Analysis of the Husbands' Perception of Their Wives as Babies Incapable of Walking the Life Path - Research Paper Example

A Critical Analysis of the Husbands’ itarian Perception about their Wives as Babies Incapable of Walking the Path of Life on their Own Both Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper” and Kate Chopin’s “Desiree’s Baby” deal with the patriarchal perception of a woman as a petulant child –incapable of walking through the path of life on their own- that, therefore, can be pampered, chastised and even be physically forced to follow the guidance of their male counterparts. These authors attempt to propound that the social institutions of marriage and family are structured in such a patriarchal manner that these institutions themselves advocates for the husbands’ superiority perpetuating the inferiority and subservience of the wives. In such patriarchy-shaped institution, even the most passionate relationship allows little scopes for the women to have their ‘say’, since male-lust and carnal hungers remain disguised under the facades of love and passion. Both Gilman and Chopin’s are loved, and then toyed as a petulant baby that is capable of nothing, but of creating childish nuisance for their husbands. Both Desiree’s and the protagonist of Gilman’s story husbands appear to be authoritarian patriarchal figures that strictly exert their restrictive authority over their wives. The slight difference between Armand’s (Desiree’s husband) and John’s (Jane’s husband) authorities is that whereas John’s sincere restriction imposed upon Jane pushes her towards horrible psychological transformation, Armand abandons Desiree considering her as a sex-machine that has failed to produce his desired result. Like most other feminists in the 19th Century Gilman attempts to dig up the root of patriarchy built in the familiar structure of the social institution of family. Indeed Gilman has challenged this patriarchal attitude towards women as a child with psychological deficits. Thrailkill Fagan Jane notes that Gilman’s story originates in her own experience as he says, “the real purpose of the story was to reach Dr. S. Weir Mitchell [Gilman’s husband], and convince him of the error of his ways” (47). In the very first place she has put the traditional husband-wife relationship in the conventional marital institution, into question, which is commonly acknowledged as healthy and hailed as the safest place for women after their marriage. In the story, Gilman propounds that a type of superiority complex of the patriarchal authority of the male dominated society lies in there beneath this apparently universal aspect of a husband’s love or care for his wife. Scrutinizing John’s (a proper noun denoting commonly the male counterpart of a marital bond) caring activities from a woman’s perspective, she rather vindicates that women like Jane are not active and equal participants in the love-game with their husbands like John. In most cases, women are no match for their male counterparts in this husband-wife love game. Rather they are considered as the most delicate, the weakest, the most fragile and incapable of walking through the path of life on their own; therefore like a baby, they are to be tended delicately, to be cosseted and pampered by their husbands. Gilman further shows that such love and care of a husband, indeed, linger a woman’s inferiority in her household by delaying her maturity. In cases it deteriorates a woman’s psychological condition often pushing her to the verge of insanity. But in the “Desiree’s Baby” Chopin has approached towards the traditional concept of love and passion between a husband and a wife from a different angle. For her, the terms “love” and “passion” are ultimately the productions, of patriarchy, which are intended to keep the male-lust and male-desire under the mask of euphemism. In the traditional husband-wife relationship, love is ultimately means of male exploitation. (Wolff 45-46) But this love, the mask of male-lust, gets dissolved when confronted with major choices of life. First Armand suddenly falls in love with Desiree: “Armand Aubigny riding by and seeing her there, had fallen in love with her” (Chopin 34). The narrator of the story draws the readers’ attention to the peculiarity of Armand’s love: “The wonder was that he had not loved her before” (Chopin 34). Indeed at this point, Chopin enigmatically refers to the underlying male-lust in Armand’s sudden and convulsive amorous feelings for Desiree. The passion that “awoke in him that day” essentially is a man’s sexual infatuation and obsession with the opposite sex. Such passion occurs suddenly with the huge unleashing strength of an avalanche, or a prairie fire, or “anything that drives headlong over all obstacles” (Chopin 33). The author’s disparaging remark comes along subsequently: “That was the way all the Aubignys fell in love, as if struck by a pistol shot” (Chopin 33). The phrase “all the Aubignys” commonly refers to any man’s sexual lust for a woman. Indeed Desiree and even Armand are not aware of the true nature of the love that goes on between the two. In such love, she serves as a mere pacifier of her