Silas Weir Mitchell

The Woman in the Walls The physician John’s wife in “The Yellow Wallpaper” is a very intriguing character. Her postpartum depression and the way that she loses her mind slowly, then all at once catches the attention of a reader and makes them question many things throughout the story. As the woman starts losing her ties to the outer world, she begins to question the reality of her own life. She starts getting comfortable in her life in the room, she starts seeing things in the wallpaper, and…

At times when individuals become wrecked by reality, they tend to cast astray from realism and begin to survive within the depths of delusions and illusions. And so because of their choices to elude from the harsh reality, they lose themselves among waves of self-oppression and in the course of time suffer from differentiating what is reality and deception. An individual who fled from her cruel past and the reality that substantially made her the epitome of psychological hysteria is Blanche…

The first stanza of “Hanging Fire” by Audre Lorde focuses on the physical characteristics of the speaker. A nameless teenager who is stuck in this prolonged delay before adulthood. She is in a conflict with both her love interest and mother and is engaging in self-deprecation regarding her appearance. “My skin has betrayed me” prefaces the main use of visual imagery in the first stanza which is “how come my knees are so ashy”. On first glance it would appear that this is just a self-inflicted…

The most interesting panel on page 134 of Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home is the 3rd panel, which consumes more than half the page in its depiction of Bechdel’s childhood gothic revival home. There are several images that are overlaid, which may be described as internal panels. They magnify the individual studies of the family inside, and their solitude is amplified by their silhouetted forms. Despite the fact that the entire family lives under one roof, Bechdel seems to imply that they are only able…

In Charlotte Perkin Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper,” Gilman expresses the struggle of Jane’s personal freedom. Jane has postpartum depression, an illness which restricts a mother from seeing their newborn baby until defeating the depression. In order for Jane to make progress, she needs some type of freedom. The illness, her husband, and the awful yellow wallpaper have completely taken control of her life and her freedom has been snatched away as well. As the story progresses, the wallpaper has…

Leaving a person with depression in a lonely house, with very few people is deleterious for the person. Depression can cause a person to breakdown to a point where the individual starts doubting about her health and her thoughts as well as the other people’s thoughts. To prevent a breakdown from occurring, people around them need to be very cautious and give the affected one freedom. This caution is not taken within the short story “The Yellow Wallpaper”. As a consequence the affected character…

Underneath the Yellow Wallpaper: How A yellow light encourages a pause – not a full blown stop, as red lights demand – but a short period of consideration. Within this moment, one determined whether they want to proceed or to stop. Similarly, Charlotte Gilman uses her short-story “The Yellow Wallpaper” as an example for her readers to judge whether they should proceed in confining women or if they should cease harboring the misconception that women as weak and incapable. Gilman purposefully…

In the story “The Yellow Wallpaper” I chose John as the antagonist in the story, because John is the one that seems to be the main antagonist in the story. John treats her like a child half of the time in the story when he’s around and not out for work, but he also has a different opinion from what Charlotte has about the “yellow wallpaper”. In the story, John makes decisions for Charlotte; so she never makes her own decisions, she’s too crazy to understand how to make her own decisions or…

Another instance where John proves to be insensitive to his wife would be when she builds up the courage to speak to him about her fears and leaving their “vacation home”. John answers her by saying “What is it, little girl?”(Gilman 93) this is not how the modern husband would respond to his wife considering they would be about the same age. In continuation, the narrator says “John laughs at me, of course, but one expects that in marriage” (Gilman 85). In the average marriage a husband would not…

For this assignment I have chosen 2 artworks. The first artwork below is Christina’s World by Wyeth. In this painting the main subject is on the ground looking towards a barn and house that appear to be on a farmland in a field. The subject is in a lavender pink dress that is slightly faded. This is a major contrast to the farmland and buildings as these are various shades of grey-brown which is a complementary colour to the faded celeste blue. Concepts (Home, Loss or Longing) Concept 1 Home -…