so many unresolved questions, The Yellow Wallpaper keeps its power.Was the doctor husband totally without bad intentions?If no, why did he not respond to his wife's simple request NOT to stay in the upstairs nursery with the awful peeling wallpaper?Did her writing actually cause her to become more upset? or was this a thing he just wanted to control?If she could make it outside for daily walks, why does she keep insisting that her husband would not allow her to DO anything?She could have gardened! fed birds! found a pet! followed the wildlife! dug a pond!So this descent into madness felt more like the choices of an unstable mind rather than an intent by her husband and his sister to drive her insane.

[sprainedbrain · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Such a disturbing short story... chronicling a woman’s descent into madness while being forced to convalesce for her ‘nervousness’ by her all-knowing physician husband. So creepy and dark, but gorgeous prose. Her use of the word ‘creep’ towards the end gives me the heebie-jeebies.‘It is so pleasant to be out in this great room and creep around as I please!’ ?

[lynnb_64 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Heralded as an example of early feminist literature, this novella tells the story of a young mother whose husband (a doctor) prescribes bed rest for her "nervous condition". He isolates her from friends and family, in a room with ugly yellow wallpaper. And because he is a man, and a doctor and her husband, he knows best. And she, alone and unhappy, goes crazy. This is a powerful commentary of women's lack of power in a man's world.

[trayceetee · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I had picked this book up on a whim, largely due to how slim it was, but also because the little synopsis on the back of the book sounded interesting. Before I could start it, someone posted something on Facebook about how they'd read this book ages ago, and it had always stayed with them. I thought, "Huh. And I've never even heard of it...."
I read it in one sitting, less than an hour's time. For me, that's VERY fast. I can see, now, why they said it always stayed with them. I don't know that I would have appreciated it if I'd read this when I was in my teens or twenties, or even in my thirties.... but at this exact point in my life, it DEFINITELY spoke to me!!!
Another one I'll re-read again and again!!!

[deltaqueen50 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I really enjoyed the deliciously creepy novella The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. The author hit all the right notes and left the reader wondering if they had just read about a woman’s decent into madness or this was a story about spirit possession. This story was first published in 1892 and I would say it has definitely stood the test of time.Told entirely from the woman’s perspective, we learn that she, her husband, physician John, his sister and their baby are spending the summer in a remote colonial mansion. Her husband has diagnosed a need for a “rest cure” for her nervous depression. The negative aspects and limited understanding about this women’s psychological condition are soon apparent as she spends her time in isolation. She is confined to one room of the house, an old nursery and with nothing to fill her time with, she soon turns her attention to the room’s wallpaper, and in particular it’s intricate patterns.For such a short story there is a lot for the reader to think about including a woman’s role and rights in Victorian society and mental health issues. I loved how the author gave this story a haunting quality and left the conclusion up to the reader to determine. The Yellow Wallpaper had just the right amount of “unexpected” and I highly recommend this story.

[musecure · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Wow! How is it I've never run across this before? Gilman's writing and characterization is superb. This is definitely one to go back to again and again.

[arkrayder · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This was an okay short story about a woman’s decent into psychosis. It’s written in the form of a diary entry but there are no dates or times. Just a long stream of consciousness. Quick read.

[wendyfairy · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This edition has a version "translated" into modern English, as well as the original in an appendix. There are also two scholarly essays, and some additional statements from the author about the women's right to vote and why she wrote The Yellow Wallpaper.

[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.

[deborahj2016 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Amazing, painful, frightening. TV Tropes even refers to this short story from 1892... (especially in the "Room Full of Crazy" trope...)

[lydia1879 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

... how do I even review something like this.

First of all, it's a masterpiece.

Secondly, it chilled me to my core.

Charlotte Perkins-Gilman wrote a feminist psychological thriller and horror story. Perhaps one of the first. And one of the greatest.

The thing that I admire about this story is that it was able to terrify me on two levels. It has layers of social implications and it's very complex.

I'll have to read it again some day, when it doesn't terrify me so much.

I don't think I can say with any conviction, how much this book affected me, but it'll stay with me for the rest of my life.

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

It starts so simply...a couple is on vacation. She is ill and taking a rest in the country. But is that true? She is scared, and trapped, and not allowed to leave. Her fear is palpable. Or, maybe, she is an extremely unreliable narrator?

[thebookjunky · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I doubt I will ever read again such powerful descriptions of wallpaper. What vivid writing!