Symbolism in The Yellow Wallpaper.

In the yellow wallpaper, several symbols are used to show the oppression of women by men and the struggle against that male dominated society. While many symbols could be seen from the text to support this, there are three predominant symbols throughout the story that lend credence to the woman's suffrage theme. The yellow wall-paper itself is symbolic of the law that men attempted to place on women during the 1800s. The color yellow is often referred  with sickness or weakness, and the writer's mysterious  is a symbol of man's opinion  of women. The two windows from which the writer often peers out of, observing the world but apart from it, is representative of the possibilities of women if seen as equals by the opposite gender.
The yellow wall-paper, of which the writer declares, "I never saw a worse paper in my life," is a symbol of the hate  that men attempted to enforce upon women . Gilman writes, "The color is hideous enough, and unreliable enough, and angry enough, but the pattern is torturing"  this is a symbolic metaphor for restrictions placed on women. The author is saying subliminally that the denial of equality for women by men is a "nasty" act, and that when men do seem to reward women some measure of that equality, it is often "unreliable." The use of the words "infuriating" and "torturing" are also descriptions of the feelings of women in 19th century society. Here Gilman gives her personal opinion, saying that if women are given the same rights as men that women society would do it better.