# The Yellow Wallpaper ~ 19th century Short Story Discussion



## Cuechick (Oct 28, 2008)

I read this tonight, got it free here:http://feedbooks.com/book/3609

Interesting info here (be careful of spoilers in story description): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Yellow_Wallpaper

Would love to hear others thoughts on this interesting story!

It is a very quick read and I thought it


Spoiler



an incredibly well crafted story. You are slowly pulled into her madness and with just tiny changes in syntax your realize she had gone from observing to being one of the women she imagines. There are also other subtleties as she describes her life and her lack of control over it.


 Haunting and skillfully done, I think I may read it again in a few days...

Love the feedbooks site by the way. This was my first freebie and I just saw _Gone With the Wind_ on there, which I have always wanted to read, even more so since moving to Atlanta.


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## CS (Nov 3, 2008)

I remember this!

Oh man, I read it in a Lit class years ago and have thought on and off about it ever since. I'm sure I forgot the name until now, and the story itself kinda faded from my memory after a while, but this post has brought it all back for me.

Wasn't the word "wallflower" influenced by this story? I could be wrong on that, or it could've been the professor's own speculation.

In any case, thank you for this post. I'll be downloading this tonight for sure.


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## Marci (Nov 13, 2008)

CS said:


> I remember this!
> 
> Oh man, I read it in a Lit class years ago and have thought on and off about it ever since. I'm sure I forgot the name until now, and the story itself kinda faded from my memory after a while, but this post has brought it all back for me.
> 
> ...


Pretty much my story, too. It made a huge impression as I've never forgotten this title. "Haunting", yes. It lead to a very lively discussion in class - gender roles, expectations, social expectations, etc.

*Thank You* for posting this, Octochick! Now I have it too. I will read it again & post my feedback when I can.

Marci


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## Wells83 (Nov 19, 2008)

Very good story.  It's very subtle but still manages to be engaging.


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## BrassMan (Dec 8, 2008)

This discussion put me in mind of the short stories I used to use with college freshmen. Short stories are an acquired taste, but they worked nicely in a one semester class where novels would have made students founder. The Yellow Wallpaper always went over well. Several more that usually prompted good discussions were

A Rose for Emily (Faulkner)
The Chrysanthemums (Steinbeck)
The Lottery (Shirley Jackson)
The Story of an Hour (Kate Chopin)
The Storm (Kate Chopin)
Greasy Lake (T. C. Boyle)
Hills Like White Elephants (Hemingway)
A Clean, Well Lighted Place (Hemingway)

My personal favorites are the two by Kate Chopin. She lived in New Orleans and wrote around the turn of the last century, and her treatment of her subject matter (women in society) was so controversial that the (male) establishment shut her down. She wasn't rediscovered until the women's movement in the 1970s. Even today, her stories shock some people. Both of the ones above are just terrific. The Story of an Hour is a masterpiece in miniature, and The Storm is hilarious and surprising.

That website wouldn't come up, or I would have checked to see if these were available too. If they are, or are available elsewhere, KindleBoarders might enjoy them too!

///////Al
aka BrassMan


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## Jeff (Oct 28, 2008)

There are a number of Edgar Allan Poe's short stories available on FeedBooks as well:

http://feedbooks.com/author/16​
EDIT: ..and thank you for the post, Octochick; great short stories are too often overlooked.


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## Leslie (Apr 7, 2008)

I have never read The Yellow Wallpaper and now I am curious so I will download it. Thanks for the tip, Octochick!

L


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## Marci (Nov 13, 2008)

Brassman -

"The Lottery" is a classic - and readers, don't let the word "classic" fool you. Nothing old or musty about it!  Just great storytelling.

I'll now have to look into those Kate Chopin short stories.  I have read her but now I can't remember what title I read 

Marci


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## BrassMan (Dec 8, 2008)

Marci said:


> Brassman -
> 
> "The Lottery" is a classic - and readers, don't let the word "classic" fool you. Nothing old or musty about it! Just great storytelling.
> 
> ...


Good point, Marci. Sometimes the word "classic" means fusty, or hard to read and obscure. "A Rose for Emily," for instance, is a classic, but it's also Faulkner, meaning written in his dense, slow style. Still, it amounts to a horror story. My students were usually shocked and a little revolted by it (which was great, in a freshman English class).

Hemingway's "Hills Like White Elephants" is conveyed as if the reader were overhearing a man and a woman talk at a cafe table at a train station. There's no narrative, only dialogue. Yet between the lines you learn the history of the couple and their current, sad situation. It's a marvel of composition, the kind of thing a lesser writer, like me, would never dare, like juggling seven balls at once. "A Clean, Well-lighted Place" is written in Hemingway's typical clean, spare sentences, and it conveys the terrible bleakness of an elderly man (actually two) who has nothing to look forward to.

"The Story of an Hour" is barely two pages long. Every single word belongs precisely, and there are not one but three surprises at the end. It's a jewel of a story. "The Storm" could be a novel, though it's only maybe four or five pages. Once my freshmen realized its point, they were scandalized, some of them. Even today, the point of the story is, well, revolutionary. Her other stories are good, but perhaps not immortal. She's known for her novel, _The Awakening_, about a woman who rebels against the limits of her time, and they were real and considerable, as anyone familiar with history knows. Personally I didn't find it as riveting as the two stories. There's something about compression that's compelling.

I should think these stories would be available free somewhere--Project Gutenberg, or some similar site. All could be read in an hour, and, like true classics, they are unforgettable.


