Howell Eglin

Mrs. Pritchard
English II-American Literature
December 17, 2015

Madness is a theme displayed through many of the literary works

that we have read this year. Also, the two works show unstable
marriages, which can lead to madness. Two works that have shown
madness, even though they were written in different literary
movements are, Rip Van Winkle, and The Yellow Wallpaper.
Washington Irving wrote Rip Van Winkle, and Charlotte Perkins
Gilman wrote The Yellow Wallpaper." Although these works were
written in different literary movements, they are still much alike in that
they both suggest a theme of madness in their personal way. Rip Van
Winkle was written in the literary movement of Romanticism, and
The Yellow Wallpaper was written during the Realism movement.
Other themes are present throughout this work, but both stories share
the theme of madness.
Madness is shown throughout Rip Van Winkle in that Rip is a man
who is annoyed by his nagging wife. Due to this, he hikes to the
Kaatskill Mountains and falls asleep for twenty years. One taste
provoked another; and he reiterated his visits to the flagon so often
that at length his senses were overpowered, his eyes swam in his

head, his head gradually declined, and he fell into a deep sleep.
(Irving 16) The initial escape is mad in itself because no ordinary man
would hike up mountains just to get away from his wife. However, Rip
does, and he falls into a deep slumber. Little did he know, he had
woken up twenty years later. As he approached the village he met a
number of people, but none whom he new, which somewhat surprised
him, for he had thought himself acquainted with every one in the
country round. (Irving 17). This selection shows that Rip was confused
that he had woken up twenty years later, but he figured out that he
had in fact gotten away from his nagging wife. The slumber represents
madness because a man, Rip was able to get away from his problems
and nagging wife by falling asleep for twenty years. This is mad in its
own regard. Furthermore, what was a cause for this madness were the
marital struggles between Rip and his wife. He felt like she was always
nagging him, and this drove him to take a hike up to the mountains.
The theme of madness carries on to The Yellow Wallpaper.
In The Yellow Wallpaper, the main character is the narrator, and
she becomes crazier and crazier throughout the story. She is going
under care for depression. Her husband is a physician, which makes it
ironic that she would be going crazy. However, due to her condition,
she spends a lot of time alone in the house. The wallpaper in the
bedroom captivates her. The narrator feels that her escape from her
illness is writing. I think sometimes that if I were only well enough to

write a little it would relieve the press of ideas and rest me. (Perkins
3) This shows that she really enjoys writing, yet she is not of the health
to actually do so. The wallpaper in the story is slowly driving the
narrator to be crazier with the help of her prior condition. It is the
strangest yellow, that wall-paper! It makes me think of all the yellow
things I ever saw--not beautiful ones like buttercups, but old foul, bad
yellow things. (Perkins 8) This wallpaper is truly captivating the
narrator. After the narrator has spent extensive time with the
wallpaper, she said she has grown somewhat fond of it, but soon
enough the wallpaper begins to dominate her imagination. Soon, she
finds a mark on the wall that seemed as if someone had been crawling
against the wall. She feels that there is a woman trapped inside the
wallpaper. This all just has to correlate to the theme of madness. The
woman has literally gone mad. The theme of madness that is shown in
both The Yellow Wallpaper and Rip Van Winkle is interesting
because they both came from different literary movements.
Rip Van Winkle is a romantic piece from the Romanticism
movement. This story is representative of romanticism because it
places faith in the power of the imagination, hence the deep slumber
for twenty years. Also, it celebrates the individual freedom, which is
what Rip was able to receive in the end. However, while there are
many characteristics of Romanticism in Rip Van Winkle, the theme of
madness is still there. On the other hand, The Yellow Wallpaper was

written during the time or Realism. A characteristic of Realism that is

shown in this story is that the character is defined realistically by the
authors characterization. This helped develop the narrators character
more than usual. Through Realism and Romanticism, the theme of
madness was still able to emerge in both pieces of literature.
Despite the difference in their respective literary movements, The
Yellow Wallpaper and Rip Van Winkle were able to develop a theme
of madness. This theme was displayed through the main characters of
the story as well. While themes of love and isolation are also shown
somewhat throughout these stories, madness was the one that
connected them the most.