For next Tuesday, be sure to: 1) read and annotate Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story, “The Yellow Wallpaper“; 2) write down one instance of the “veil” motif in Du Bois and bring it to class.
For the latter, Du Bois uses the actual term, “veil,” six times in his first chapter. These are pretty obvious instances. Can you find any less obvious or more figurative uses of the image of the “veil”? For example, think about the first sentence of the chapter – – where the “unasked question” appears to function like a veil – – or the use of “shadow,” “shades,” various kinds of darkness, etc. Quote from the Du Bois text, write that quote down on a piece of paper, and deliver that paper to class.
Here are a couple of things to think about as you read and annotate the Gilman story: 1) In “The Dynamo and the Virgin,” Adams sees the dynamo as representative of deeper, more sublime forces, forces that threaten his sense of order. Can you spot similar moments of disruptive, sublime forces in Gilman? 2) In “Of Our Spiritual Strivings,” Du Bois describes “[t]he shades of the prison-house clos[ing] round about us all.” Can you spot similar images or descriptions of confinement – – literal, but especially figurative – – in “The Yellow Wallpaper”? Again, these are only suggestions – – your annotations are your thing.