[ SECRET POST #5066 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #5066 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 25 secrets from Secret Submission Post #725.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[fscom]

06. https://i.imgur.com/oB7EL5y.jpg

Transcript Please

[(Anonymous)]

Would anyone mind writing a transcript? I can't read this one, and I really want to see a secret about the Yellow Wallpaper.

Re: Transcript Please

[case]

I read this story as a teen and assumed it was a ghost story where the narrator was gradually being possessed. I thought this for about a decade until a friend told me it was actually about sexist repression of women.

I had picked up on the sexism in the story, but I thought it was to show that no one was listening to her when she tried to tell them about the spirit that was taking over her mind.

Either way, it's still a horror story, just of two different kinds. I still like my interpretation better though.

Re: Transcript Please

[(Anonymous)]

Thank you Case! <33

Re: Transcript Please

[(Anonymous)]

Thank you!!!

[(Anonymous)]

... is this one of those re-submitted secrets? I'm having a strong sense of déjà-vu.

secret op

[(Anonymous)]

No, I made it new last Friday

[(Anonymous)]

I remember feeling so sad for the narrator when I read this book. She couldn't do anything when they put her in that room, not even hold her baby, and it made me wonder how many women there had been in the past in her position. I lowkey used to wish for a sequel when I was younger because I really wanted to know if she ended up being okay in spite of what happened at the end.

[sparklywalls]

In a way she's still being haunted (and losing a sense of herself in the process) so your original interpretation isn't completely out there to me.

I really loved this story in my teens as well. It was pretty interesting reading your take, brought back a lot of memories of myself and a friend (I sadly no longer talk to) going over the text and talking about it like it was our job.

[(Anonymous)]

It's kinda both? Totally valid to read it as a real ghost story. A lot of the really good horror is just... entwined with the social commentary, yeah?

[(Anonymous)]

Uh, I guess it's all up to interpretation, but while I also assumed it was a ghost story. It's actually (apparently) just about a woman slowly descending into madness. The moving images in the wallpaper is a common hallucination when it comes to delirium. If I wanted to get all introspective about it, it makes more sense to me that it would be more of a commentary about the inevitability and existence of madness in each and every soul and the losing battle as people attempt to ward it off... or something. Definitely not sexism.

[(Anonymous)]

"The Yellow Wallpaper", while it is a solid ghost story, is also a direct response to the "Rest Cure" - a practice that would theoretically cure a (generally middle-class) woman's anxiety by shutting her away from all stimulation, company, exercise... and drove them up the wall instead. Charlotte Perkins Gilman experienced this, and the doctor who prescribed her the "Rest Cure" read the story and reconsidered his practices.

CPG was an extremely feminist writer and trying to read anything of hers without considering what she was saying about gender roles is like, I dunno, looking at a flower garden when you're red-green colourblind. It can be done, but you're going to miss important shit.

[(Anonymous)]

ayrt

That's a good point, I wasn't familiar with her story so I didn't think to connect it in that way. I love the story when I read it a fair number of years ago and it was briefly discussed in a class in high school. I am vaguely familiar with rest care though, most I recalled the part where they moved up north for better access to clean air (I think) which I know was a common recommendation for basically all aliments to get them away from city pollution.

[(Anonymous)]

ayrt

Well, it's the sign of a good story that it works even if you don't know the entire context of how it got written, so, yeah.

Sorry if I came across as a bit snippy, nonny.

[(Anonymous)]

That's not rest care, that's trying to treat TB in a sanitorium. (Obviously it didn't cure TB but the clean air often helped with the coughing.) Rest care was specifically used on women, particularly women who had post-partum depression.

[(Anonymous)]

it's about a woman being locked up her husband and doctor 'for her own good' until she goes completely fucking insane
of course its about sexism

[(Anonymous)]

I love how you completely ignored the conversation that already happened half an hour ago just to try to be an asshole. Good job, I'm glad only your opinion counts in the world.

[(Anonymous)]

I like your interpretation, anon. I read this book hoping for what you were interpreting, but with the knowledge it was a feminist writing. Knowing that made the story lose some spark, tbh. I probably need to re-read it, but I didn't really enjoy it.

[(Anonymous)]

The interpretations don't seem incompatible to me. IMO, the horror of the story lies in being denied help and not being believed as a woman, which is honestly just as effective for me (as a survivor of medical abuse) whether it's a mundane or paranormal affliction. IDK, I like your reading of it.

[(Anonymous)]

I prefer it as weird fiction where the MC is made vulnerable by her own struggles exacerbated by misogyny and her goddamn fucking husband. Like, is the consensus that he was trying to get rid of her? Because there's no way he thinks he's actually helping her, jesus.

Ultimately it doesn't really matter if the wallpaper was really some non-euclidian runes that summoned forth a possessing monster, but I like it more if that's what the character thinks.

[(Anonymous)]

I thought that during that time period, sticking her in the attic and not letting her do any kind of work was what they thought would help her. If that's the case, her husband probably thought he really was helping her.

[(Anonymous)]

It sounds crazy to us, but there was a time in history when people DID think these types of treatments helped, which is why they were so common. Women were put in asylums against their will for lots of trivial, nonsense reasons like being "promiscuous", "hysteria", going through menopause or just being more trouble than their families wanted to handle. Some of the commitments were likely spiteful. But keep in mind that the general medical consensus at the time had some nutty beliefs about what would help a woman who was depressed, etc.

[(Anonymous)]

I thought it was eerie because I thought she fantasized out of boredom and went crazy and was absorbed into the yellow wallpaper!

[(Anonymous)]

Best take tbh

[meadowphoenix]

Well I really do think sexism haunts us, and it can garner a similar reaction as ghosts when some people, mostly women, are the only ones who can see it