Women's Literature of the 19th Century - Research Paper Example

 Women’s Literature of the 19th Century: Discussing “The Story of an Hour,” “The Yellow Wallpaper,” and “Little Women” INTRODUCTION Most little girls, teens, young women and many women of many demographics, in general, all have a vision or fantasy of who they might one day marry; who will this “Prince Charming” be? In this modern day and age we equate marriage with meeting a special person that we love who brings greater joy and freedoms into our lives; this makes perfect logical sense today. However, Marriage of love, respect, and anything resembling equality was not typical and not the traditional purpose of marriages within society throughout history. Marriages were historically used to unite families, provide proper male heirs, or for political gain. Wives, essentially, belonged to their husbands like money and livestock. In many ways marriage was simply another format of female ownership, where control is passed from father to husband. In many ways women were traded to men as payment or collateral. By the mid to late 19th century marriage was still very much an arrangement of necessity for, both, men and women. Men needed to marry to establish himself and his family line, while women married for financial security, societal pressures, and forced gender roles (Wohlpart 1). Love, freedom had little meaning to the marriages of that era. Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour, in 1894, is a fantastic representation of the “mentality” of women in her era. She is not alone, female authors of that time were all speaking out in their own ways of the female experience and perspective on their societies and environments. In order to understand better the feminine perspectives it’s necessary to review more than one single work of the time. Louisa May Alcott, author of “Little Women,” and Charlotte Perkins Gilman, who penned “The Yellow Wallpaper,” also present strong female views of marriage and gender realities in that era. Modern ideologies hold that love, freedom, and marriage are synonymous with one another; however that was not always the case, which is something each of these stories’s main characters successfully convey the perspectives of love, freedom, and marriage for the women of male dominated 19th century society. HISTORY “The Story of an Hour” is a very short, short story that tells the tale of Mrs., Mallard. She is wife, who has just been informed that her husband has died in an accident. She excuses herself to solitude. While she mourns the man’s loss; and did wish him ill. However, she, also, ultimately realizes, in her hour of contemplation, that she may be far better off being his widow rather than his wife. She would have freedom. She would no longer be forced to conform to gender roles and societal pressures and perspectives on the lives of women (Wohlpart 1). She could do as she pleased. In this we see that for her and, no doubt, many women, the reality of marriage was oppressive, confining, and stagnating. This epiphany fills her with joy and hope. But when she leaves returns to the downstairs she discovers that her husband is not dead and has arrived at home. Her shock of seeing him there, essentially, gives the poor woman a heart attack and she dies (Chopin 1-2). The question that haunts this story is, is her shock, simply, the surprise of seeing him not dead, or did she die from the disappointment of realizing that her hope of freedom, her chance at a life of her own, and a release from the restriction of her marriage was now snatched away in an instant (Hicks 1-24)? DISCUSSION We all know that the mid to late 19th century was a strict society and class systems based around an entirely patriarchal society. The nature of marriage in such a society is intended to favor the man, not the woman. This without question creates imbalance and leads to oppression, repression, and marriage as imprisonment of their individual being. They are their father’s daughter and then they are their husbands wife, there was no self-empowerment (Hicks 1).The ideal woman and wife of the era, could cook, sew, provide and raise healthy children, and maintain the household and meet the husbands needs. Most importantly, however, she would not talk too much, ask too many questions, and have no opinions about anything like philosophies and politics. In some cases wives were really little more than glorified nannies in their own homes. Again, the idea of romantic love, individual freedom, and marriage were entirely different things. Romantic love was a thing of books, fairy stories, and individual freedoms are really only applied to men. Marriage was in many ways a “business transaction,’ usually between men, sometimes women were consulted very little. (Hicks 2). “Little Women” and “The Yellow Wallpaper” also convey similar messages in different ways. Little Women’s protagonist, Jo March, is an opinionated, self-sufficient, young woman. The March family, as a whole, had given up the socialite life and the wealth for humanitarian concerns and charity work. She was not raised to be a simpering simple minded bauble, as many women were, in the Civil War society of Concorde, Massachusetts where the story takes place. Jo does not want to be like those women and is not considered “marriageable” by her rich Aunt who considers her, both,” masculine” and too high strung. Ambitions, intelligence, capabilities, hopes, dreams, and assertiveness are positive male traits, but a woman cannot and should not possess them. When Jo’s sister considers marriage Jo is unhappy (Alcott 1-24).This was because when women get married they belong to someone else. While today, in most cases, the marriage of a loved one is exciting news, however, at this time, when marriage was a repressive, oppressive and confining institution that does not favor the wife it was, again, necessity, not always joy. In “The Yellow Wallpaper” presents us a nameless narrator and protagonist. All we know about her is that after the birth of her child she was diagnose, by her husband, as having mental illness or hysteria. As we follow the story we realize that she is being “institutionalized” in her own home. There are bars on her windows, the door is locked, and she is attended to like a patient. Her treatment involved “no activity,” no moving, writing, or thinking, just sitting. So she defies that rule and keeps a secret journal of her experiences, which is the story we are reading (Gilman 647-657). Today we would recognize her condition as post-partum depression, not hysteria or insanity. The perspective is the same male provided medical quackery that pervaded the 19th century in relation to women’s medicine (Treichler 61-62). This thinking was partly encouraged and supported by psychiatrists, like Sigmund Freud, whose sexist perspectives were incorporated into his work helped to give the image that women were over-emotional, illogical, and that outbursts of feelings like sadness and anger are indentified