The Gothic novel is a type of fiction which was inaugurated by Horace Walpole's The Castle of Otranto: A Gothic Story (1764). Following Walpole's example, authors of such novles set their stories in the medieval period, often in a spooky castle furnished with dungeons, underground tunnels,and evoke horror via mystery and a variety of terror.
Later the term "gothic" has been extended to a type of fiction which does not set in the medieval period but is saturated with a gloomy and terrified atmosphere. The extended sense of the term "Gothic" can be applied to Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights, her sister Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre and so forth. Charlotte Perkins Gilman's macabre fantasy--"The Yellow Wallpaper"--also exploits the nightmarish feel, violence, and uncanny terror frequently found in Gothic writings.
Some feminist critics use the term "female Gothic" to discuss some particular stories in which the heroine expresses what otherwise cannot be spoken under the law of patriarchy. The genre of the "female Gothic" allows women writers otherwise subject to the narrative restrictions of gentility to find outlets for their repressed sides or the unconscious.
Therefore, in the story "The Yellow Wallpaper," can you find any "Gothic" elements? What are they (the setting, the room, the narrator, the psychological status of the heroine)? Why does Gilman use this "Gothic" genre to express her dark protests, fantasies, and fear?
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Basically, I would say both the setting and psychological status of the heroine contain "Gothic" elements in the story.
We all know that the setting is in an ancient mansion which is probably like 17’s or 18’s. Inside the mansion is dim, moist, creepy, and spacious. Such a place is a perfect scene that are favored by “Gothic” novel. The yellow wallpaper in the room which the narrator lives drives her insane in some way. Madness, which refers her emotion at the end of the story, is also a kind of Gothic elements.
Suffering from postpartum depression, most women who just bore babies could tend to act in a weird and twisted way. Gilman herself, certainly, would not be counted in exception. I suppose that since her mind was all twisted at the time, she wanted to express her feeling to readers so readers would understand how she felt as being a mother who suffered postpartum depression. My point of view is, in order to make her expression definite distinct to readers, Gilman chose the Gothic style to exaggerate her writing.
There are many things indicate that this it's not a typical novel which usually be written. The author uses the room with yellow wallpaper to be its main setting is really beating reader's mind, that color's mystery isn't like purple or black but has kind of evil. I think it really bravo to use this kind of stuff. And also, the description of narrator's changing attitude is really unusual, and it let the whole story conduct in a weird and queer atmosphere.
I think that Gilman uses this kind of way to express herself that she was dept in postpartum psychosis. In the story, the narrator tear the wallpaper to release the women in the wall, I think it expresses the author want to escape from the male-hegemony society. The invisible torturing is hard to imagine in 21th world, so it might be the reason why Gilman wrote this story to yell for her dissatisfaction of her own life.
The narrator told us that she thought there was something queer at the very first time. The house was untenanted and so cheap! She was put in a room which used to be a baby’s room and with a locked bed. She couldn’t write because her husband and the sister in law spied on her all the time. But what bothered her most was the yellow wallpaper in the room which its color really made her uncomfortable! The wallpaper was just disgusting at first but later it became a fence and trapped a woman inside! The above-mentioned things are gothic elements. The author had to use this kind of creepy things to make us feel what her feel. She was lonely and in a hostile environment. She couldn’t write or do anything. She couldn’t make any decisions, either. So she did what she only could do in the end of the story-went crazy.
In the beginning, the "setting", a "colonial mansion" which is a "hereditary estate" is taken as a "haunted house" by the narrator. From the narrator's point of view, the nursery, and the yellow wallpaper in particular, become a prison which reflects her inner thought and tortures her mind. And it is in this room that the narrator with slight postpartum depression is obsessed with the yellow wallpaper, and it is here that she'll go madness in the end.
In addition, we also can find gothic elements in psychological status of the heroine. At first, the yellow wallpaper represents her view of herself: sinful and ugly, for she bogs down on the ridiculous contradictions in her role as a wife and a mother. And she tries hard to carter for her husband’s sake. Nonetheless, with time passing, the narrator connects herself with the woman, who the narrator imagines creeping and being trapping behind the yellow wallpaper.
From my perspective, Gilman used this genre to express her dark protests, fantasies, and fear in order to combat against the constraint on women from contemporary male-hegemony society and drain off the suffering which is taken as a good thing by men.
Gothic novel is always full of mystery and terror. We can find many Gothic elements in this story. Their house is haunted and the room is strange. It is said that the heroine thinks the pattern of the wallpaper likes a broken neck and two bulbous eyes. That is a amazing Gothic element in this story that I think.
In my opinion, the author uses this Gothic genre to express her upset and furious emotion for her marriage. We all knew that this story is Gilman’s story. She has a tragic marriage and she express such a terrible thing is losing her baby. She becomes resentful to this world or to her husband. That is the reason which I think the author such a weird and terrible words to write this story.
