Gender and Medicine in "The Yellow Wallpaper" by Gilman

Introduction: The Rest Cure and Its Consequences

"The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman is a brief psychological study of a woman slowly going mad over the course of an imposed rest cure prescribed by her physician-husband. The story illustrates the extent to which limited knowledge of the female psyche, combined with a refusal to treat women as intelligent, independent beings, ironically produces the very types of behaviors that psychological treatment of the era was supposed to prevent. Both women and men are guilty of limiting women's voices when women attempt to escape the conventional confines of motherhood and domesticity. Although the main character's love of reading and writing is a constant and sustaining force in her life, she is denied it when it is assumed her illness stems from her refusal to conform to conventional roles.

Female Biology as Disease in the 19th Century

As noted by history professor Hilary Marland, "The Yellow Wallpaper" is very much a product of its historical era and contains specific references to what were seen as uniquely female complaints. "All women were seen by physicians as susceptible to ill health and mental breakdown by reason of their biological weakness and reproductive cycles. And those who were creative and ambitious were deemed even more at risk" (Marland). It is not simply that the heroine is suffering from a personal crisis or malady. She is living in a world where the very state of being female is regarded as a disease. Women were viewed as being innately less intelligent, and this was not something which could be overcome. In fact, if women tried to engage in intellectual study, they were seen as attempting to be like men and were thus more, rather than less, vulnerable to illness. The woman in the story appears to be in an unhappy and unequal marriage, but the idea that marital troubles might be at the source of her frustrations is never entertained, because marriage is seen as the natural life outcome for women.

Medical Authority and Marital Power

Gilman openly based the short story on her own experiences with a so-called rest cure that was supposed to quiet her nervous agitation. But unlike her nameless heroine, Gilman's cure was prescribed by Dr. Silas Weir Mitchell, who gained fame for treating what was then called nervous exhaustion in Civil War veterans — a condition today likely called PTSD (Marland). Gilman's first husband was an artist, but in her short story she alters the facts of her own life to make a point about the overwhelmingly male perspective of the medical profession ("Charlotte Perkins Gilman"). The narrator's brother is also a physician. She is surrounded by uncomprehending men who view her only in terms of the common, medically accepted diagnoses of the era. "John is a physician, and perhaps — (I would not say it to a living soul, of course, but this is dead paper and a great relief to my mind) — perhaps that is one reason I do not get well faster," she says (Gilman). Even when surreptitiously writing on her own, she is afraid to criticize her husband, as the surveillance of patriarchal society is always observing her, including through John's sister.

Before the rest cure has fully begun, there are signs that the woman has a more adversarial than loving relationship with her husband. "If a physician of high standing, and one's own husband, assures friends and relatives that there is really nothing the matter with one but temporary nervous depression — a slight hysterical tendency — what is one to do?" she says (Gilman). Her husband insists on speaking for the two of them as a couple, even when his wife contradicts what he says. He holds the authority of medical knowledge and of his gender.

The narrator regards the prospect of being discovered by her husband and violating his prescription as something fearful. "There comes John, and I must put this away — he hates to have me write a word" (Gilman). The orders of the physician and the demands of the husband are conjoined in the story, suggesting that men exercise tyranny over women both through the medical profession and within marriage. Marriage, as well as a medical prescription, denies women the ability to write and pursue intellectual professions — particularly after they have given birth, as the narrator has.

Works Cited

Anderson, Margaret. "19th Century Childbirth." 26 May 2018. Web.

"Charlotte Perkins Gilman." Biography.com. 26 May 2018. Web.

Crowder, Sarah. "Feminist Gothic in 'The Yellow Wallpaper.'" Lone Star College. 26 May 2018. Web.

Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. "The Yellow Wallpaper." 1899. 26 May 2018. Web.

Marland, Hilary. "'The Yellow Wallpaper': A 19th-Century Short Story of Nervous Exhaustion and the Perils of Women's 'Rest Cures.'" The Conversation. 27 Feb. 2018. 26 May 2018. Web.

Martin, Diana. "Charlotte Perkins Gilman and 'The Yellow Wallpaper.'" 1 May 2007. 26 May 2018. Web.