as mental instability or hysteria, a disease named specifically female reproductive organs. In other words hysteria is not something a man could ever suffer from. Male thoughts were productive, male ambition was encouraged, male emotions were just, while women’s thoughts were irrelevant, ambition was seen is inappropriate, and female feelings were dismissed as a product of their own weaknesses, failings, and uncontrollable female emotions. Therefore negating and silencing the female voice; her words are either wrong, out of turn, or a product of mental instabilities. ( Treichler 61). While “Little Women” only touches a bit upon the particular aspect of love specifically, because love and disdain for the decadence of the socialites in the era were both instilled in the March children, however, in, both, “The Story of An Hour” and “The Yellow Wallpaper” we see the physical toll, or perhaps price, of marriage for women of that time; one dies the other is made insane. In such a strict society of rules, traditions, and ideals it is imperative that the “status quo” is always maintained and no one “rocks the boat” and questions it. These women did just that. They told women’s stories from the perspective of women as they are not as men have defined them to be. In many ways these works could qualify as ‘mini” act of defiance against the men and culture that represses and oppresses them. In “The Story of an Hour” Mrs. Mallard’s holds her defiance up like a banner. She would be free; that word makes it very clear that to be married is to not be free (Wohlpart 1). This is a bold message in her era. This kind of thinking could turn women from their assigned gender roles that keep the male gender in power. In “Little Women” we see a similar association when Jo refuses Laurie’s proposal (Alcott 12-13). She would not make a good wife for him and never be able to perform the duties of a proper wife and, she did not want to. To the sensibilities of the era her refusal was incredibly outrageous, foolish, and self destructive any young woman could make. Turn down a proposal from a wealthy suitor during a troubled and war-torn economic time would be incredibly strange and would definitely be seen as a rebellion against the existing status quo. In “The Yellow Wallpaper” the messages presented are layered within the imagery of her confinement. Her male defined “madness” is a metaphor for marriage itself, at least from a feminine view; a cage is still a cage even when it is gilded. The bars on the narrator's windows and the instruction to do nothing but, simply, being always under stimulated, worked to discourage her from expressing or discovering her own potentials. By the end of the story the once the depressed woman is driven to insanity not because of any condition she had but from the confinement imposed upon her (Gilman 9-10). This is not unlike the views of marriage. That women’s whole being is being restricted and silenced; this kind of treatment could make women go mad. The logical idea being that marriage as an institution was a matter of imprisonment into self loss and possibly madness. In all three stories these women authors never fail to include, at least, one female character that personifies her station, the expectations of her, and happily accepts the life of a wife in the era eagerly. Mrs. Mallard’s sister in law is that representation of a woman of that time, the narrator in “The Yellow Wallpaper,” also, has a proper, sane, and subservient who visits her, and finally in “Little Women” there is Jo’s older sister, Meg. Meg is more proper and more intrigued about living the life of a young wife and socialite in society, but, also, wants to marry for love, not money. Her eagerness to become a wife and mother to Jo is like giving in or giving up and conforming to a societal structure that does not respect you or allow you to be “yourself,” but the ideal that society demands (Hicks 1-2). “The Story of an Hour” is a fantastic and succinct look at the possible inner workings of a wife of that era and has the carrot of freedom dangled before her and snatched away was more than her heart could bear. In a rather dark way she essentially conveys the message that death would be preferable than returning to the life of a 19th century wife. Each of the women authors have done exceptionally well and captured both the patriarchy and lack of gender fairness that could easily strip the psyche of a woman down, until she conforms, goes crazy, or dies. These are harsh commentaries of society at the time and not all received them well, however their appeal among modern readers has made each of these tales classics of literature, specifically women’s literature. However, it is the works of Kate Chopin, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, and Louisa May Alcott all layered the groundwork for the women for all the women that would fight to change the image of women, the rights of women and the perceptions of women all across the globe. CONCLUSION Today most perspectives on gender equality and the rights of women have change and improved throughout the last 100 plus years after these stories were written. The world is still full of people who would marry for money, or power, or prestige, with no regard for love or romance. However, that is hardly the norm in this modern era. Many will choose their mates based solely on the love that they feel and nothing more. Many women today could not imagine living in the times that these women did and having the courage, bravery, and audacity to defy the status quo of the societies around them and speak up for the plight of women and the indecency of the patriarchal system forced upon them. However, had it not been for these brave female authors we might not have been so quick to change and women as a gender might still be suffering the effects of a "right-less", patriarchal society that offers very little to women. It is very clear that “The Story of an Hour,” and both the secondary stories discussed, are prime examples and commentaries on the nature of love and freedom in relation to marriage in the eras in which they lived. WORK CITED Alcott, Louisa May. Little Women. online: 1868. 1-24. eBook. . Chopin, Kate. "The Story of an Hour." Exploring Literature, Writing and Arguing About Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and the Essay. . 4th2008. 1-2. Print. Gilman , Charlotte Perkins Stetson). The Yellow Wallpaper. online, 1894. 647-657. Web. . Hicks, Victoria. "Patriarchal Representation and Domestic Liberation: The Home in Kate Chopin’s Short Fiction." University of North Carolina at Asheville. Fall (2009): 1-24. Print. . Treichler Paula A. "Escaping the Sentence: Diagnosis and Discourse in "The Yellow Wallpaper." Tulsa Studies in Women's Literature. 3.1/2 (2012): 61-77. Print. Wohlpart, Jim. "Patriarchal Society and the Erasure of the Feminine Self in Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour”." Florida Gulf Coast University. (1997): 1. Web. 3 May. 2014. . Read More