Gregoire 1

Isabel Gregoire
Mrs. Kirschner
English 2 Block 3
14 December 2015
Sexist Literature
Gender plays an important and unique role in every time period. Even today women are
not treated as equals in places. In these stories, the men are controlling and hold leadership
positions in the government and in these womens lives. Women were treated as fragile pieces of
their husbands property or lonely castaways in The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins
Gilman, The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, and in The Story of an Hour by Kate
Chopin while men are treated superior and do not have the same complications that some women
do.
In The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the narrator is a young woman
who has just given birth to a child. Her husband, who is a physician, deems her incapable of
taking care of the child because she has post partum depression. The narrator says that her
husband does not believe [she] is sick! And what can one do? (Gilman 1) meaning that she
knows that she has no say in her treatment. The narrator is not taken seriously when she
expresses her opinions on her sickness and she is not allowed to write because her husband
thinks it is bad for her. She says that [John] hates to have [her] write a word because he thinks
it is bad for her. She has no say in her treatment and care, which is typical for women in this
time period.
In The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, the main character is a female who is
punished for her actions. Hester, the main character, has committed a sin with a man and is

Gregoire 2
being punished but her partner in crime is unknown. At first, Hesters community wanted to
know who her partner in crime was and they even bribed her by saying speak out the name [and
we] may avail to take the scarlet letter off [your] breast (Hawthorne 58). Hester is treated
differently than her fellow sinner. She is punished while her fellow sinner hides for a number of
years. It seems as if the town forgotten that there was another individual who committed
adultery and needed to be punished.
In The Story of an Hour by Kate Chopin, Mrs. Mallard is treated like a moving van
worker would treat a glass table, very carefully and slowly. Mrs. Mallards husband was thought
to be killed in a railroad incident. When her sister broke the news to her, great care was taken to
break [the news of her husbands death] to her as gently as possible (Chopin 1). Her sister and
her husbands friend thought she was fragile because her now deceased husband kept her
somewhat shielded from the outside world.
All three of the women in these stories are judged by their actions and are not given the
power to make decisions for themselves. In The Yellow Wallpaper the main character is
misunderstood, in The Scarlet Letter the main character is punished, and in The Story of an
Hour the main character is treated as a fragile piece of her husbands property.