The Yellow Wallpaper Women

In the short stories, “Cat in the Rain” and “The Yellow Wallpaper,” both short stories describes the life of two women and their relationship with the people, specifically men, around them. In the “Cat in the Rain” it describes an American wife who develops an attraction to the hotel’s padrone as she wanders out to save a cat in the rain, while her husband, George, stays up stairs in the hotel room. On the contrary, “The Yellow Wallpaper” tells a story about a female who is trapped in a nursery as a solution her husband, John, proposes for her “disease.” In both short stories, the relationship between the female and the male characters are unhealthy and destructive since both the male counterparts are ignorant and dismissive of the female’s
Just like George, John is dismissive towards his wife. John uses his authority as a doctor and husband to talk down to the narrator and traps her in the nursery. The narrator states, “John does not know how much I really suffer. He knows there is no reason to suffer, and that satisfies him.” (Steton 649). This illustrates how John is unwilling to understand the narrator’s condition and how he is acting ignorant to her situation. John also does very little to show that he cares for the narrator. He is constantly going to town and leaves his sick wife for his sister, Jennie, to take care of. The narrator also states, “ I tried to have a real earnest reasonable talk with him the other day, and tell him how I wish he would let me go and make a visit...But he said I wasn’t able to go, nor able…” (Steton 651). This clearly show how dismissive John is towards the narrator. He completely shuts her idea up and believes that he knows how to cure her. John neglects the narrator’s proposals and fails to listen to what she has to say. Just like the American wife and George, John and the narrator also lacks proper communication for a healthy
In both stories, the husbands were ignorant and dismissive towards the wife and develops a sense of dominance. Both George and John prevent their wives from speaking their opinions, and ultimately enforcing a controlling and demanding demeanor. Their neglectance and controlling presence creates a unhealthy relationships since both their wives create a relationship with someone else to express themselves. In the “Cat in the Rain” the American wife develops an attraction towards the hotel’s padrone because she was unable to receive the attention from George. Similarly, the narrator in “The Yellow Wallpaper” develops a relationship with the girl in the wallpaper because John was unable to listen and understand what she was going