A Comparison Of Bell Jar And Duncan In The Way

The novel, The Bell Jar, is a half autobiography and half fictional story written by Sylvia Plath. It follows the main character, Esther Greenwood, in first person point of view through the comforts of high society in college all the way to the asylum for the insane. While the setting is in the 1950's, the book has stood the test of time by not only being a story that discusses difficult issues but also challenges the social pressures of that time.

Coming of age is defined as the transition from one’s youth to his or her adulthood. Romeo and Juliet by Shakespeare, House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros, and Lord of the Flies by William Golding all explore this concept. Romeo and Juliet is a story about two star-crossed lovers in the depths of forbidden love despite an ancient family feud. House on Mango Street is a series of vignettes about a young Latina girl’s life growing up in Chicago. Lastly, Lord of the Flies is about a group of abandoned children who work to survive on a deserted island. Each of these stories provides details as to what characteristics define a mature individual, and they also show the various processes to achieve this maturity.

In The Bell Jar, Esther finds it extremely difficult to put her thoughts into words. She loses friends as she is unable to communicate with them. She lacks relationships due to her silent behaviour. “The silence depresses me. It isn’t the silence of silence. It’s my own silence,” (Plath 18) she says. Although at first Esther feels upset by the lack of connections she has, she loses motivation to even try and explain herself to others. Unlike Mr. Chance in The Cloud Chamber, and Deborah in I Never Promised You a Rose Garden, Esther’s mental state does not improve, and she is unable to resolve lost connections. Esther’s mother tells her, “the cure for thinking too much about yourself is helping somebody who is worse off than you” (Plath 161). However, in her case, she’s so disconnected from the people who were once a big part of her life, that she doesn’t know who to reach out to. She doesn’t see herself being capable of maintaining stable and happy relationships with others when she can’t even maintain her own happiness.

People's lives are shaped through their success and failure in their personal relationships with each other. The author Sylvia Plath demonstrates this in the novel, The Bell Jar. This is the direct result of the loss of support from a loved one, the lack of support and encouragement, and lack of self confidence and insecurity in Esther's life in the The Bell Jar. It was shaped through her success and failures in her personal relationships between others and herself.

For most adolescents, the coming-of-age period can challenging and painful. For Esther Greenwood in “The Bell Jar” by Sylvia Plath, however, coming-of-age is literally life-threatening. As she notices the differences between herself and her friends and attempts to find meaning in her life, Esther regresses into madness, and then makes several unsuccessful attempts to end her life using various means. The source of Esther’s discontent, however, is never entirely clear. In, “The Bell Jar” by Sylvia Plath, the author expresses that Esther’s journey and events are that of a coming-to-age realization or story for her.

In the life of a teenager, negative experiences are sometimes inevitable. As adolescents transition into young adults, there i’s no doubt that they would sometimes feel down because of a few traumatizing experiences. These negative experiences could range from a whole variety of reasons. In fact, sometimes adolescents feels as if they have no control over the situation which is evident with the character Melinda in the book Speak. On the other hand, teens are sometimes subjected to very sudden harsh and traumatic changes in one’s life which they have to cope with and learn from which can be seen with Andy and Shane in the book Skud. Along with that, there were and still are other teenage

Meg Jay touched based on the topics that most Twentysomethings are dealing with in their lives, in her book, the defining Decade. Whether it have to do with the finding their identity, love, or just understanding how our brains work. Meg Jay wrote, “Our 20s are the defining decade of adulthood. 80% of life 's most defining moments take place by about age 35. 2/3 of lifetime wage growth happens during the first ten years of a career. More than half of Americans are married or are dating or living with their future partner by age 30. Personality can change more during our 20s than at any other decade in life. Female fertility peaks at 28. The brain caps off its last major growth spurt. When it comes to adult development, 30 is not the new 20. Even if you do nothing, not making choices is a choice all the same. Don 't be defined by what you didn 't know or didn 't do.” Twentysomethings have this sense of fear when entering the real adulthood life almost like they are falling and do not know how to fly yet. In The Defining Decade, Jay touches base on these feelings that her own patients had, and connects them to how many other Twentysomethings are feeling.

