In the short story "The Yellow Wallpaper", by Charlotte Perkins Gilman it is interesting to see an otherwise simple plot become increasingly complex due to the metaphorical significance of the wallpaper. In my reading, I can come up with many applications of the narrator's "sickness" to matters of the world; such as femininity, depression, and the confines that other people put on us, or that we put on ourselves. .
After analyzing the story, it could easily be said that the author was trying to portray the struggle of domination between men and women. In a sense the narrator eventually escapes her husband's control but at the cost of her own sanity. I feel that Gilman's story can be taken in its most literal sense as the battle between male and female, but to dig deeper, why couldn't we say that the story shows a general struggle over the control of our own lives? .
The general population is brought up by some authority that tells us what is right and wrong, and as we grow older we slowly become more independent. As we move away from whomever or whatever has raised us, we begin to savor our sovereignty, but also realize that now we still have to answer to someone. This someone can be a boss, landlord, the government, God, etc. We are never entirely free, that is until we are dead (or at least dead to this world). Although, I feel we can never really be free, there are some things that can act as a temporary escape. .
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The wallpaper is symbolic of the state of mind of the narrator. The room where the narrator has to spend her time is symbolic of the conditions that eventually make her lose her mind, and the most dominant feature in the room is the yellow wallpaper with its "torturing" pattern. The woman is eventually forced into a prison within her own mind. The wallpaper represents this prison. .
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The woman's husband treats her like a child.