The woman behind the wallpaper

<Tab/>Charlotte Perkins Gilman's story, "The Yellow Wallpaper", is an account of a mentally disturbed woman and her descend into madness. The story not only depicts the woman's struggle with mental illness, it also displays the struggle women faced in a male dominated society around the 1890's. <Tab/>The prescription from her husband, John, a practicing physician, is that she goes on "bed rest" to treat her …

…and to get a key, which he does and he enters. He is shocked and asks "What is the matter with you? For God's sake, what are you doing! To which she responds, "I've got out a last...and I've pulled off most of the paper, so you can't put me back!" She relates her situation of confinement and identifies with the woman in the wallpaper. In freeing the woman, she has also freed herself.