Discussion: The Yellow Wall Paper and The Cottagette

“The Yellow Wallpaper” is written in first person narrator as recognize by the use of “I” in text and the narrator is telling about what she sees, thinks, feels and what her experiences are in the story.  In the story, the narrator describes how she sees and thinks the house as “I would say a haunted house “(Pg 1) and she describes her feeling of someone is staring at her from the pattern of the yellow wallpaper in her bedroom as “There is a recurrent spot where the pattern lolls like a broken neck and two bulbous eyes stare at you upside down” (Pg. 4). I think it is an unreliable narrator because there are many areas that she mentions them but no further explanation are given and the sentence that gives me the narrator is unreliable is that when she talks about the smell as “I thought seriously of burning the house –to reach the smell. But now I am used to it. The only thing I can think of that it is like the color of the paper! A yellow smell” (Pg.9). I think this is the narrator’s distorted thinking and confusing me.

According to Merriam Webster dictionary, the meaning of the word “dystopia” is:  an imaginary place where people are unhappy and usually afraid because they are not treated fairly.    I think “The Yellow Wallpaper” is dystopian because the narrator is unhappy about the bedroom,   the work she is forbidden for taking care of her baby like other mothers, and not to write.

“The Cottagette” is also written in first person and reliable narrator since there is nothing confusing or distorted thinking. The meaning of the word “utopia” is:  an imaginary place in which the government, laws and social conditions are perfect. I think “The Cottagette” is utopian because everything in the story is perfect for both Mr. Matthew and Malda like they love each other, to get marry, the beautiful place they both like and most important thing that Malda doesn’t need to cook and Mr. Matthew loves her as a painter.

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