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lalalaluziie 's review for:
The Yellow Wall-Paper
by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
I've read The Yellow Wallpaper a couple of years ago, and came to it with fresh eyes again now. I absolutely loved the eerie yellow imagery, the descriptions of the patterns. It reminded me of looking at the wooden panels above my bed as a child and finding patterns in the specks, even sometimes mistaking them for eyes.
This time around I think I paid more attention to reading it. It was clearer to me that we have an unreliable narrator (or maybe the most reliable and honest of all?), and that we get a single point of view only. You can feel the shift in syntax, diction, and atmosphere as she slowly (but not so slowly) "descends into madness". It feels like she is not only ripping down the wallpaper but actually reaching through the pages and clawing her nails into you, the reader, and pulling you with her into the room, and eventually into the wall prison itself. Absolutely fascinating. I love the "crazy woman in the attic" trope, it awakens deep female rage in me and makes me want to punch all of the surrounding characters that don't believe her or take her seriously straight in the face.
This time around I think I paid more attention to reading it. It was clearer to me that we have an unreliable narrator (or maybe the most reliable and honest of all?), and that we get a single point of view only. You can feel the shift in syntax, diction, and atmosphere as she slowly (but not so slowly) "descends into madness". It feels like she is not only ripping down the wallpaper but actually reaching through the pages and clawing her nails into you, the reader, and pulling you with her into the room, and eventually into the wall prison itself. Absolutely fascinating. I love the "crazy woman in the attic" trope, it awakens deep female rage in me and makes me want to punch all of the surrounding characters that don't believe her or take her seriously straight in the face.