Maternal Geometry in the Female Gothic

 Article

An analysis of the Gothic haunted houses of Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper” and Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House as spaces of Non-Euclidean maternal geometry, where female protagonists explore their relationship to motherhood through interstitial, nonconforming patterns of embodiment and identity.  The paper aims to address a trope that underlies much of the Female Gothic, where space, although potentially terrifying, may also be empowering as women navigate new boundaries and conceptions of the self.