This short story - I doubt that it is even a novella or novelette - took me a fifteen minute bus ride to read. I had never heard of it before but it is apparently a very early offering in feminist fiction.
A young woman is confined in a home by her husband, a doctor, who assures her that it is for her own best interests. Gradually, she slips into - or seems to slip into - a kind of insanity manifested by her curious relationship with the yellow wallpaper in her room, which she at first loathes but later becomes, shall we say, very comfortable with.
The work is based on the treatment which Gillman herself received from the renowned early psychologist, S Weir Mitchell, and is critical of Mitchell's methods. It's a powerful piece of work, you are never quite sure whether the narrator is sane or not, and the writing constantly propels the reader forward as the volatile patient's attitude towards her husband, the world outside and the yellow wallpaper changes. Well worth reading.
9 out of 10.
