The Yellow Wallpaper

The Yellow Wallpaper has a great mixture of literary elements to make the reader feel the narrator's insanity. Although many have viewed this story as just a great gothic tale; there are many social issues in The Yellow Wallpaper that are still prominent in today's current world. The issue of self-expression inhibits the narrator's life and is one of the causes for her insanity. In The Yellow Wallpaper there are many passages that exhibit the importance of self-expression. However the passage on pg 6 from her husband shows the theme of importance of self-expression. John, her husband and physician, is one of the primary people who inhibit her self-expression. The narrator deals with problems of severe anxiety; where today's remedies would be medication and most importantly counseling. Unlike today's prescriptions of cure, John feels that rest and silence of the narrator's anxiety and expression can cure her. As the narrator's insanity progress, so does her silencing of expression.

In The Yellow Wallpaper, the narrator states: "He says my imaginative power and habit of story making, a nervous weakness like mine is sure to lead to all manner of excited fancies and that I ought to try to use my will and good sense to check the tendency." (6) This passage shows John's influence to the narrator and portrays her cause to insanity. John states it is weakness to have a creative mind and one should silence it. The narrator goes from expressing her anxiety to at the end just being silent. This passage and view of John, causes the reader to hide her writings. When the narrator states she would like to leave the yellow room, she would like the bigger room, he tells her no and there is no point. This is an inhibition of her self-expression. It seems whatever the problems the narrator faces; John is there to silence her.