On the cold fall evening of September 29th, I chose interview my dad, James Fisher, about his experience of coming of age. He has affected my life, so I wanted to see what affected his life. When I met with James Fisher, he was very enthusiastic. I asked him to sit down with me.

Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar is a work of fiction that spans a six month time period in the life of the protagonist and narrator, Esther Greenwood. The novel tells of Esther’s battle against her oppressive surroundings and her ever building madness, this is the central conflict throughout the narrative. After coming home from a month in New York as a guest editor for a magazine, Esther begins to have trouble with everyday activities such as reading, writing and even sleeping. Her mental state decreases rapidly until she eventually attempts suicide. During the rest of the novel Esther recounts her experiences in recovery until she finally plans to leave the hospital. Even though Esther’s

In general, I liked the ending of the Bell Jar. The fact that you don’t know the ending intrigues me and makes me think of many different scenarios for what happens to Esther in the future. A quote that caught my attention was “But I wasn’t getting married. There, I thought, to be a ritual for being born twice” (244). This quote could have many different interpretations. I interpreted it as figurative sense in the fact that Esther was born twice and has had two lives. The first life of hers was when she was in the city and got into a deep depression. As for her second life Esther was hoping she could get out of the mental facility and start a new life of her own.

The Bell Jar explores a number of themes and topics that were relevant in the era in which it was written: the 1960s. The novel itself was based in the 50s, a decade before Plath had published it. It explores Esther Greenwood’s battle with depression, a mental illness that was aided by the time period in which she developed it. A significant part of Esther’s depression stemmed from the societal pressures placed on women in that particular period. Societal expectations placed on women deeply affected all aspects of their lives.

The world is filled with an infinite amount of human possibilities; however, this spectrum of "infinite possibilities" can slim down to one because an individual can succumb to peer pressure. Their thoughts and actions are altered according to the respective environment they associate themselves with. They may or may not face the reality at one point in the future, but the chances for that are slim because naive minds are susceptible to adapt according to their surroundings. In other words, the individual will conform to the social construct in order to fit in. The character Esther Greenwood, from The Bell Jar, a nineteen year old adult living independently in New York City experiences this. She suffers from the pressures of her society; this leads her to adjust her actions according to these pressures. She was expected to fit the “image” that was socially acceptable – a pure women until marriage, but a mother and wife after. Esther feels isolated from society if she attempts to be a “normal” girl, but this makes her stand out. Because of the hardships Esther faces with men and society, she has a hard time trying to figure out what to do with her future. Similarly, in A Room of One’s Own, by Virginia Woolf, women have to adjust to the expectations set for them by their societies. Woolf provides a “real life” story to demonstrate the ways in which women were looked down upon for writing rather than fitting the acceptable womanly image. The guidelines given by Virginia Woolf

With time to reflect I’ve realized a failure is not necessarily the end; one can always turn a failure into a learning experience. I understand now the importance of both seriousness and fun in life; the simultaneous importance of self-gratification and of the hard work needed to get there. The most important thing for me to realize was when to put such concepts to use. I now know I can have fun, even if I define it differently than others. I recognize the importance of what I am doing as an individual and how my actions now will aid me in the future. Growing up, to me, means accepting blame and changing to learn from it. I accept the self-given blame for not trick-or-treating and not believing in a toy-giving man with a beard and continue to learn from these experiences that there is a time to be serious and a time to let go. With more being expected of me as years pass, I continue to apply the idea of failure leading to success as I know a failure is not the end, but just the

Thesis: In The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath utilizes an autobiographical protagonist to express purity versus impurity, as well as mind versus body in a world of double standards.

Coming of age as a story theme illustrates a character’s growth and maturity as they transition from child to adult by way of either a single event, or a series of events. Coming of age is a popular theme in young adult and adult fiction alike, capitalizing on the fact that almost everyone remembers their youth and looks back on those years with strong emotions, either positive or negative (40-43, Benedetti).