Real Estate Agent 1: This “colonial mansion, a hereditary estate” situated in the beautiful English countryside “stands well back from the road, three miles from the village” (1). “Delicious garden,… large and shady, full of box-bordered paths, lined with long grape-covered arbors with seats under them” (1). Downstairs bedroom “opens onto the piazza with roses all over the window” (1). Upstairs bedroom “a big, airy room, the whole floor nearly, with windows that look all ways, and air and sunshine galore” (1). Extraordinary shady estate perfect amount of escape to a beautiful place, not to far from village life.
Real Estate Agent 2: The haunted house stands alone a far three miles from the village (1). Upstairs bedroom with barred windows has not been used in years (1). Rings and tings in the upstairs bedroom’s walls left over from its use for a boy’s school(1). Repellant color scheme with a smouldering unclean yellow and a dull yet lurid orange (2). All the windows allow for one never to be alone and always watched. The sunlight gushing in has caused fading to the once unique estate. Now “reaches the height of romantic felicity” (1).
[View this as "John" is the real estate agent 1 and Gilman is real estate agent 2. ]
Note: I feel like John's view of the world is just like that of a real estate agent in the sense that he sees only what he wants to see (I also feel that many guys feel this way present day, but that is another day's topic). Gilman's view of the world is not only distorted at this point in her life, but is constantly watched, which makes it hard to make an accurate judgement upon how she really sees life. People who are constantly being watched, know it and act differently... so when she gets those few fleeting moments to write, I feel as though she doesn't know if she should still be acting on the page (where she draws in parts of how John feels about things) or if she should say how she truly feels. And this constant not knowing how to behave, could drive a person mad.
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