In this report, two stories will be compared. These two stories are the Story of an hour by Kate Chopin and The Yellow wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. In both of these stories, men are the dominant character and do not give much power or control whatsoever to the women. Both of these stories were written by women in a time period where these types of writing were entirely unheard of. The Story of an Hour is a short story about a woman named Mrs. Mallard who is unhappily married and is locked in a marriage with a man to whom she does not truly love. One day, Mrs. Mallard (who is known to have severe heart problems) is informed by her sister Josephine that her husband has been in a terrible car accident with a train and is now diseased.
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The woman has recently given birth and is slightly depressed, causing the husband/doctor, John, to place her in a room entirely unaccompanied. She is given orders by her husband to do nothing but sleep until she feels better. She is commanded not to write anything or exit her confinement. Doing as her husband asked occurred in the opposite effect that her husband desired. She began slowing into a deep insanity. Due to her inability to do anything but sleep, she soon became obsessed with the yellow wallpaper that layered the walls. Soon enough she began believing that a woman was trapped in this wallpaper causing her to attempt to “free” this woman that she has imagined. She says, “The front pattern does move - and no wonder! The woman behind shakes it! Sometimes I think there are a great many women behind, and sometimes only one, and she crawls around fast, and her crawling shakes it all over” (Stetson page 8). There is actually a moment in which she begins believing that she herself came out of the wallpaper! She started ripping the wallpaper off of the walls and slowly creeping around the room rubbing up against the wallpaper. Later, her husband comes in to check in on her but the door is locked. She tells him where the key is, so he goes and retrieves it. He opens the door to see his wife “creeping” along the walls. By this time, she has torn off all of the yellow wallpaper. He passes out right in
The woman has recently given birth and is slightly depressed, causing the husband/doctor, John, to place her in a room entirely unaccompanied. She is given orders by her husband to do nothing but sleep until she feels better. She is commanded not to write anything or exit her confinement. Doing as her husband asked occurred in the opposite effect that her husband desired. She began slowing into a deep insanity. Due to her inability to do anything but sleep, she soon became obsessed with the yellow wallpaper that layered the walls. Soon enough she began believing that a woman was trapped in this wallpaper causing her to attempt to “free” this woman that she has imagined. She says, “The front pattern does move - and no wonder! The woman behind shakes it! Sometimes I think there are a great many women behind, and sometimes only one, and she crawls around fast, and her crawling shakes it all over” (Stetson page 8). There is actually a moment in which she begins believing that she herself came out of the wallpaper! She started ripping the wallpaper off of the walls and slowly creeping around the room rubbing up against the wallpaper. Later, her husband comes in to check in on her but the door is locked. She tells him where the key is, so he goes and retrieves it. He opens the door to see his wife “creeping” along the walls. By this time, she has torn off all of the yellow wallpaper. He passes out right in