Alexandria Hall Essays (1709 words) - Fiction, Literature

Alexandria Hall Phillip Joseph American Short Stories October 23, 2017 Comparing themes in Freemans's "The Revolt of Mother" and Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper" Although today women are generally seen as equal in the United States, this view has only relatively recently been widely adopted in this country. For much of history, women have been viewed as subordinates to their perceived stronger, faster, more rational male counterparts. Because of this widely accepted societal ideology, women were almost solely confined to the domestic aspects of life during the traditionalist era, which is roughly regarded as the period between the start of the1920s and the end of the late 1970s. "The Revolt of Mother," by Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman and "The Yellow Wallpaper," by Charlotte Perkins Gilman are two short stories that provide a glimpse into the treatment of women during the traditionalist era and reveal the way that they were limited to their domestic duties. In both stories, nearly every one of the events that unfold parallel societal notions about feminism, exemplify female limitations in society and highlight the confinement of women withi n the domestic realm during this time in American history. Likewise, both stories parallel patriarchal injustices that were present in society during this period, despite the different ways the female characters react given their circumstances. In other words, there are strong similarities between the plots of the two stories and the way each event within the plots parallels some societal norm that oppressed women during this period; however, the two stories diverge from one another in the way that the female characters reacted to their oppressors, which, again, provides an authentic representation of women's lives during the traditionalist era. Among the parallelisms that can be observed in both "The Revolt of Mother," and "The Yellow Wall Paper," both f emale characters were kept in confined domestic spaces by their husbands , the oppressors . For example, Sarah Penn and her children were confined to a small, decrepit house and her husband, Adoniram Penn, had no plan of keeping the promise he made to his wife forty years ago that he would build a new home for his family. Instead, he keeps his wife contained in a small decaying house with a crooked staircase and a kitchen that is the size of a closet. Despite his attempts to keep his wife restricted in this unsuitable home, she resists him and undermines the patriarchal power within the home by moving her family and all their belongings into her husband's new farmhouse as soon as he leaves for the day. Quite similarly, in "The Yellow Wall Paper," the main character and narrator repeatedly voices her hatred for the dull, murky room and the moldy yellow wallpap er that she has been confined within; despite her resistance to be held in the room, her husband John makes her stay in the room because he believes it will help cure her sickness, which he believes is merely a passing burden. Rather than defying her husband and standing up for what she knows is best for her, the female narrator succumbs to his will without argument and obediently stays locked in that room. Altogether, the literal confinement of these women in a domestic space is a parallelism that mocks the way that society tends to confine women this way, not literally but ideologically. During this period, women were generally made to feel incapable of escaping the domestic realm, just as the female characters in these short stories felt incapable of escaping their dissatisfying environments. To further exemplify the way that these stories parallel the treatment of women during this time in society, the female character's husbands completely ignored their wives' thoughts, feelings, and demands. In "The Revolt of Mother," Adoniram had promised to build Sarah a new home for the last forty years, yet he seemingly unquestionably expected her to watch silently as he built yet another barn on their property to house even more cows. Despite his wife's clear disappointment about what her husband is having built, Adoniram continued to ignore her feelings and went about his day as usual. Likewise, the first-person female narrator in "The Yellow Wallpaper," experienced similar subjection to her husband John's lack of regard for her