Behind the Yellow Wallpaper
Event Details
A vivid immersion in a nineteenth century feminist horror classic.
Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860–1935) was an American writer and feminist. Her works critiqued the economic, social and medical systems that enclosed and dehumanised women. Her most famous short story, The Yellow Wallpaper (1899), was written in response to her own treatment by doctors she trusted for a ‘severe and continuous nervous breakdown’.
In her short essay, Why I Wrote The Yellow Wallpaper, she describes how mandated bed rest and reduction to the state of an invalid caused her to ‘come so near the border line of utter mental ruin that I could see over.’
The Yellow Wallpaper gives voice and agency to the narrator, who confronts mental illness, societal repression and, ultimately, the transcendent experience of art. This workshop is structured in the inclusive LitSalon tradition: dynamically facilitated discussion with a weave of contextual information and insights.
JOINING DETAILS:
- A workshop at the British Library led by Toby Brothers and Jane Wymark
- Tuesday 13 February 2024, 6.30-8.30 pm (UK)
- Booking via the British Library website
