The Yellow Wallpaper Symbolism

In the story "The Yellow Wallpaper" the author use of symbolism is prominent all throughout the story. The overall symbolism of the story is towards women rights. The family’s entire life symbolizes America during the time of the women rights movement. The narrator symbolizes the female population as it stands before the women rights movement and later shows women if they gain the same rights as men. The narrator's husband symbolizes the male population of America as he is trying to hide his wife, which is what the male population of that time was trying to do. The yellow wallpaper in the story represents the barrier between a man and his rights and a woman and her rights. It shows that if that barrier is torn down then America will go crazy and lose all of what order it has. It starts with the family’s move out to the country. It is symbolizing that there is no need to draw attention to women rights because if it gains attention then it will grow and grow to where no one has control over it anymore. In the beginning of the story the family moves out to the country, away from the city. This is illustrating the move in time towards where they are in the time period of the women rights movement. Then when the family gets to the house the narrator notices the wallpaper, or the barrier. As the story progresses the narrator, women, noticed the wallpaper, the barrier, and in the beginning is fine with this barrier. Then as the story goes on it shows how women slowly start becoming less ok with that barrier being there. Then as the story goes on it shows how women feel they are being pushed under the rug by their husbands. Then as her case gets worse it is showing how the men of America are slowly losing control because women are going crazy as they slowly break down the barrier. Then when she finally tears down the wallpaper, women finally gain rights, she goes madly insane and her husband walks in and faints, showing men have lost control. When the husband faints it is showing women have finally won the battle for women rights and have gone crazy with power and ambition causing America, the family’s whole life, to go into turmoil. In the end the author is saying that as women gain their rights they slowly go insane with the new found power that they have. In conclusion the author is showing us the journey that American takes as it transitions to a society controlled by the opinions of men to a society where women finally have a say.