The Effect of Isolation

Through out the story “The Yellow Wallpaper,” written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, and the film, “Santa Sangre,” the main characters finds themselves led into a state of insanity. In the story “The Yellow Wallpaper,” the narrator explains that she is suffering from post partum depression, leaving her husband to treat her with rest cure or bed rest. During this time, she is placed in a solitary room with walls covered in yellow wallpaper. Similarly, through out “Santa Sangre,” Phoenix grows up with his family in a circus, only to end up losing them. He was locked in a trailer as his father had an affair, murdered his mother by cutting off both her arms and then committed suicide in front of Phoenix. He is then …show more content…

Even Phoenix is never really a normal boy, he simply performs for the circus and does not branch out into society. Always living in a fantasy sets him up for even more isolation, as he gets older because he cannot distinguish what is real and what is not.

As Phoenix grows into adulthood, there are several aspects of his life that prove his isolation from society causes him to go insane. One of the aspects is that he ends up in a mental hospital where he is isolated in a room that has four white walls, a tree, and a small window at the top of the room. At the hospital, Phoenix has some interactions with society, but he does not know how to function properly in the society unlike in “The Yellow Wallpaper,” where the narrator has no contact with society. At one point during the film, Phoenix is taken out on the town with other people from the hospital. The entire time, he walks around with a dazed look on his face; he appears to have no emotion. Phoenix is unable to be an efficient part of society. This proves that his time in isolation brings him closer towards being instable.

In addition, the way Phoenix acts in isolation proves his overall insane state of mind. For instance, on a regular basis, he only eats raw fish like it came straight out of a lake; he often climbs up the tree and does flips off of it like a monkey. His actions are those of an animal, not a human. Phoenix does not verbally communicate with the doctors, nor make