Celebrated feminist writer Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860–1935) was born in Hartford, Connecticut. She is perhaps best remembered as the author of the short story ‘The Yellow Wallpaper’, which details a woman’s descent into madness after she is cooped up in a misguided attempt to restore her to health. The story was a clear indicator of Gilman’s views on the restraints of women and related to her own treatment for postpartum depression.

Catherine J. Golden is professor of English and the Tisch Chair in Arts and Letters (2017–22) at Skidmore College. She is author of Serials to Graphic Novels: The Evolution of the Victorian Illustrated Book (2017), Posting It: The Victorian Revolution in Letter Writing (2009), and Images of the Woman Reader in Victorian British and American Fiction (2003). She is editor of Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s The Yellow Wall-Paper: A Sourcebook and Critical Edition (2004), co-editor of The Mixed Legacy of Charlotte Perkins Gilman (with Joanna Zangrando, 2000), and a regular contributor to the Victorian Web and Illustration Magazine, a British arts journal.