husband’s carnal desire. (Wolff 36) Desiree and Jane appear to be babies imprisoned in the luxuries provided by their husbands. Being married to the wealthy scion Armand, she lives in a great of deal of material happiness and luxuries. The “yellow stuccoed house”, the “quadroon slaves”, the “great mahogany bed, that was like a sumptuous throne” etc are reminders of Desiree’s material happiness in her wealthy husband house. In the beginning of the story, she is found to be happy also with condition in the house. Yet like a toddler she trembles at the frown of her husband. She becomes flooded with happiness when Armand smiles: “When he frowned she trembled, but loved him. When he smiled, she asked no greater blessing of God” (Chopin 34). Like Desiree, Gilman’s protagonist also lives in grandeurs and abundance of material happiness. Jane describes the grandeur of her husband’s house: “The most beautiful place... It makes me think of English places…for there are hedges and walls and gates that lock, and lots of separate little houses for the gardeners and people” (Chopin 34). Amid these grandeurs, Gilman’s protagonist is imprisoned by her husband’s authoritarian view about her illness. This imprisonment is not visible in plain eyes; rather it is to be perceived. Indeed both Desiree and Jane are their husbands’ property and at the ends of the stories they lose their usefulness. Therefore, Desiree is thrown away because of her supposed color, while psychologically transformed Jane’s fate remains unknown. Both authors portray the traditional authoritarian patriarchal figures in their stories. Whereas Gilman’s protagonist John appears to be a restrictively caring husband, Armand appears to be a wealthy owner who owns Desiree along with others in her possession. The fact that the girl does not have any family-given name does not bother Armand: “He was reminded that she was nameless. What did it matter about a name when he could give her one of the oldest and proudest in Louisiana?” (Chopin 33). It is because he does not need the personal or individual Desiree. Rather he needs the corporeal Desiree that can fulfill Armand’s desire of having sex and having an heir for his ancestry. A beautiful nameless girl who does not have any personal identity could fulfill all these necessities of Armand. But the true nature of Armand’s love –that is his need of Desiree’s bodily existence- gets unfurled after Desiree’s usefulness becomes challenged by her supposed race. When Armand confronts with the question of Desiree’s race, her physical value as the pacifier of her husband’s carnal desires diminishes. Therefore, as a prudent slave-owner he chooses to replace her. This authoritarian behavior of Armand is also visible in his interpersonal relationship with his wife. As an authoritative figure, he has achieved the skill to make his wife tremble simply by frowning. But this frown is certainly invisible; “When he frowned she trembled, but loved him. When he smiled, she asked no greater blessing of God. But Armand's dark, handsome face had not often been disfigured by frowns since the day he fell in love with her” (Chopin 34). Gilman’s protagonist’s husband’s authoritarian attitude is evident in his continual refusal to view the narrator-protagonist as a mature individual capable of deciding what is best for her and the protagonist continues to comply with the expectation of her husband. In other word she has to comply with the expectation of the male dominated society. The narrator’s husband John ironically thinks that she is feeble, biologically incapable and childish. But internally the protagonist of the story believes that she is capable of doing anything she likes. But John ironically believes that intellectual work like writing is harmful for the narrator, since according to him woman are unimaginative petulantly childish. Apparently John seems to be a very caring husband. He appears to be aware of the needs of her wife. But in reality, John never can read the protagonist’s mind. He suggests that keeping away from any kind of ‘work’, that is, being inactive can cure her. But the irony is that John course of treatment rather deteriorates her situation. The depression becomes worst and the narrator is pushed towards the verge of insanity. The narrator is also aware of the reverse effect of John’s treatment, as she says, “I sometimes fancy that in my condition if I had less opposition and more society and stimulus—but John says the very worst thing I can do is think about my condition, and I confess it always makes me feel bad. So I will let it alone and talk about the house” (Gilman 68). John continually underestimates the protagonist’s psychological paranoia. He refuses to perceive the narrator’s psychological malady, because he does not think that women also have mind as men do. So the protagonist’s psychological condition is fairly underestimated by John, as the narrator says, “If a physician of high standing, and one’s own husband, assures friends and relatives that there is really nothing the matter with one but temporary nervous depression—a slight hysterical tendency—what is one to do?” (Gilman 67). On the surface level, John