As the 19th century was coming to a close, Kate Chopin and Charlotte Perkins Gilman penned two stories dealing with similar themes, The Story of an Hour and The Yellow Wallpaper. Both stories feature female protagonists who struggle with issues of personal confinement and find eventual freedom, whether through death or insanity. Although the stories contain several similarities, the two women are depicted in markedly different ways. While both women share paths to liberation, each view their surroundings through a different lens, whether through perspective or outlook. Gilman and Chopin depict women who share afflictions, but whose paths diverge in how they view their husbands, environments and roles. In The Story Of An Hour, Chopin’s protagonist Louise Mallard is initially overcome by grief at the reported death of her husband, “weeping at once, with sudden, wild abandonment” (Gilman 2) until she moves upstairs to sit in her bedroom armchair.
Once there, the portrayal of Mrs. Mallard transforms as her surroundings begin to express her feelings of delight as her “gaze was fixed away off yonder on one of those patches of blue sky” (2).
Mrs. Mallard begins to revel in the thought of freedom, and Chopin illustrates the exterior world outside her window as one of emerging optimism, full of “new spring life” (2) and describing that the “delicious breath of rain was in the air” (2).
The world through her window depicts a joyful place in the aftermath of her husbands reported demise as “she was drinking in a very elixir of life through that open window” (3).
The Essay on The Yellow Wallpaper Jane Woman Gilman
Tyer 1 Drew Tyer Jennifer McCune ENGL 131224 February 2005 No Work and No Play Makes Jane a Dull Girl Jane in Charlotte Perkins Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper" was "touched" as some say long before she was prescribed, and administered the "rest cure" by her husband for her then unknown ailment now called postpartum depression. The boredom and isolation of this cure only allowed her mind to venture ...
In The Story of an Hour, the depiction of rain and spring are positive influences, showing Mrs. Mallard as welcoming to her surroundings and emerging into the possibility of a bright, alive world of personal liberty.
In contrast to this, Gilman’s protagonist Jane spends the majority of her time describing the interior of the upstairs room she is confined to. Whereas Chopin depicts the outside world lovingly, Gilman’s character voices constant contempt for her quarters, stating “I don’t like our room one bit” (Gilman 56).
Every aspect of the room is picked apart, “the floor is gouged and splintered” (59), she describes the room as an “atrocious nursery” (57) and there are even “bars on the windows” (56).
Primarily though, Jane spends her time throughout the story agonizing over the design of the yellow wallpaper, claiming “I never saw worse paper in my life” (57).
Unlike The Story of an Hour, the outside world is an afterthought in Gilman’s story, with the summer weather playing little role in Jane’s behaviour. Jane instead spends her time obsessing over every aspect of the yellow wallpaper, eventually even smelling it (66).
Jane’s pessimistic representations of her surroundings foreshadow her eventual descent into madness.
In The Story of an Hour, Kate Chopin’s protagonist conveys that the thought of a life lived independently would trump the survival of her husband, describing in detail that she would “live for herself” (Chopin 3) and no longer be subject to a “powerful will bending her in blind persistence” (3).
While Louise Mallard bears no ill will towards her husband as “she had loved him” (3), it is made clear that their shared life holds no temptation in comparison to spending the remainder of her years being only answerable to herself, the freedom which she “suddenly recognized as the strongest impulse in her being” (3).
While she would grieve her husband, she ultimately longs for freedom, and when this is taken away from her with the return of her unharmed husband, it is too much for her to take.
Unlike The Story of an Hour, Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s protagonist Jane is depicted as being submissive to her husband, deferring to his opinion when he forbids her to leave the residence, saying “he said I wasn’t able to go” (Gilman 62).
The Essay on Yellow Wallpaper Story Gilman Hour
... differences within the two short stories, there is also similarities contained in Chopin's "The Story of an Hour" and Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper," such as ... a life were nothing was expected of her. She found freedom in locked quarters. Just as John's wife did in "The ... time period. In "The Story of an Hour," Louise locks herself in her room after discovering that her husband has died and at ...
She is completely subservient to his will throughout the story, going as far as to hide her writing, stating “there comes John, he hates to have me write a word” (57) and mentioning that John has given her “a schedule prescription for each hour in the day” (56).
Jane repeatedly asks her husband to “take [her] away” (63) from the room and ultimately blames herself for her the toll she takes on her husband, feeling she is a “comparative burden already” (57).
Gilman’s protagonist has a very different relationship with her husband compared to Chopin’s, mentioning “John does not know how much I suffer really” (57), a big contrast to the selfish desires and longing for freedom of Chopin’s protagonist. In conclusion, the depictions of the women in The Story of an Hour and The Yellow Wallpaper differ in terms of their relationships to their physical environments, their husbands, and their sense of self. While both writers present characters who are longing for freedom, each character finds that freedom through a different avenue. Chopin’s character finds freedom in physically, through her death, while Gilman’s protagonist finds her freedom mentally, though her descent into madness. Though they each lead and perceive their lives in separate ways, they both find the eventual salvation they desire through their individual routes towards their freedom from oppression.
Works Cited
Chopin, Kate. “The Story of an Hour.” Mercury Reader. Ed. Janice Neulib, Kathleen Shine Cain andStephen Ruffus. Toronto: Pearson Learning Solutions, 2011. 1-4. Print.
Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. “The Yellow Wallpaper.” Mercury Reader. Ed. Janice Neulib, KathleenShine Cain and Stephen Ruffus. Toronto: Pearson Learning Solutions, 2011. 54-70. Print.
