The Yellow Wallpaper (1899)

Author: Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Translated back to English from Russian translation (translated to Russian by Sergei Trofimov)

Chapter 10

Original text

I think that woman gets out in the daytime!
And I’ll tell you why–privately–I’ve seen her!
I can see her out of every one of my windows!
It is the same woman, I know, for she is always creeping, and most women do not creep by daylight.
I see her on that long road under the trees, creeping along, and when a carriage comes she hides under the blackberry vines.
I don’t blame her a bit. It must be very humiliating to be caught creeping by daylight!
I always lock the door when I creep by daylight. I can’t do it at night, for I know John would suspect something at once.
And John is so queer now, that I don’t want to irritate him. I wish he would take another room! Besides, I don’t want anybody to get that woman out at night but myself.
I often wonder if I could see her out of all the windows at once.
But, turn as fast as I can, I can only see out of one at one time.
And though I always see her, she may be able to creep faster than I can turn!
I have watched her sometimes away off in the open country, creeping as fast as a cloud shadow in a high wind.

Re translated text

I think the woman comes out during the day! I’ll tell you a secret- I saw her! Yes, I saw her through the window.

It is the same woman, there is no doubt about that. She’s creeping, but most women don’t creep in the daytime. I saw her on a long shady alley, where she was creeping from side to side. Then I saw her in the dark arbors that are twined with vines. She creeps around all of our park!

I saw her on the road under the trees. She was prowling like a dog, and when cars were passing by her, the woman would hide behind the blackberry bushes. I don’t blame her. It must be very humiliating to creep in daytime. I always lock the door when I creep in daytime. I can’t creep at night because John can suspect something bad.

John is very suspicious now! I don’t want to irritate him. It would have been great if he would move to a different room! Besides, I don’t want anyone to see me at night.

I often wonder, can she be seen from all windows at once. But no matter what, I can only follow her from one window. And even though I always see her, she crawls away faster than I can follow. Sometimes I notice how she creeps through an open space – fast, as if it’s the shadow from the clouds in a strong wind.

The Yellow Wallpaper (1899)

Author: Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Translated back to English from Russian translation (translated to Russian by Sergei Trofimov)

Chapter 9

Original Text

I really have discovered something at last.
Through watching so much at night, when it changes so, I have finally found out.
The front pattern does move–and no wonder! The woman behind shakes it!
Sometimes I think there are a great many women behind, and sometimes only one, and she crawls around fast, and her crawling shakes it all over.
Then in the very bright spots she keeps still, and in the very shady spots she just takes hold of the bars and shakes them hard.
And she is all the time trying to climb through. But nobody could climb through that pattern–it strangles so; I think that is why it has so many heads.
They get through, and then the pattern strangles them off and turns them upside down, and makes their eyes white!
If those heads were covered or taken off it would not be half so bad.

Re translated text

I really discovered something important at last.

Observing the changes every night, I finally noticed, that the outside pattern is moving! What will you say about that? And the woman behind it is trembling impatiently!

Sometimes it looks as if there are many women behind the pattern, but sometimes there’s only one of them, and she crawls fast around me. Her movements make the furniture shake. On the bright stripes she keeps calms, but in the shady parts she grabs the bars and shakes them hard.

She always wants to come out. But no one can come out of the pattern, it’s oppressing every one.  This is why there are so many heads. If it was possible to paint over them or take them out, it would look absolutely normal.

