In This Excerpt From Her 1898 Book Women and Economics, Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935) Presents a Passionate Argument for Women’s Economic Independence. Gilman, a Leading Feminist of the Time, Describes the Painful Cost of the Limitations Forced Upon Women’s Lives – “the Smothering ‘no’ Which Crushed Down All [women’s] Human Desires to Create, to Discover, to Learn, to Express, to Advance…” Unable to Pursue Their Lives as Freely as Men, Women of the Time Were Forced to Channel All Their Energy Into the Home, Stifling Their Full Potential and Forcing Them Into Dependency. This Selection Has Been Translated to Persian by Tavaana. While Gilman Reached Fame During Her Lifetime for Her Feminist Writings, After Her Death She Passed Into Obscurity, Until Feminists of the 1970s Rediscovered Her Literary Work. Gilman’s Short Story “the Yellow Wallpaper” Was Hailed in Particular as a Striking Illustration of the Repression Women Suffered, Both Through Marriage and Through Medical Practices of the Time. The Themes of Repression and Stifled Hopes That Charlotte Perkins Gilman Wrote About Have Gone on to Echo in the Writings of Virginia Woolf, Kate Chopin, and Other Female Authors.
