A nameless woman, confined to a nursery by her physician husband, becomes obsessed with the room's unsettling wallpaper, which mirrors her growing mental distress. The story is celebrated for its powerful critique of 19th‑century gender norms and medical practices, and for pioneering psychological horror in American literature.
Try these questions
- How does the wallpaper motif symbolize the themes of confinement and female oppression?
- What does the narrator’s relationship with her husband reveal about her character’s psychological decline?
- In what ways does the story reflect the historical context of the ‘rest cure’ and attitudes toward women’s mental health in the late 1800s?
- How does Gilman’s first‑person journal style affect the narrative’s tone and the reader’s perception of reality versus imagination?
The Yellow Wallpaper
Charlotte Perkins Gilman