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.

Charlotte Perkins Gilman (July 3 1860 – August 17 1935) was a prominent American sociologist novelist writer of short stories poetry and nonfiction and a lecturer for social reform. Her best remembered work today is her semi-autobiographical short story The Yellow Wallpaper which Charlotte Perkins Gilman wrote after a severe bout of postpartum psychosis. She was a utopian feminist during a time when her accomplishments were exceptional for women and Charlotte Perkins Gilman served as a role model for future generations of feminists because of her unorthodox concepts and lifestyle.