The Rocking-Chair

by Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Genres: Classics, Fiction, Short Stories, Horror, American

16 pages, Unknown Binding

Published January 1, 1893

About the author

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

She was the daughter of Frederic B. Perkins.

Reviews

[Zamantha · Rating 5 out of 5]

there’s no way they weren’t gay

[juni · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.8

“i will live no longer with a liar and a traitor.” “then you will have to kill yourself.” i was GAGGED

[sonam karma tshomo · Rating 4 out of 5]

"the unacknowledged attraction of the fair unknown."

"hal was a merry, prosaic, clear-headed fellow, and i sensitive and romantic. the fearless frankness of family life we shared, but held the right to unapproachable reserves, and so kept love unstrained."

"hers was a strange beauty, infinitely attractive yet infinitely perplexing."

"are you hurt, my dear boy?"

"i could not bear to tell that man, my more than brother, that he lied."

[yvette ★ · Rating 3 out of 5]

idk if they were fighting over the girl or their feelings towards eachother

[makayla · Rating 3 out of 5]

they were gay

[kheeia · Rating 4 out of 5]

will reread on pride month ❤️🌈

[Wende · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was WILD but then again most of Gilman is.

[Hephaestus Aexander Morrisette · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was fruity. Then... Idk

[ajš౨ৎ · Rating 3 out of 5]

surprisingly I enjoyed this one more than 'The Yellow Wall-Paper", maybe I set too high expectations for it. anyway, I enjoyed the portrayal of men-men and men-women relationships through this short story!


overall I think this is the last Charlotte Perkins Gilman work I'll read - her writing doesn't do much for me, the style is not my cup of tea and I usually prefer (ironically) 'longer' short stories

[Iam · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5/5
I'm not sure how I feel about this but I feel that was the point.
It had me captivated.
A tale as old as time, two men competing over a woman, letting it come between their friendship and the inevitable death.
The woman being real or not does not change anything in the outcome, but of course in the execution

[Julia · Rating 3 out of 5]

fruity

[maddi · Rating 4 out of 5]

They were def gay

[lilly golota · Rating 4 out of 5]

let maurice kiss boys challenge!!! he clearly wants hal. “iago is a repressed homosexual”

[marina · Rating 4 out of 5]

4,75

en the rocking-chair dos hombres están tan obsesionados con la idea de una mujer y con que el otro pueda estar con ella, que acaban volviéndose locos

me ha gustado mucho, tiene una forma de escribir que la mejor palabra que se me ocurre para describirlo es eerie y para quien le guste leer según la estación sería buena lectura de otoño

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

Again, mega kort verhaaltje

[Adeeba Shark]

A little horrified.

[Anouk Martens · Rating 4 out of 5]

Die waren heel gay.

[ტუნგუსკა · Rating 5 out of 5]

რა კარგი ჰორორი იქნებოდა სანახავად...

[Leona · Rating 2 out of 5]

Idk how I feel about the fact that it’s a ghost story, the ending was the best part. (no, I’m not saying that I liked it because it ended)

[Rawan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I did not focus on the story as much as I focused on the relationship between them. As my fellow readers say. They’re definitely gays 🤣

[andreea · Rating 3 out of 5]

« i will live no longer with a liar and a traitor. »
« then you will have to kill yourself. »
FLABBERGASTED

is this about the ghost girl or their feelings?? fruity

[Viamaria · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cute ghost girl messes with two idiot men. I like :)

[Diana Lungu · Rating 5 out of 5]

And historians will call them: Close friends, besties, roomates…
Very “The human chair” like, it gave me a sense of terror that only the idea of someone hiding in your most personal space can trigger.

[Ophilia Adler · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ok short story, didnt really grip me like her other stories

[Apostolos Skotis · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Rocking-Chair is a nice short story about two friends that one day happen to gaze upon a woman sitting in a rocking chair by a window and are instantly captivated by her beauty. This leads them to book two rooms in the same hotel she apparently stays at and an endless quest to meet her. Gilman does an amazing job describing the ever-growing obsession of the friends with getting to that rocking chair and speaking to her. That obsession leads to a tension between them that slowly builds throughout the story, as both of them start to "see" the other getting closer to their desired woman and their own chances slipping away. This all culminates in a thrilling final confrontation between the two men, which finally addresses the lingering mystery and leaves us with even more questions to ponder.

While a really short story, it was captivating enough, I liked the twists, and generally enjoyed it. If it was only up to the story itself, I would have happily awarded it four stars. My gripe with it, though, is the underlying message trying to be conveyed. Gilman is well known for her pioneering work in feminist literature and her finest work, The Yellow Wall-Paper, while not as enjoyable a story as this one, it had a much better arguement. For that reason, it resonated more with me than this particular story.

From what I interpreted and, through my research, many others also, this story is about the objectification of women in the minds of men. I can see the point Gilman is trying to make here, the two friends only ever saw a silhouette of the woman and immediately fell in love, rushed to meet her, and as the days went on; fell harder for a portrayal they had each weaved in their minds. The mystery and the alure of that woman drew out their most toxic behaviors, destroying their long friendship.

