Comparing The Rocking Horse Winner And The Yellow Wallpaper

Being Unique Before Fitting In During the 1950s, a majority of women were expected to live up to certain standards. Each member of the family was expected to act a certain way and fit into the mold of society. Woman in the 1950s typically did not look at a man on the side of the street to see what is inside a bucket, let alone even stop to ask what is in the bucket. But the mother in “Bucket of Blood” written by Katherine Waugh displays a different approach to life and her family. She displays how every family is unique and it is okay to be the one that stands out.

Money and the pursuit thereof has often proven itself to be disastrous to the balance of society and the interworking of the human mind. In The Rocking-Horse Winner, by author D.H. Lawrence, readers begin to see the psychological effects of the never ending pursuit of riches. The main character, Paul, learns the devastating consequences of greed at a young age, when he discovers that he has special talent for picking the winning race horses. Having grown up in a family that craves a lavish lifestyle that they can not afford, the boy sees this as an opportunity to provide for his mother and the rest of his family. Nevertheless, the situation escalates into an obsession that he will never recover from.

Hester’s Challenge In the novel, The Scarlet Letter, Hester is a very strong and independent woman. She goes through all the judgement from the townspeople alone without anyone but Pearl by her side. Hester’s life becomes very tough after the scandal. Reverend Dimmesdale, the father of Pearl, does not assist Hester in the raising of Pearl; he only watches them from the outside.

As a photographer myself, the theory of punctum is not unknown to me; however, the application of the concept of punctum towards the perfomativity of a photograph is unchartered territory. The photograph I chose to analyze is Dorothea Lange’s renowned portrait Migrant Mother, which is a Great Depression-era photograph featuring a migrant farmer, and is among the most famous photographs from this turbulent chapter of American history. The raw emotion in the mother’s face, paired with her body language and grimy appearance, captivates viewers; however, it is not the mother that makes this image so powerful to me, but rather, the turned away children framing their mother. This detail adds a new dimension to the portrait for me.

Mother Archetype Mothers are seen occasionally as the strangest, craziest, altruistic people who have ever been encountered. However some argue that they are the complete opposite. The basic perception of mothers that they are loving, caring, and very nurturing, and this makes up the mother archetype, not only modern day but records and perceptions that date back to ancient history. Although it has come along way, Mothers play a very important role in modern day theatre, literature, and even stories dating back to the biblical era. In ancient texts, we see this role being played by Thetis, Achilles mother in Greek mythology.

The success of “The Yellow Wallpaper” and Jekyll and Hyde is due to its psychological effects brought upon their main characters, due to their doppelganger. The Yellow Wallpaper and Jekyll and Hyde are two different short stories that were both written during the 19th century, which both have a similar style in which they convey a message relating to the norms during that era. The comparison between the main characters and their doppelgangers are raised by creating conflict between the two characters. The woman in the wallpaper from The Yellow Wallpaper and Hyde from Jekyll and Hyde have a psychological effect on the main characters particularly by creating havoc and aid, but affecting them in a different way. Charlotte Perkins Gilman and Louise Stevenson use the doppelgangers of the main character in order to create havoc

In the 1930s, harsh weather conditions in the United States turned fields into dust and caused many Americans to suffer through extreme hardship and poverty. Many migrant families were destitute as they struggled just to survive. Dorothea Lange captured the plight of one of these families in her photograph Migrant Mother. The photograph depicts a family suffering from extreme poverty, but it also demonstrates the determination of a mother to do her best to care for her children and to endure through difficult times. The mother and her children are severely impoverished.

The pressure to display wealth in society is an ongoing concern, one that has been present since social and economic classes were first introduced into society. “The Rocking Horse Winner” by D.H. Lawrence and “The Necklace” by Guy De Maupassant are two short stories that display what this kind of pressure can do to a person and their family. Both Authors lived around the same time, only a few years after socioeconomic classes were first introduced into Europe. The financial situation of Mathilde Loisel from “The necklace” ends up leading to more hardships. Their biggest problem is that Mathilde and Hester (from “The Rocking Horse Winner”) put their social appearance above other people in their families.

Greed is the only sin that will tear mothers from their children and families. In the year of 1926, the new founded author D.H Lawrence had witnessed many years of poverty within his own community and even family. Having been in such a poor situation, he was inspired to write a novel to show how less fortunate families reacted to not being able to afford living, representing how greedy they can be. Within the story he included realistic problems that were present within 1920’s America, specifically gambling and the lust for money.

The Rocking Horse Winner by DH Lawrence, critiqued from a psychoanalytic point of view emphasizes the key theories and aspects of the human psyche that Sigmund Freud hypothesized. In The Rocking Horse Winner, the Oedipus complex, the three zones of the Human Psyche and the exploration of Freudian Infantile behaviour are seen throughout the text to best describe the child 's deep desire, where all of his actions have motivation and reason, even if he was not consciously aware of them (class notes). The Oedipus complex is explored throughout the text, it is a term developed by Freud in his theory whereby the child develops an unconscious rivalry with his father competing for the love of his mother (class notes). This is evident when the young

Although Trifles and “The Yellow wallpaper” were both written by women, they were also apart of the time period. Gilman wrote stories as in this such for women to gain confidence and encouragement for a positive change in themselves (Tanski). Writing these books during a time they were in could help women become strong and, furthermore, be more independent. " The Yellow Wallpaper" is Gilman's semi-autobiographical story of taking Dr. S. Weir Mitchell's "rest cure" to alleviate her depression after the birth of her daughter (Nadkarni). She also suffered from depression.