Researching the historical significance of a text gives a new interpretation of the text under question. You take the text at face value when reading it for the first time, but you do not truly understand the significance of the text until you have fully researched the story behind it, as well as the historical significance that it holds. "The Yellow Wallpaper" brought light to the treatment of women with mental illnesses in the nineteenth century. When researching  Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the author of "The Yellow Wallpaper," I found that she struggled with mental illness for more than three years. She explained her illness as "continuous nervous breakdowns tending to melancholia   and beyond." ("Why I Wrote the Yellow Wallpaper")

After struggling with depression for three years, Gilman decided to see a doctor. She went to the best-known nervous disease specialist, Dr. S. Weir Mitchell. He told her that there was nothing seriously wrong with her; she was just overworked or stressed and needed to "live as domestic a life as possible." Under his Rest Cure treatment, she was put into isolation, bed rest, and electricity/massage in order to "cure" her illness. ("Writing on Women Writers") She was told to "have 'but two hours' intellectual life a day" and "never to touch pen, brush, or pencil again." ("Why I Wrote the Yellow Wallpaper") After three months of the Rest Cure treatment, her depression grew to its highest point where she claimed she could "see over." (Why I Wrote the Yellow Wallpaper) 

She decided to cut out the men in her life, which were her husband and her doctor. After doing so, she became better. She did what made her happy and cut out the things that didn't. 

Charlotte Perkins Gilman wrote "The Yellow Wallpaper" to show society that Dr. S. Weir Mitchell's Rest Cure did not save her, but actually drove her further into melancholia. She wanted to show the world how destructive the effects of the rest cure really were. ("Writing on Women Writers") She decided that he deserved to read about what he put her through, so she sent him a copy of the book; he never responded to it. 

I began to see a pattern with gender playing a big role in the diagnosis. Mitchell believed that the work women did was "emotionally and physically demanding and their husbands were often insensitive to their wives' needs." ("Weir Mitchell Rest Cure") Women were seen as symbols of motherhood and purity. They were seen as things to strive to have, as if they were attainable by any man as long as he put forth some effort. Women were seen as weak and inferior to men, especially to their husbands. ("Science Museum") The most common form of mental illness that women in the nineteenth century were diagnosed with was hysteria. ("Weir Mitchell Rest Cure") Most of the women diagnosed with hysteria were from the upper or middle class. A woman's place in the nineteenth century was usually the home, being a housewife and rearing children. ("Science Museum") If a women was unhappy with that lifestyle or unhappy with her husband, she was seen as weak or disobedient. These women felt as if they didn't belong in the lifestyle they were living. Housewives felt unaccomplished and isolated in the home, which drove them crazy. Mitchell believed that a woman's role was to stay in the home, so it makes sense that he would order them to remain at home as a form of treatment. By locking them up in the social norm he could somehow control their mental state. Women who had bigger expectations for their lives were harder to cure, they displayed more willpower; therefore, they KUHN 3KUHN 3were easier to break down. ("Weir Mitchell Rest Cure") "For those who did not respond to his regimen, Mitchell described the rest cure as punishment for "willful" or "foolish" women: protective seclusion became isolation and rest became enforced inactivity." ("Weir Mitchell Rest Cure")

Another way of dealing with mentally ill women was to put them in asylums. Elizabeth Packard shared her story in "The Prisoners' Hidden Life, or, Insane Asylum Unveiled." The book describes her experience of being put into an asylum against her will by her husband. Because he was a man he could overpower her. In the nineteenth century it was legal for a man to have his wife committed into a mental hospital against her will. She spent three years in the asylum because she didn't share the same religious beliefs as her husband, who was a Calvinist minister. (Langworthy) She was taken against her will by police and admitted into the asylum. This showed the oppression of women in the 1800s. (Langworthy)  

Because of women authors like Charlotte Perkins Gilman and Elizabeth Packard, people were made aware of the problems of treating mental illnesses. Many women found "The Yellow Wallpaper" to be a perfect representation of the social oppression they felt. Women were the ones that were affected most by "The Yellow Wallpaper" being published. It showed that women could break out of the social norm and away from a man's control. Charlotte Perkins Gilman used the wallpaper reference as an example of tearing down the walls that were keeping her from being who she wanted. For her, the men in her life were the walls keeping her captive. By the end of her book, she escapes their control and her husband faints which shows, in a way, that she overcame his control over her. This book brought new power to the feminists. It educated the world on how oppressing a woman with depression is not a way to treat her and will only make her condition worse. Feminists responded to Elizabeth Packard's story as well, women were KUHN 4KUHN 4outraged by the control her husband was able to have over her. She was kept captive for no reason at all, other than her husband saying she was crazy. Feminists began writing about the specific standards that women were expected to meet and if they did not meet the standards or lifestyle that was expected of them, they could end up in an asylum. (Langworthy) By writing about the oppression of women and encouraging social change, feminism blossomed. Because of Charlotte Perkins Gilman and Elizabeth Packard, women felt like they finally had a way to share their stories through writing. 