But I believe we have to contextualize a few things. The two friends, at the start of the story, saw a woman they both liked the appearance of and tried to get her attention and "shoot their shot". There is nothing inherently bad with that. The next couple of days, they were faced with a peculiar situation, as when they got back from work, while standing in the street in front of the hotel, they could see that the ghost woman was in their room, sitting in the rocking chair, rocking back and forth and smiling at them. They would both immediately shoot up the stairs, individually as they did it in secret from each other, and enter *their own room* only to find only a fleeting shadow of her and hear her far-away laughter. This continued for multiple days as both tried to no avail to get close to her. But, if we take a second and look from their perspective, each day they come back to see the woman, sitting *in their room*, teasing them and laughing when they get close. They probably believe, and rightly so, this is just her flirting with them. But even if they don't and even if she is the landlady's daughter which we learn later that she isn't this is still their room that they booked and overstep no boundaries by entering. After that, they start seeing the other getting closer and closer to the woman without telling them, believing their friend is having relations with her behind their back. In the end all the lust towards that woman and the growing resentment towards each other can be justified by the fact that she is not a real woman, but (probably) a ghost. They are subject to fake scenes of a woman first flirting with them and getting close with their friend instead. These are not real and are shown to both of them, so when the confrontation happens, the distrust and resentment toward each other is the only natural conclusion. Any allegory attempts are also poor, in my opinion, because no *sane* man will reach that level of delusion. Having fantasies about a person you like is normal and happens by both genders on normal levels.

In conclusion, I really like the story as a fictional, supernatural thriller. I also really like the message trying to be conveyed, especially in the 1900s when this was published. It was another brave attempt at change by Gilman. But, I think the message falls a little flat and the story should have been tweaked in service of that.

[booksandreads8 · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was such an eerie and interesting little gothic story. What begins as a simple curiosity about a girl sitting in a rocking chair slowly turns into something much darker and more unsettling. The atmosphere builds quietly, and before you realise it, the tension between the two men becomes the real focus of the story.

What I found most fascinating was how the woman at the center of it all is barely known to them. She is mostly just a figure in the window, yet both men project so much meaning onto her. Their fascination quickly turns into suspicion and jealousy, and their friendship slowly begins to unravel. In many ways the story feels like a commentary on how easily women can become objects of imagination and desire, with men creating stories about them without ever actually knowing who they are.

The rocking chair itself adds this strange, haunting presence to the story. It almost feels symbolic of the obsession that keeps returning and pulling the characters back in. By the end, the supernatural element leaves you with more questions than answers, but that ambiguity actually makes the story linger longer in your mind.

For such a short story, it touches on quite a lot. Jealousy, illusion, obsession, male rivalry, and the danger of projecting fantasies onto someone who remains unknowable. The ending is quiet but chilling, and it made the whole story feel even more unsettling in retrospect.

[The Other Silas · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love the idea and exploration of obsession, especially when it's symbolized by a seemingly benign object. The friendship between these two men is something they're almost proud of.

"Better a nightmare than a contradiction; a vampire than a quarrel."

But how quickly that undying bond dissolves in the face of their obsession with an elusive woman. It's one of the most common tropes in fiction, the friendship between two more-than-brothers dissolving over a woman and of course, the woman is always the one blamed. But what if the woman was never there? An elusive figure, a phantom neither of them can catch, and their own perceptions making them think the other has a closer bond with her than them. The moving of the chair to symbolize how much it's haunting them, the physical injuries symbolizing the cracks in their friendship, and in the end, the death is not caused because a woman drove Hal to it, it's caused at Maurice's provocation. The woman was never there, the men were the cause of their own destruction. She? She was merely a conduit, a phantom that haunts, a symbol and nothing more.

Beautiful. Beautiful story.

[Ru · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.25

The Rocking-Chair is the short story of two men, seemingly very close, who move into a rented accommodation after seeing a beautiful, golden haired woman rocking in a chair in the window.

This is a short, creepy and perfectly enjoyable story. It didn't blow me away, but the little messages about petty jealousy and the mockery of men fighting for a woman was nice. Similarly to the short story I read prior, An Extinct Angel, there was nothing wrong but nothing stood out to me or really caught my attention.
The ending was a little rushed though, a lot of things happened in too few pages which is a theme in Gilman's work so far. Most of her stories could do with a few extra pages of depth and development.

[Jayy Fourth · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great story I would love to read more of Charlotte Perkins Gilman, it's really different from the yellow wallpaper, and that makes the story really unique, it's different, and also intricate on details, even though it's a short story, it never misses to emphasize "The Rocking Chair" and my thoughts during reading this story is that I think the girl doesn't exist, so they're kind of in a delirium, the narrator sees his friend with the girl, his best friend seeing the narrator with the girl, the unstoppable rocking in the rocking chair at night, so yeah this ghost or spirit is messing their friendship, and also using someone's death as the story resolution kinda caught me of guard to be honest.

[Elle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Despite the fact its only 16 pages long, and isn't as notorious, widely known and unsettling as The Yellow Wallpaper, I did actually quite enjoy this little short story.

It seemed it did what it set out to do. It made me curious as to what exactly was going on (and despite knowing that the probability was ghost, I still wasn't sure at some parts), it set up a journey/development of the characters (even if that development of character was going down rather than up) and used language to really convey emotions/the obsessive nature Maurice shows throughout the story.

Other people didn't seem to like it much, but I thought it was a good little piece.