by Lisa Rosenkranz

Created on: December 15, 2010

An analysis of The Yellow Wallpaper reveals that the main character was suffering from more than just post-partum depression, quite possibly a severe case of schizophrenia.  While the reader may believe that the confinement was what had driven her into madness, a closer reading shows the narrator is already completely out of her mind and therefore unreliable from the very onset of the story.

Right away the narrator tells us that her husband John doesn’t believe she’s sick.  He says she has a “temporary nervous depression” and a “slight hysterical tendency.”  The first could possible be a symptom of postpartum depression, which according to the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists is defined by intense feelings of sadness, fear, anger, and anxiety that interfere with a new mother’s ability to function normally.  If left untreated the condition worsens, but nowhere is there any mention of “hysterics.”   If we examine the narrator’s journal entries we can easily see that her behavior is a bit more psychotic, even from the very beginning, than a diagnose of postpartum depression would permit.

 After the reader is filled in on John’s sentiments about the narrator’s current emotional state, she changes the subject as it appears the discourse of her condition upsets her.  She then goes on to describe the strange old house where her and John have taken up residency.  She describes the “delicious” gardens with “grape covered arbors,” and the dilapidated greenhouse, but once she begins to describe the house itself, she instantly focuses on their bedroom, and then to the wallpaper.

 As soon as she mentions the wallpaper, her psychosis begins to show itself.

"I never saw a worse paper in my life.  One of those sprawling, flamboyant patterns, committing every artistic sin.  It is dull enough to confuse the eye in following, pronounced enough to constantly irritate and provoke study, and when you follow the lame uncertain curves for a little distance they suddenly commit suicide-plunge off at outrageous angels, destroy themselves in unheard of contradictions."   (266)

This is some very strong language for wallpaper and gives a glimpse into the mind of the narrator.  The patterns are “flamboyant … committing ever artistic sin,” yet “dull enough to confuse the eye…” 

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