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## CS (Nov 3, 2008)

I read this again a few days ago for the first time in ten years, and


Spoiler



the main character's slow descent into madness


 is just an amazing piece of writing.

I urge everyone to DL this.

BTW, it looks like there's a movie adaptation coming out this year: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0790788/


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## Angela (Nov 2, 2008)

I think I am enjoying discovering the classics (and rediscovering classics) more than all the new stuff that is out there! I am so loving feedbooks more every day!


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## LauraB (Nov 23, 2008)

I love her writing. She also has a book called Herland that is wonderful. It is sort of a comedy, she isn't known for her sense of humor, but it is sort of sarcastic and funny. Very good. I got it at Amazon for Kindle. I don't know if it is in the free sites. Check it out if you can find it. Very much worth the time, and not much longer than The Yellow Wallpaper.


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## BrassMan (Dec 8, 2008)

OK, then those who read "The Yellow Wallpaper" might want to consider something that absorbed my students who read it. In the story (can't say about the movie yet) some of them found clues that the husband might be complicit


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in his wife's condition, that is, that he helped orchestrate it.


 How about that?


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## BambiB (Dec 22, 2008)

So I am intrigued and decided to download it to my Kindle.  Now, just to find time to read it!


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## CS (Nov 3, 2008)

BrassMan said:


> OK, then those who read "The Yellow Wallpaper" might want to consider something that absorbed my students who read it. In the story (can't say about the movie yet) some of them found clues that the husband might be complicit
> 
> 
> Spoiler
> ...


WOW, that IS pretty wild. Never even crossed my mind, but it does make sense. What clues did they discover?


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## BrassMan (Dec 8, 2008)

Well, see, that was part of the fun--the hunt for supporting details and then the class discussion. I don't have a copy of the story handy at the moment, but there's no reason we couldn't have our own discussion here on the Boards, like a mini-klub. Want a hint about one of those details?


Spoiler



It had to do with the setting


.


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## Harmakhet (Feb 12, 2009)

I had read this a few years ago for an English Lit class as well and came to a similar idea CS.  I loved the story and plan on rereading it once my kindle comes in.


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## BrassMan (Dec 8, 2008)

What a great idea! We have the link to The Yellow Wallpaper at the top of the first page. 

The cool thing about short stories is that they're short. That's why they were so great in class; they were like M&Ms. 

Maybe one of our Kindle bloodhounds could sniff out Kate Chopin's stories, The Storm, and Story of an Hour. Both can be read in fifteen minutes, and they're super stories.

Link, anyone??


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## BambiB (Dec 22, 2008)

BrassMan said:


> Maybe one of our Kindle bloodhounds could sniff out Kate Chopin's stories, The Storm, and Story of an Hour. Both can be read in fifteen minutes, and they're super stories.


I really like The Awakening. Not a short story though...well short, but not 15 minutes short!








http://www.amazon.com/Awakening-and-Selected-Stories-The/dp/B000OIZT18/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=digital-text&qid=1235144935&sr=1-1

Hmmm...not sure why I cannot get the link with the pick, but I have added it separately.


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## BambiB (Dec 22, 2008)

It looks like this one may have several of Chopin's shorter stories:








http://www.amazon.com/Including-Awakening-Respectable-Published-MobileReference/dp/B001FB20RY/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=digital-text&qid=1235144935&sr=1-2


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## BrassMan (Dec 8, 2008)

That wasn't linked, and I don't have the time to hunt it down (I'm bicycling), but if it does have her stories, then great. Those who like The Storm might also like At the Cajun Ball, which is sort of a prequel to The Storm.

If you liked The Awakening, then I gar-ron-tee you're going to like The Storm and The Story of an Hour. They're considerably more lively than The Awakening, and it's obvious they were written by the same woman with the same things on her mind. For what it's worth, she was one of the first American writers to be influenced by French Naturalism, that is, to write about everyday people with everyday (sometimes scandalous, at least by the times) problems. Flaubert (_Madame Bovary_) was one of her influences.

Personally, I also love the cajun flavor of her stories.


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## Sparkplug (Feb 13, 2009)

It looks like Kate Chopin's novels and short stories are available for free from freekindlebooks.org.


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## BambiB (Dec 22, 2008)

BrassMan said:


> That wasn't linked, and I don't have the time to hunt it down (I'm bicycling), but if it does have her stories, then great.


The link is below the pic...I couldn't get them together.


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## BrassMan (Dec 8, 2008)

I should have seen that. That looks like a good collection. Both The Storm and The Story of an Hour are in it. The price is budget range (higher than mine, though   ). I only wish Kate Chopin could get a little of it.


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## durphy (Nov 5, 2008)

Besides the


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descent into madness angle


 there's the symbolism of the


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bars on the window


. The way her husband treated her reminds me of the


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My Little Chipmunk


 remark from The Doll House. This became a good argument for


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feminism


.


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## BrassMan (Dec 8, 2008)

durphy said:


> Besides the
> 
> 
> Spoiler
> ...


Yes, they do. Either way you look at it,


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whether the husband is a schemer or just an insensitive clod (like the doctor),


 that's true. Seems I remember there was something like that in Gilman's background too.


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## BrassMan (Dec 8, 2008)

As that was posting, I found myself thinking that there's no reason


Spoiler



a man always has to be the bad guy


. In fact, there's another wonderful, classic short story that's funny as blazes, by James Thurber: The Catbird Seat. It has to be online for free somewhere. I love that story.


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