Compare and Contrast - Essay Example

But John says if I feel so, I shall neglect proper self-control; so I take pains to control myself—before him, at least, and that makes me very tired.” (Gilman 380) ---The Yellow Wallpaper Charlotte Perkins Gilman We are given three short stories to evaluate – The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Hills Like White Elephants by Ernest Hemingway and The Story of an Hour by Kate Chopin. We will be comparing and contrasting them according to the different ways in evaluating literature-- plot, theme, setting, character, and point of view. In doing so, we hope to have an in-depth understanding of what these three stories may have wished to convey to the audience it was written for. First, we will look at the stories based on the plot. By looking at the three works, we get an impression that they are evolving around issues that women were faced with in a patriarchal society that was prevalent in the times they were written. The plot usually began with a representation of a woman’s character based on her words, her trail of thoughts and her reactions to each event that unfolded in the story. Each woman was shown as a strong individual with a mind that tried to deviate from the trend of being given to fancies, as many women were viewed, yet they were not being taken seriously even if they tried to show a capacity to think and act intelligently. There was always an underlying current of a sense of things becoming unstable whenever the woman tried to show any signs of breaking off from the chains of her mundane existence as a woman—often seen as an indecisive, weak and emotional being. The common concept was that each female character was presented with opportunities to stand up as individuals separate from their partners in terms of decision-making, and in each story, the options ranged from a semblance of real freedom, as seen by the following statements: ‘Well,’ the man said, ‘if you don’t want to you don’t have to. I wouldn’t have you do it if you didn’t want to. But I know it’s perfectly simple.’ ‘And you really want to?’ ‘I think it’s the best thing to do. But I don’t want you to do it if you don’t really want to.’ ‘And if I do it you’ll be happy and things will be like they were and you’ll love me?’ (Hemingway 402) These underlined that the woman should have a sense of “obligation” to make a decision that would make “them” happy as shown by the following lines: ‘We’ll be fine afterwards. Just like we were before.’ ‘What makes you think so?’ ‘That’s the only thing that bothers us. It’s the only thing that’s made us unhappy.’ (Hemingway 401) In the Story of an hour, the author was able to show how some women would only be able to realize this “freedom” through the escape called death, while in The Yellow Wallpaper, we are shown how a descent into the throes of madness is what helped realize the sense of freedom of the woman. These three stories showed how difficult the fight for individual identity was for women during that period, much more if they wanted to get away from the bondage that was inherent in their sex as women in a society teeming with misconceptions regarding their capacities. Each of the stories opened by presenting us different settings all involving and reflecting the different backgrounds and dilemmas of each of the protagonists of the stories. The backdrop gave us hints of the most palpable of the emotions that our characters were experiencing. In describing the patterns or the surroundings, the story begins to unfold with a hint of what is to come, and a somehow similar thread ran underneath the three stories assigned for reading, which was a sense of gloom and doom for the characters. For The Yellow Wallpaper, the author began with the house and gradually introduces to us what the main character saw initially as the ugly yellow wallpaper. She notices a rather disturbing pattern which gradually developed into an obsession with her. Since our character is being treated for an illness, she was forced to spend as little time as possible in thinking or doing strenuous exercises of the mind, such that her mind became focused on what was most striking to her-- the wallpaper. From the way she started to describe the pattern in the paper, we get a sense of a descent into chaos and doom threatening to overwhelm the character in the story. Like the pattern, her mind went awry, and would sometimes go follow a certain path before turning back on itself and going an unexpected way. We can also see that the more she tries to figure out the pattern, the more she sinks into a certain despair regarding her plight as a prisoner in her own home and by her own doctor and husband. Like the pattern, we can see her mind going into a kind of chaos of its own making by trying to not think, meaning it was not to function the way it was made for, seeing that it is supposed to be thinking. In Hills like White elephants, we are introduced to a backdrop of dry white hills that become the initial focus of our protagonist. The young girl in the story was implied to be pregnant, perhaps by the man who was with her in the train station. Here we are presented with how the man seems to imply taking the life that was in her womb to which she initially was seen to be seemingly undecided. The arid land could have been a reflection of what the emotions were that plagued the young woman who was pregnant. The dryness, or lackluster nature of the surroundings mirrored the dryness of the notion of having been presented with an option to take life. In The story of an Hour, we are introduced to the setting of a death that occurred whose news was to be broken to the victims young widow in their house. The author showed us a calm environment where the young widow heard of the death of her husband. Subsequently, she had locked herself in her room to try and grieve. But as her thoughts progressed, we are given descriptions of spring in full bloom outside the house, hand in hand with the gradual uplifting of the widows spirits at the realization of her freedom from the “bending will” of her husband. By showing us snatches of scenery along with the evolution of each female protagonists thoughts, we are shown the development also of the theme in the story. The theme most noticeable was the issue on gender inequality, and the bias against women that was prevalent in those days. Based on the theme, we can see that other than the stories being focused on women, we are shown the struggle of the protagonists regarding issues related to womens rights in the early times. We see the women as being shown to be indecisive, helpless, child-like and “imprisoned” by the simple fact that they are women, and society had no real place for them outside the home and the beyond who they were as domestic partners of the men. In general, we are given themes of despair at the plight of the women being held prisoner by their gender, and the lack of identity they had in the years that these stories came out. We are also shown how each character struggled to make decisions, not because they are incapable, but because the popular belief was that they are “given to fancies” and are weak physically, and that their mental capacities were considered way inferior to that of their counterparts. There was also an undercurrent of hopelessness, hope and freedom that somehow wrapped up each of the stories. This was notable in Mrs. Mallards finally being free, but she had to have died with despair at seeing her hope of freedom dashed to pieces at the arrival of her husband who was alive after all, symbolically misdiagnosed as death from “joy that kills” (Chopin 41). In each of these, we are given a hint of what the story might be about, or what the initial emotions are in each of our subjects, yet the common emotion was despair at not being taken seriously, at having to bend to the will of the “stronger person” symbolized by their husbands. The point of view seen was always from the main character, which in the all three stories was the woman. Regardless of the name, we are presented with the development of the story as seen through the eyes of an individual who existed in a society that inherently refused to see her as a ‘thinking’ individual. We see through a haze of struggle for freedom from the chains bonding the women to individuals considered her superiors, more commonly her husband or male partner. In the three stories, however, we see that the female character was finally able to experience freedom through three very different ways—through death, insanity and silence. There was a decision to be made in the three stories, and in each of them, we see that the authors somehow put the partners of the main characters on an opposing view from the point of view of the female character, emphasizing the differences between them in handling situations. For instance, in Hemingway’s short story, we recall what Jig said, “I don’t feel any way,’… ’I just know things.’ (Hemingway 402). By this we can see that despite what the man thinks, she knows how her decision would impact the relationship that they had, and she knows that she understands her situation. Perhaps we can surmise that from her final statement, she had finally decided, through no talk from him, what she wanted to do about their problem, which was the life growing inside her. It was shown how difficult it must have been to be seen as inferior in terms of control and will such that we would never have expected the female protagonists to succeed in overcoming the imprisonment of their beings until we get to the end when we see that they have succeeded, even if we find their success to have been painfully earned in the end, and we saw them rise -- "Ive got out at last," said I, "in spite of you and Jane. And Ive pulled off most of the paper, so you cant put me back!" Now why should that man have fainted? But he did, and right across my path by the wall, so that I had to creep over him every time! (Gilman 390) REFERENCES: DiYanni, Robert. Literature: Approaches to Fiction, Poetry, & Drama. 2nd edition. McGraw Hill, 2008.  (pages 38-41, 379-390, 400-403). Read More

