In the story “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Gilman, John, the husband of the narrator, is known to be the villain. As a physician he assures his wife is going through a nervous depression, locks her up in a yellow room and takes away her wish to write and communicate to other people; because he believes this will help her recover. He leaves his wife in the room, but only to see if she gets better.
So, is John really the villain in this story? John is not the villain, but several times throughout the story, he does have bad behavior. To begin with, we know for certain that John is a physician and tries to do what he believes is right for his wife’s health just like he would with any other patient. He believes isolating her is the solution so no matter what she says or what she does, he will not let her out of his sight. He thinks what he is doing is right, and she would eventually get better, but that does not quite happen. In the story The Yellow Wallpaper: Overview Short Story,1892 by Linda she explains how John shuts out her interactions “Shut off from all normal interactions and locked into what John calls a nursery but which smack of a space used previously for incarceration. ” He uses science to try and help his wife but he is not acting as a villain, but some people may think so because he gets on his wife’s nerves. Furthermore, John does care about the health of his wife and tries to do what he believes is right for her.
Despite this, he cannot help her at all simply because he does not believe she is really ill. He doesn’t notice when she is trying to express herself or what she really is going through “…John would not hear of it”. Without knowing what she is feeling, it is very difficult to know exactly what goes through her mind and spirit. In the story The Yellow Wallpaper: Overview Short Story,1892 by Linda Martin Makes it clear that he doesn’t care for her opinion “…listening to her is the last thing on his agenda.
” So, we realize John does have good intentions to heal his wife so he follows what he believe is right other than listening to his wife. He does end up harming his wife, but that is not his intensions. Despite this, we must give him the benefit of the doubt. He does have some moments where he helps his wife, which he does not know that means so much for her. For example, when she tried to express her feelings but failed when and started crying uncontrollably, and then he “…gathered me up in his arms, and just carried me upstairs and laid me on the bed and sat by me and read to me till he tired my head”, he did what was best for his wife.
It is in this moments that we come to respect John, and we understand that everything he does, he does out of love. In the story The Yellow Wallpaper: Overview Short Story,1892 by Linda Martin describe that John has brained washed her to thinking what he is doing is best for her “…she has been convinced that what John does is best for her.” It might be what he thinks is best for most people but maybe not his wife.Therefore, he does show some bad decision’s, because he has good and caring intentions but he doesn’t know what might be good for her.