or the narrator’s husband appears to be a physician of high social standard who passionately cares for his psychosis-affected wife. In the story John has been characterized though the narrator’s eye. The story is to be read neither as the narrator’s complaint against John nor her judgment for the imposed rest cure prescribed by her husband. Rather the narrator’s yearning for a bit more freedom runs throughout the whole story in a self-excusing confessional mode. (Bak 41-2) Indeed this self-excusing confessional mode of the narrative evolves from her self-perception as a woman in a male-dominated society in which she can only beg pardon for her desire for more freedom, since she cannot challenge her husband’s approach and attitudes towards her as an immature child from whom freedom of doing intellectual and outdoor physical works is supposed to be harmful. (Bak 35) Gilman’s narrator never makes any complaints against this attitude towards her. Rather her self-excusing yearning for more freedom boosts up the ironies of John’s attitude towards her wife. Indeed the feminist theme of the story achieves its highest expression through the use of irony, as in this regard Barbara A Suess says, “Any astute reader cannot help but perceive the conscious irony inherent in Jane's overt pairing of her awareness of John's counterproductive medical advice with her (supposed) verification of his sagacity and devotion” (5). In a flawless physical setting of the story, the readers become aware of the sufferings of the Protagonist Jane only through the ironies. Apparently John appears to be a caring husband who is excessively aware of the needs and wellbeing of his wife. But this excessiveness of the husband’s devotion and restrictive approach towards the narrator ultimately reveal his perception about his wife as a child who is incapable of deciding what is good for her health. The readers are eventually provoked to question whether the restrictive environment which he creates for his wife is to be considered as a forced imprisonment imposed on the narrator. Gilman’s story speaks more of the patriarchy’s attitudes towards women’s mental illness, in the 19th century, which was considered to be the result of extensive brainwork. Especially in women’s case, brainstorming was thought to be more detrimental to women’s psychology. Consequently women are commonly kept away from brainwork such as reading, writing, mass education, and from any other intellectual works. Indeed, the main line of the story “The Yellow Wallpaper” has greatly been shaped by a major event of Gilman’s life, as Thrailkill says, “The Yellow Wallpaper draws heavily on a particularly painful episode in Gilman’s own life” (67). In 1886 after the birth of her daughter, Gilman becomes a victim of severe depression. In a book, “The Living of Charlotte Perkins Gilman” Gilman admits that her “unbearable inner misery” is worsened by her husband’s presence. Her husband, Weir Mitchell, nervous specialist prescribed her “rest cure” or “forced inactivity” as her treatment that rather worsened her condition further (Gilman 79-82). All her condition was conveyed into the story “The Yellow Wallpaper”. The stories, “The Yellow Wallpaper” and “Desiree’s Baby” story deals with the inferior and subservient position of women within the patriarchal structure of a family where women’s are treated more as babies than wives. But the fact how Gilman’s technique of characterization is associated with this theme is obviously critical not only for its deftness to portray a woman’s status in a family under the trammeling grip of her husband, but also for its manifold application that essentially can vindicate a number of patriarchal aspects that are often ironical. In contrast to Gilman’s approach to expose the institution of marriage as a source of patriarchal oppression, Chopin has attempted to uphold a husband’s “love”, “passion”, etc as patriarchal discourses for cloaking and euphemizing male-desire or male-lust. Works Cited Bak, John S. "Escaping the Jaundiced Eye: Foucaldian Panopticism in Charlotte Perkins Gilman's 'The Yellow Wallpaper'." Studies in Short Fiction. 31.1 (1994): 39-46. MLA International Bibliography. EBSCO. Web. 25 Feb. 2010. Chopin, Kate. "Desiree's Baby." 1893. The Heath Anthology of American Literature Late Nineteenth Century 1865-1910. Ed. Paul Lauter. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2006. 359-363 Gilman, Charlotte Perkins, “The Yellow Wallpaper”, Feminist Story Collection. New York: Bookshaw. 1998 Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. The Living of Charlotte Perkins Gilman. New York: Penguin, 2006. Suess, Barbara A. "The Writing's on the Wall: Symbolic Orders in 'The Yellow Wallpaper'." Women's Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 32.1 (2003): 79-97. MLA International Bibliography. EBSCO. Web. 25 Feb. 2010. Thrailkill, Jane F. (2002). "Doctoring 'The Yellow Wallpaper'," ELH, volume 69, issue 2. Wolff, Cynthia Griffin. “Kate Chopin and the Fiction of Limits: Desiree’s Baby.” Short Story Criticisms: Excerpts from Criticism of the Works of Short Fiction Writers. Vol. 8. Detroit: Gale Research Inc., 1978. Read More