For The Yellow Wallpaper, the author began with the house and gradually introduces to us what the main character saw initially as the ugly yellow wallpaper. She notices a rather disturbing pattern which gradually developed into an obsession with her. Since our character is being treated for an illness, she was forced to spend as little time as possible in thinking or doing strenuous exercises of the mind, such that her mind became focused on what was most striking to her-- the wallpaper. From the way she started to describe the pattern in the paper, we get a sense of a descent into chaos and doom threatening to overwhelm the character in the story.

Like the pattern, her mind went awry, and would sometimes go follow a certain path before turning back on itself and going an unexpected way. We can also see that the more she tries to figure out the pattern, the more she sinks into a certain despair regarding her plight as a prisoner in her own home and by her own doctor and husband. Like the pattern, we can see her mind going into a kind of chaos of its own making by trying to not think, meaning it was not to function the way it was made for, seeing that it is supposed to be thinking.

In Hills like White elephants, we are introduced to a backdrop of dry white hills that become the initial focus of our protagonist. The young girl in the story was implied to be pregnant, perhaps by the man who was with her in the train station. Here we are presented with how the man seems to imply taking the life that was in her womb to which she initially was seen to be seemingly undecided. The arid land could have been a reflection of what the emotions were that plagued the young woman who was pregnant.

The dryness, or lackluster nature of the surroundings mirrored the dryness of the notion of having been presented with an option to take life. In The story of an Hour, we are introduced to the setting of a death that occurred whose news was to be broken to the victims young widow in their house. The author showed us a calm environment where the young widow heard of the death of her husband. Subsequently, she had locked herself in her room to try and grieve. But as her thoughts progressed, we are given descriptions of spring in full bloom outside the house, hand in hand with the gradual uplifting of the widows spirits at the realization of her freedom from the “bending will” of her husband.

By showing us snatches of scenery along with the evolution of each female protagonists thoughts, we are shown the development also of the theme in the story. The theme most noticeable was the issue on gender inequality, and the bias against women that was prevalent in those days. Based on the theme, we can see that other than the stories being focused on women, we are shown the struggle of the protagonists regarding issues related to womens rights in the early times. We see the women as being shown to be indecisive, helpless, child-like and “imprisoned” by the simple fact that they are women, and society had no real place for them outside the home and the beyond who they were as domestic partners of the men.

In general, we are given themes of despair at the plight of the women being held prisoner by their gender, and the lack of identity they had in the years that these stories came out. We are also shown how each character struggled to make decisions, not because they are incapable, but because the popular belief was that they are “given to fancies” and are weak physically, and that their mental capacities were considered way inferior to that of their counterparts. There was also an undercurrent of hopelessness, hope and freedom that somehow wrapped up each of the stories.

This was notable in Mrs. Mallards finally being free, but she had to have died with despair at seeing her hope of freedom dashed to pieces at the arrival of her husband who was alive after all, symbolically misdiagnosed as death from “joy that kills” (Chopin 41). In each of these, we are given a hint of what the story might be about, or what the initial emotions are in each of our subjects, yet the common emotion was despair at not being taken seriously, at having to bend to the will of the “stronger person” symbolized by their husbands.

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