The Yellow Wallpaper

by Charlotte Perkins Gilman · 1892

First published in January 1892 in The New England Magazine, *The Yellow Wallpaper* is a short story that follows a nameless woman confined to a nursery by her physician husband after the birth of her child. Prescribed a "rest cure" that forbids mental and physical activity, she becomes obsessed with the peeling yellow wallpaper in the room. As the pattern seems to shift and reveal a trapped figure, her journal entries trace a descent into madness that serves as a powerful condemnation of 19th‑century patriarchy and the dismissal of women’s mental health. The story is celebrated for its economical horror, gothic atmosphere, and pioneering feminist critique of gender roles and medical oppression.