Though the time of the setting was not in the medieval time, the author tried to create an atmosphere of horror and trepidation by using the colonial mansion, a great immovable bed, and the strange patterns on the wallpaper to convince us that something creepy was about to occur. First, the author set the scene on ancestral halls, a hereditary estate, which might give us images of desolation and dreariness. Second, the great “immovable” bed was very absurd that this kind of beds only appeared in mad houses. However, a woman who just gave birth to a baby was persuaded to live in. Finally, the patterns which implicitly stood for the psychological status of the heroine were amazingly complicated and sprawling flamboyant with revolting smouldering unclear yellow. The author intended to build up a mysterious feeling by performing the patterns in a very eccentric and extraordinary way to appeal readers.
I think it’s clear that the author thought the social pressure and assumption imposed on women at her time were very ridiculous and trite. She believed that these rules and notions belonged to the people who lived a long time ago. Anyone who kept staying in this prejudice, the medieval castle, would one day dig their own grave because they were not improving their civilization. Moreover, the living type in the medieval age was a manor where the residents lived were very limited and regular. That made them fear for changes. However, there were plenty of stories regarding heroes being made up at that time. Perhaps, the author held a weak hope for being just like the hero to evoke people’s awareness to overthrow this twisted value and save women from tortures of the gender prejudice.
In the story, Gilman use “ancestral”, “hereditary” and “haunted” to describe the house. I think these words are the “Gothic” elements. Gilman also set an immovable bed in the room to strong the “Gothic” atmosphere. In Gilman’s unhappy marriage, she often thought that maybe marriage is not suit to her or maybe stuck her. To release the bad emotion of her wrong marriage, she used the “Gothic” genre to show her fear of what she had met.
There are a lot of elements in this story"the yellow wallpaper." For example, a colonial mansion, a hereditary estate, the cellar, florid arabesque are the elements in this gothic story.
Gilman used this genre to express what she suffered from the partriarchy and her marriage. I thing the gothic atmosphere just like her life, because of the constraint, inhibit, depress. As a result, her life became really dark and gloomy.
The Gothic tale portrayed a gloomy and mystery atmosphere for people. In this story, the colonial mansion and the yellow wall paper form important elements. The colonial mansion is old and long untenanted just like the medieval castle which give people ghostliness feel. The formal yellow wall paper is not a threat to the narrator but in this story the flamboyant pattern and the strange smouldering unclean yellow really made narrator go crazy.
I think Gilman has been under repressed long time on postpartrum melancholia and her personality began to change. In the end of the story the woman begin to creep is also a reflection to Gilman. She doesn’t want other people think that she is sick or has some strange idea in her mind. She wants to escape from the reality and be herself.
Gothic elements are the basic of the story, and I find some examples. First, the narrator said that “a haunted house, and reach the height of romantic felicity.” If the house is really romantic felicity, I wonder why it is a haunted house. In my point of view, I think it is very weird and gloomy in the setting. Also, the narrator is a classical person of Gothic. She usually soliloquizes in the story, such as “There was some legal trouble, I believe…” and “I don’t like our room a bit…” It seems that the narrator murmurs something, but I believe it is a way for her to share her feelings.
The reason why the author used the “Gothic” way to express her thoughts is that she had too many terrors. After a woman gives a birth to a baby, she must be very tired. She also needs to take care of two new people, one is her husband, and the other is her newborn baby, who comes into her life suddenly. She terrified a brand new life and wanted to accuse of the patriarchy. The terrors in her mind are so huge, so she used mystery, spooky, terrified, and creepy writing skills to describe. These skills also make the whole story in a haunted, mysterious, and odd atmosphere, causing readers to wonder what happened and keep going reading.
The narrator described the house with a spooky atmosphere. Looked haunted, have bars in the room, and wallpaper with the color of dirty yellow. I think Gilman use this “Gothic” genre to give readers a mysterious feeling and will want to read more. It becomes more interesting when using “Gothic” genre. People will think “what`s next?” during the story. In my opinion, the writer usually will use unnatural and weird things to portray dark feelings well.
One of the conventions of Female Gothic literature is a fear that is indescribable and unimaginable. It depends as much on longing and desire as on fear and antagonism.
The Yellow Wallpaper, an example of the Female Gothic form, offers a stunning examination of the abject through a young woman’s transformation from writer to wife to mother to invalid to lunatic, a process that is partially inferred by the reader. The trauma of birth and the resulting postpartum depression, coupled with the infantilisation and the intellectual stifling of the narrator by her husband make this woman an instance of the abject to herself. These in turn cause her descent into insanity, where the boundaries disintegrate between her self and her delusion, between sanity and insanity, and she is brought to a frightening state of
indistinction. The abjection of the narrator functions within ‘The Yellow Wallpaper’ to demonstrate the abjection of women at the time, and the process by which their intellectual selves were separated from their physical selves in a horrifying creation of alterity within their own minds.
The reason to use the Gothic style, I think it can express the strong emotions and the pain from the marriage. It makes the reader having a profound impression from this suffering.
There are many elements and settings of "gothic" in the short story, like the yellow wallpaer, the bar added on the window, the husband's authority and the imprisoned main character.