The Yellow Wallpaper (1899)

Author: Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Translated back to English from Russian translation (translated to Russian by Sergei Trofimov)

From Chapter 5

Original text:

On a pattern like this, by daylight, there is a lack of sequence, a defiance of law, that is a constant irritant to a normal mind.
The color is hideous enough, and unreliable enough, and infuriating enough, but the pattern is torturing.
You think you have mastered it, but just as you get well underway in following, it turns a back somersault and there you are. It slaps you in the face, knocks you down, and tramples upon you. It is like a bad dream.
The outside pattern is a florid arabesque, reminding one of a fungus. If you can imagine a toadstool in joints, an interminable string of toadstools, budding and sprouting in endless convolutions–why, that is something like it.
That is, sometimes!
There is one marked peculiarity about this paper, a thing nobody seems to notice but myself, and that is that it changes as the light changes.
When the sun shoots in through the east window–I always watch for that first long, straight ray–it changes so quickly that I never can quite believe it.
That is why I watch it always.
By moonlight–the moon shines in all night when there is a moon–I wouldn’t know it was the same paper.
At night in any kind of light, in twilight, candlelight, lamplight, and worst of all by moonlight, it becomes bars! The outside pattern I mean, and the woman behind it is as plain as can be.
I didn’t realize for a long time what the thing was that showed behind, that dim sub-pattern, but now I am quite sure it is a woman.
By daylight she is subdued, quiet. I fancy it is the pattern that keeps her so still. It is so puzzling. It keeps me quiet by the hour.

Re translated text:

In day light I notice an inconsistency – some sort of violation of the laws of graphics. This irritates me terribly! And the color is horrible! It’s unreliable! It makes me mad, but the pattern itself is what makes me suffer. It seems as if I learned it vertically and horizontally, but at the moment I shift my eyes, it performs a back somersault. And after that I do a somersault myself. It slaps you in the face, kicks you in the stomach with its leg, and steps, steps all over you! No this is just a nightmare!

The outside pattern – colorful arabesques – remind me of a fungus. Imagine a toadstool on the stumps! Endless rows of toadstools that sprout and ascend in tediously long curves – this is something that looks like the pattern. But it looks like that only sometimes! And there is something about this paper that no one besides me notices: its changes! Tiny changes!

When the sun shines through the east window – I always observe its long and straight rays- the changes happen so fast, that I can’t catch them. But I always follow them. In the moon light – and the moon in a cloudless sky shines all night – the wallpaper transform into something else! At night, in any light (at twilight, candlelight or lamplight, but the worst is the moonlight) the pattern becomes a grid. And behind the bars there is a woman who flounces out. Now I see her clearly.

I couldn’t understand for a long time, who or what is behind the grid. In the beginning it was a vague figure. But now I know, it is a woman. In the daylight she is submissive and quiet. The pattern of the wallpaper holds her still. This is actually not surprising; it holds me still for hours as well.

The Yellow Wallpaper (1899)

Author: Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Translated back to English from Russian translation (translated to Russian by Sergei Trofimov)

From Chapter 4

Original text

Of course I never mention it to them any more–I am too wise,–but I keep watch of it all the same.
There are things in that paper that nobody knows but me, or ever will.
Behind that outside pattern the dim shapes get clearer every day.
It is always the same shape, only very numerous.
And it is like a woman stooping down and creeping about behind that pattern. I don’t like it a bit. I wonder–I begin to think–I wish John would take me away from here!

Re translated text

I will, of course, not say anything. I am too wise and I continue my observations. I found such things on this wallpaper that no one else besides me will know – even if they want to! Every day, vague forms appear behind the external painting.  They are always the same shapes but there are more and more of them. They remind a woman who fell on her stomach and creeps fast on the pattern. I don’t like her. I wonder… I begin to think… I want John to take me away from here!

The Yellow Wallpaper (1899)

Author: Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Translated back to English from Russian translation (translated to Russian by Sergei Trofimov)

