Summary
What's the narrator's main hobby or way of expressing her creativity?
The narrator liked to write in her journal to express her thoughts and creativity.
Who controls the narrator’s life, decisions, and treatment throughout "The Yellow Wallpaper"?
John
Who is the main character in the story?
An unnamed woman who enjoyed writing about her thoughts and feelings.
“It is like a bad dream.” What type of figurative language is this?
Simile
Why does John take his wife to the countryside and forbid her from working or writing?
Because he thinks rest will cure her “nervous depression,” showing how doctors at that time misunderstood women’s mental health.
What does the narrator believe and feel when she tears down the wallpaper at the end?
She believes she’s freed the woman inside, symbolizing her own break from oppression, even as she loses her sanity.
What is John’s role in the story, and how does he unintentionally harm his wife?
He is the husband and her physician, who forces rest and isolation, thinking he’s helping, but actually worsens her mental health.
What literary device is used when the narrator describes the wallpaper as having “sickly, unclean yellow”?
Imagery, because it creates a vivid, unsettling picture of the wallpaper.
What kind of room does the narrator stay in, and what features make it feel like a prison?
A former nursery with barred windows and a nailed-down bed, symbolizing how she’s treated like a child and her feeling of being trapped.
What does John’s “care” for his wife ironically reveal about gender roles in the 19th century?
It shows that men’s “protection” was actually a form of control that silenced women’s independence.
Why does John dismiss the narrator’s feelings?
He believes he knows what’s best for her as a doctor and a man.
“All those strangled heads and bulbous eyes and waddling fungus growths just shriek with derision!” What type of figurative language is this?
Personification - the writer is comparing inanimate details on the yellow wallpaper to things that have human-like descriptions and can "shriek."
What does the woman the narrator sees behind the wallpaper represent?
The woman represents the narrator herself, trapped by her husband’s control and desperate to break free.
Which quote reveals the normalization of women being belittled in marriage?
“John laughs at me, of course, but one expects that in marriage.”
How does the narrator's behavior change by the end of the story?
She descends into madness and fully identifies with the woman in the wallpaper.
What type of figurative language is present when the narrator says she sees a woman “shaking the pattern” of the wallpaper?
Personification, giving human qualities to the wallpaper to show her projection of being trapped.
How does the ending of the story show both liberation and tragedy at the same time?
The narrator’s madness is her only form of freedom. She breaks free from John’s control, but at the cost of her sanity and identity.
How does the narrator’s quiet rebellion against John symbolize the larger feminist message of the story?
Her growing resistance to his authority represents women’s struggle to reclaim voice and freedom in a patriarchal society.
How does John’s attitude at the end of the story reveal his development as a character?
He collapses in shock when he sees his wife’s madness, showing he finally realizes he misunderstood her, losing his authority and confidence.
“There are things in that paper that nobody knows but me, or ever will. Behind that outside pattern the dim shapes get clearer every day. It is always the same shape, only very numerous. And it is like a woman stooping down and creeping about behind that pattern.” What is this symbolizing and how does it do so?
The hidden woman symbolizes the narrator herself and her own trapped state. This is done when a vivid, imagined image is used to express a real emotional or social truth (like the woman trapped in the wallpaper), which stands for a larger idea, which in this case is the narrator’s confinement and the limits placed on women.