The character has no name is one important gothic setting, which shows the character has no "ego" in such paternalism world.
Also,The main female character's brother (also a physician) and sister-in-law (a close family member), further add to the harm by ignoring her feelings.
I think the main reason why the author wants to use the gothic genre is because of an intention to emphazise how horrable the paternalism is.
sorry, uther1688 = Cleon Liu
冏RZ
A lot of horror incidents in this story, for instance, the house; Gilman used plenty of horror words to described the house was very cheerless, like a haunted house. Second was the yellow wallpaper, it is very hard to believe that a women was skulking in the yellow wallpaper. Gilman is good in imagination, she tried to use the horror words to attract the reader. Reader are like to read fully imagination story, Gilman did it. Actually this story is talking about the classical patriarchy, and the women have no decision in the era.
In this story, we can find some elements about "Gothic."
Colonial mansion, florid arabesque, yellow wallpaper and so on, which deeply stand for Gothic genre.
This story describes that a woman is oppressed cruelly in a paternal society and loses herself gradually.
Gothic genre is always with horror and terror. So, I think the author would use Gothic genre is because she wants to show how horrible it is.
I think the whole story does involve with lots of "gothic" elements, such as the beginning. Starting from unnamed married woman reflects how the relationship between her and the yellow wallpaper is formed and how they are mixed together in the end. It’s really a “brainstorming” work for me, because the narrator’s voice always with some fancy and imagination. It will be hard to define which part is reliable and which part is incredible. Maybe the narrator has already lost her mind, but we don’t know about it.
Such a “gothic” element provides me an unrealistic image that there are so many thing is not really like the appearance they like. For example, her husband, John, he rented the colonial mansion that looks like a “haunted house” without asking her for her opinion. He thinks the house will do her good, but she does not feel the same way. John neglects her feelings. He seldom caters to her pleasure to make her happier, but just takes his own convenience into consideration, even though he declares that he rented the house for her sake. Just like the “gothic” building, John builds a beautiful castle like that, and misunderstands that it will really reach to “heaven”,
Colonial old mansion hereditary building;strange arabesque pattern;ugly yellow;locked bed;the cellar;lose ego so forth are the elements of gothic.These strange phenmenons let the story become very creep and strange.
Why does the writer want to use this writing skill?In the real life,the author is also suffer from the postpartum melancholia.So she wants to use these terrible words to show her dark side and upset.Gothic words full of everywhere,it's writer's mind portrayal.
Gothic is used to describe a writing style in 18th and 19th centuries. It has mysterious and frightening surroundings. In “The Yellow Wallpaper”, Charlotte Porkins Gilman used some “Gothic” elements to build a dreadful atmosphere. We can find some words such as colonial mansion, hereditary estate and so on in the fiction. The mansion was untenanted and colonized. Moreover, as we know, the colonial culture happened in the medieval times, which could be related to Gothic elements. Besides, the yellow wallpaper was an important element. It was represented as a disgusting, nauseous, and loathsome thing. It made the woman crazy. So the author did make readers terrified. On the other question, in my opinion, the crazy woman is a reflection of the author, Charlotte Porkins Gilman. She suffered from postpartum depression and felt melancholic. Therefore, she wanted to express the desperation of life through this fiction and relieve real herself behind the yellow wallpaper. In the story, the woman seemed to be bullied by her husband; thus, she also would like to fight against paternalism at her times and that’s is why this topic is called “Female Gothic—‘The Yellow Wallpaper’.”
patriarchy is a gothic element.this can be found in the setting of the house.the arrangement of the house is so creepy and scary.the main character is locked into an ugly room, with the bed nailed dead, windows barred, and her control of life completely stripped away.this also shows the terrifying feeling of gothic stlye.this story is a little funny and scary.so i think this story is successful.
The Gothic stories usually give readers feelings of mystery and creeps. In this story, the colonial mansion and the yellow wallpaper are the gothic elements.
In the story,John symbolizes a classical partriarchy,and the narrator's brother and sister in law symbolize the assistants of the partriarchy. The narrator doesn't have a name,she's being called "darling" and "honey",which means that the narrator loses her ego.I think the author wanted to express her feelings of fear by using the gothic elements.
In the begining of the story the narrator(John's wife)thinks that the house is so cheap because this colonial mansion is a haunted house or maybe something queer about it.And she doesn't like the room with the unclean yellow wallpaper either.
In the story her husband thinks that she is sick and should not go to work.But she can not write or talk to her friends,families or someone she is familiar with,either.The people she can visit is John's families, John's freinds,someone knows John well not the wife.It is hard for me to imagine the situation about the wife.
In my opinion,Gilman use this "Gothic" genre because she wants to express the room with the yellow wallpaper is a prison for the heroine.Her husband trapped her in the room,doesn't let her connect with other people.And he never listen to his wife's need.So that's why she tears the wallpaper that her husband can not control her or ignore her free will any more.And return her freedom back.
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