The Symbolism In Charlotte Perkins Gilman's A Jury Of Her Peers

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Symbolism In a Jury of her Peers, Susan Glaspell creates a story which demonstrates how women were marginalized and treated without significance. In her story the narrator never comes right out and states who killed Mr. Hale. Yet as the story develops it is almost certainly Mrs. Wright who committed the murder. Glaspell uses many symbols as a vehicle to illustrate the turmoil and pain Mrs. Wright was in: the burst jars of jelly, the knotted quilt and most importantly the caged bird. Charlotte Perkins Gilman authored The Yellow Wallpaper, and writes a somewhat autobiographical tale about a woman who is slowly descending toward a mental breakdown. Much like Glaspell’s, Mrs. Hale, Gilman’s female protagonist is also a “caged bird.”…show more content…
Due to her past fragility and mental state (postpartum depression?), it is evident John feels she should remain passive, and compliant. As the story progresses so does the diminishing of the narrator’s mental state. She begins to envision the wallpaper as being alive. The epistolary style adds to the drama of the story and is itself a symbol and vehicle for the story’s development. The journal represents the narrator’s soul and explores her emotional turmoil and shifting perception of reality, as does the yellowing wallpaper. It is suspected that the nursery room was possibly a room for an insane person. The passage following is ambiguous: “It is a big, airy room, the whole floor nearly, with windows that look all ways, and air and sunshine galore. It was nursery first and then playroom and gymnasium, I should judge; for the windows are barred for little children, and there are rings and things in the walls.” One of the most powerful and telling lines which alludes to the symbolic nature of the wallpaper occurs when Gilman writes: “One of those sprawling flamboyant patterns committing every artistic
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