Both The Bell Jar and The Yellow Wallpaper focus largely on psychiatric treatment Compare the ways
The portrayal of the two lead characters’ experiences with psychiatric treatment in The Bell Jar and The Yellow Wallpaper have reinforced realism as both novels are autobiographical fiction, meaning both experiences written about are true, therefore providing the experiences with accuracy. Charlotte Perkins Gilman wrote The Yellow Wallpaper after suffering a long term severe and continuous nervous breakdown. ... This belief is mirrored clearly in The Yellow Wallpaper “ 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 followed her specialist’s advice for around three months, however this applied method of treatment intensely increased her illness until she reached the borderline of complete mental ruin. ... This encountering inspired her to write The Yellow Wallpaper to demonstrate the consequences of confiscating stimulation from someone wanting to recover from nervous breakdowns, or other related disorders. Apparently the famous specialist who worked with Gilman read this story and quickly changed his method of treatment. ... The Bell Jar is a slightly fictionalised account of the summer and autumn after Plath’s first year at college. ... The Bell Jar was written some years following this experience after Plath completed her college career and won a prestigious scholarship to study at Cambridge University. ... Unfortunately Plath committed suicide in 1963 at the age of 31, one year after completing The Bell Jar. ... Gilman was criticising the psychiatric treatment she received and blaming this for her descent to madness, both in reality and the story. She is quoted to say in an article entitled “Why I wrote the Yellow Wallpaper” that her story was “not intended to drive people crazy, but to save people from being driven crazy.” Plath on the other hand places more focus on a struggle to fit within society, emphasising that it was society and life which caused her nervous breakdown and that the treatment actually guided her away from suicide. ... When discussing how psychiatric treatment is portrayed in both novels it is vital to study the language of each. Plath’s writing in The Bell Jar is often very poetic, she uses metaphors to strengthen her descriptions and generate strong images in our minds which is a popular technique with poets when writing in prose. ... With its mysterious and terrifying images, The Bell Jar creates discomfiture on the reader.” The language in The Yellow Wallpaper is more formal than in The Bell Jar as it was written in the 1890’s. ... These descriptions are a lot more simple, as opposed to The Bell Jar’s extensive use of metaphors. This works just as successfully as the imagery in The Bell Jar as we get an insight into the characters mind and experience the mental breakdown in her own view. Gilman uses a clever technique to display the mental breakdown, she refrains from writing long descriptions on anything but the wallpaper. ... ” We can see a clear downfall of any sanity by the way the narrator describes the wallpaper towards the end of the short story. ... ” When comparing the treatment of mental disorders in The Bell Jar and The Yellow Wallpaper it is worth considering the causes of the conditions. Esther’s nervous breakdown is influenced largely by pressure placed on her by society. ... The woman in The Yellow Wallpaper suffers from “temporary nervous depression”, brought on by post natal depression. ... When Gilman wrote The Yellow Wallpaper she sent a copy to H. ... Once she is living in the Ancestral hall she grows obsessed with the yellow wallpaper, and it is this lack of stimulation except for a pattern that tips her over the edge into madness.