Mental Illness In The Yellow Wallpaper By Charles Stetson

In the Victorian Era many believed that people with mental illnesses were “ tainted by the devil” (2012 December 3-1). When people were suffering from mental illness they were treated very poorly and weren’t put in well sanitary places (2). A lot lived in cages, and were mostly fed spoiled food(3). Patients weren’t treated well by any means. They were basically treated like “animals” by the people who were suppose to be caring for them. It wasn’t till later around 1850, that people started to understand, that mental illness was a disease of the brain (5). “They realized that the mentally ill could be cured of their disease”(7). This eventually led to more effective treatments for mental illness. People 's views on mental illness changed greatly. …show more content…
She married an artist named Charles Stetson in 1884 and they later had a daughter (2). While she was married to Stetson she experienced a period of depression and went through a series of treatments. Which is what is said to have influenced her famous short story “The Yellow Wallpaper”. Along with being a well know writer, she also was a “successful lecturer and intellectual. She established the magazine “The Forerunner”. It allowed her to voice her opinions on ideas on different women’s issues. Later, in 1935 the great nonfiction writer, Charlotte Perkins Gilman took her own life …show more content…
The first approach points out the causes of mental illness. Whereas her second approach symbolizes the biological view of her illness. In the short story they say that the narrator was just experiencing female problems but Gilman knew that wasn’t the cause of such changes. Gilman suffered from her depression and just like the narrator she needed an outlet to relate to her experiences. For her it was a way to speak what was on her mind. For Charlotte writing was her salvation, but in the short story it was the narrator’s cause for madness. Even though the narrator did write in private, she was only able to record her time she spent in the nursery which turned bedroom into fear of being caught. The room that she was in wasn’t well suited for someone healing. The ripped wallpaper, bolted down door, and the bars that were on the windows didn’t seem very comforting. The narrator would express her thoughts on having different things in the house “but John would not hear of it”. In the story the narrator was treated as a child and craved to please her husband. He was a doctor and she wanted to please him in order to get well. “The narrator starts to realize her lack of credibility and blantly points her finger at her husband, blaming him for her nonexistent recovery stating that perhaps that is one reason I do not get well faster”. She believes that the doctors aren’t able to treat her because they aren’t