External Conflict In The Yellow Wallpaper, By Khaled Hosseini
763 Words4 Pages
Conflict often arises in a literary work causing the protagonist to face the issue. In literature, these conflicts are commonly referred to as an external conflict or an internal conflict. An external conflict is a struggle between a character and an outside force, opposed to an internal conflict which is a struggle between a character and themselves. An external conflict can be observed in the short story “The Yellow Wallpaper”, written by the American writer Charlotte Perkins Gilman. In the short story, the narrator’s conflict is caused by her husband. An internal conflict can be seen in the novel The Kite Runner, written by Afghan-American author Khaled Hosseini. In the novel, Amir’s conflict is brought upon by himself. This essay will analyze…show more content… Her husband John constrains her physically in a single room in their summer home and mentally by not allowing her to write in her journal, crippling her imaginative personality. John’s instructions determine the narrator’s life as she is under his treatment. He has such a powerful control over her, everything she does revolves around him, “John says the very worst thing I can do is think about my condition, and I confess it always makes me feel bad. So I will let it alone and talk about the house” (Gilman 86). Even in her own thoughts, the narrator is reflecting John’s opinion. She chooses to focus her attention onto the house to mask her true feelings. To avoid thinking about her depression and her marriage, she begins to focus her attention to the wallpaper. She analyses the pattern and its color, eventually becoming obsessed. Struggling to maintain a balance in her life, the narrator takes to her secret journal as relief from the instability in her life. This allows her to maintain her sanity temporarily. Battling her repressive treatment only worsens her depression and eventually causes her to spiral into