Question

Read the excerpt from “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman and complete the sentences that follow.

Answer 1

The correct answers are the following:

Question 1: option A

The fact that the narrator's own physician husband diagnoses her with "temporary nervous depression" indicates at that time women were not taken in a thoughtful manner. Indeed, there were no men with the same condition.

Question 2: option A

In those times, men were the ones who took all the decisions in the domestic establishment. John, the narrator's husband, decides that his wife needs a treatement for her hysterical affection. As a result, there is nothing she can do because nobody considered what women actually thought.

Answer 2

Answer: A) How the women of the time were not taken seriously; A) Men made all the decisions.

This excerpt from "The Yellow Wallpaper" tells the reader about the social situation of women in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Women at this time were often seen in medical spheres as "weak" or "delicate," and prone to problems of "nerves."

While the rest of the story discusses the dominance of men in the medical field, this excerpt focuses more on how women's opinions and experiences were often dismissed. Even though the woman told her husband about her symptoms, women were not taken seriously enough, and therefore, her thoughts and feelings are dismissed as hysterical tendencies.

Also, the text shows how men made all the decisions in the household. Therefore, even though the woman feels like she needs a different type of treatment, she has to follow her husband and brother's orders, whether she agrees with them or not.