From Chapter 3

Original text

I lie here on this great immovable bed–it is nailed down, I believe–and follow that pattern about by the hour. It is as good as gymnastics, I assure you. I start, we’ll say, at the bottom, down in the corner over there where it has not been touched, and I determine for the thousandth time that I will follow that pointless pattern to some sort of a conclusion.
I know a little of the principle of design, and I know this thing was not arranged on any laws of radiation, or alternation, or repetition, or symmetry, or anything else that I ever heard of.
It is repeated, of course, by the breadths, but not otherwise.
Looked at in one way each breadth stands alone, the bloated curves and flourishes–a kind of “debased Romanesque” with delirium tremens–go waddling up and down in isolated columns of fatuity.
But, on the other hand, they connect diagonally, and the sprawling outlines run off in great slanting waves of optic horror, like a lot of wallowing seaweeds in full chase.
The whole thing goes horizontally, too, at least it seems so, and I exhaust myself in trying to distinguish the order of its going in that direction.
They have used a horizontal breadth for a frieze, and that adds wonderfully to the confusion.
There is one end of the room where it is almost intact, and there, when the crosslights fade and the low sun shines directly upon it, I can almost fancy radiation after all,–the interminable grotesques seem to form around a common centre and rush off in headlong plunges of equal distraction.
It makes me tired to follow it. I will take a nap I guess.

Re translated text

I lay down for hours on this huge un-liftable bed – it is probably nailed to the floor – and peer at that pattern for hours. I assure you, it’s not too bad for a gymnasium. A usually start from the lower angle, where the hand of the painter did not touch the wallpaper, and for the thousand time I catch myself examining that meaningless pattern again.

I’m weak at understanding compositions of painting, but I know, that this pattern was made against the laws of radiation, alternation and symmetry. The lines are the only ones repeated, nothing more. If I look from one side, every line is standing vertically on its own, swelling with curved lines and curlicues – sort of a “Romanesque style” from delirium tremens. The pattern goes away in brush strokes up and down and dissolves in idiotic tails. But on another side, the stripes are intertwined in a diagonal, the stretched forms run away in oblique waves, like seaweed that was hacked with a screw.

The painting can also be tracked horizontally – at least, that’s how it seemed at first, but I exhausted myself with attempts to determine the order in this direction. They used a horizontal line for the frieze, and this miraculously adds to the confusion. In one edge of the room the yellow wallpaper was almost untouched, and here, when the day was passing away, and the low sun shined directly over it, countless forms would appear in the middle of the wall and hurry to the edges, absorbing into emptiness with the slightest distraction.

Oh god I am so tired from examining this wallpaper. I probably should nap for a little bit.

The Yellow Wallpaper (1899)

Author: Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Translated back to English from Russian translation (translated to Russian by Sergey Trofimov)

From Chapter one:

Original text

The paint and paper look as if a boys’ school had used it. It is stripped off–the paper in great patches all around the head of my bed, about as far as I can reach, and in a great place on the other side of the room low down. I never saw a worse paper in my life.
One of those sprawling flamboyant patterns committing every artistic sin.
It is dull enough to confuse the eye in following, pronounced enough to constantly irritate and provoke study, and when you follow the lame uncertain curves for a little distance they suddenly commit suicide–plunge off at outrageous angles, destroy themselves in unheard of contradictions.
The color is repellent, almost revolting; a smouldering unclean yellow, strangely faded by the slow-turning sunlight.
It is a dull yet lurid orange in some places, a sickly sulphur tint in others.
No wonder the children hated it! I should hate it myself if I had to live in this room long.

Re translated text

The wallpaper looked as if children painted scribbles over it. Above the bed head, higher, than I could reach, and in many places on the opposite wall – gaped large stains of ripped out wallpaper. I would never choose an ornament like this one. It was tasteless, gaudy and dull enough to embarrass the gaze: and at the same time precise enough to constantly irritate. This ornament urged for study, but at the moment the eyes would focus on the incorrect lines from a close distance, they suddenly disappeared, transforming into outrageous angles and dissolve in unprecedented contradictions.

The color of the wallpaper was repealing. It seemed almost disgusting – sort of a dirty yellow and smoldering fire, strangely faded under the sun light. In some places it was penetrated by a fire-orange tone, but mostly it was ill, greenish-yellow.

No wonder that the kids didn’t like the wallpaper. I hated it myself already, even though I wasn’t living in that room yet.