The NLM exhibit “The Literature of Prescription,” which looks at the impact and the medical knowledge of the day presented in “The Yellow Wallpaper” will run February 26 – April 6, on the second floor of the UTHSC Health Sciences Library and is sponsored by the Library’s Health Science Historical Collections. It is available for viewing 24/7 with badge access.
In the late 19th century, at a time when women were challenging traditional ideas about gender that excluded them from political and intellectual life, medical and scientific experts drew on notions of female weakness to justify inequality between the sexes. Artist and writer Charlotte Perkins Gilman, who was discouraged from pursuing a career to preserve her health, rejected these ideas in a terrifying short story titled “The Yellow Wallpaper.” The famous tale served as an indictment of the medical profession and the social conventions restricting women’s professional and creative opportunities.