Cultural Views Of Women In The Bell Jar By Sylvia Plath

Many women of the early 1900’s wanted to be treated fairly and equally to their male counterparts. For a long time, it was not even socially acceptable for a woman to work. As a woman’s job in society started involving be part of the work force, many

“Look at us! We’re just like everyone else. We’ve bought into the same ridiculous delusion; this idea that you have to settle down and resign from life.” (April Wheeler, Revolutionary Road). It has become a society norm that women are meant to serve housewives; to cook, clean, garden, and nurture children, even though they are much more capable of other things. The role of women is greatly overseen, as they are not perceived to be of their full potential, rather than as societies idealistic expectation. This is because men and those who are wealthy are unable to look past gender and accept women as of equal significance.

The accounting of where Esther is staying shows the normalcy and what the woman's role was in this era. For instance while Esther is describing her hotel she explains, “This hotel--the Amazon--was for women only, and they were mostly girls my age with wealthy parents...and they were all going to posh secretarial schools...where they had to wear hats and

Sylvia Plath is known as a profound writer, depicted by her lasting works of literature and her suicide which put her poems and novel of debilitating depression into a new perspective. In her poem “Lady Lazarus,” written in 1962, her mental illness is portrayed in a means to convey to her readers the everyday struggle of depression, and how it affects her view of her world, herself, and even those who attempt to tackle her battle with her. This poem, among other poetry pieces and her novel The Bell Jar, identify her multiple suicide attempts, and how the art of dying is something she has become a master of. Plath’s “Lady Lazarus,” about her trap of depression and suicide attempts, is effective and thought provoking because of her allusions to WWII Nazi Germany and the feelings of oppression and Nazism that the recurring images evoke.

Everyone deserves the freedom to be who they are without prejudice, without repugnance, and without the fear of not being accepted. In the book The Bell Jar, the author, Sylvia Plath took the reader into the mind of a suicidal woman named Esther Greenwood. The novel was set in the 1950s, a time period in which an ordinary woman is only seen as the person that stays at home as a mother and wife. Howbeit, Esther did not want to become one of the cliched women. In lieu she wanted to be an independent writer that did not get pressured into marriage. The Bell Jar opens the readers up to the ideas of what stereotypes and expectations can do to a person’s self-esteem along with their mental condition. That being said, the theme of The Bell Jar is, the pressure to follow certain stereotypes can lead to a corrupt mental state.

Throughout the novel, Esther struggled with what she felt how a woman in her society should act. At times, she feels as if there is no point to college because most women only become secretaries anyway. She feels as if she should be learning short hand and other techniques she should be learning for the secretary roll, however she does not want to. Esther wants to be a writer, however, during the time of the novel, society gave women the role as housewife. Esther felt pressure to settle down and start a family. No matter what accomplishments Esther achieves in her life, it doesn’t matter too much because they will not do her much in her later life. Everyone expects Esther to marry buddy and start a family. Once she becomes a mother, it would be assumed that she would give up her passion for writing. This discourages Esther because she is not sure that is what she wants with her life.

This shows that women of this time weren’t suppose to take up jobs that weren’t seen as temporary or challenging; they were meant to be stenographers or secretaries (Plath 5); a job that would give them the perfect environment to meet a prospective husband. Women were not to be seen as smart or capable because it was a turn off to men who feared they would be dominated by their wife’s success (Chesler 66). Cee Jay, the editor of the beauty magazine that Esther interns for, is constantly judged by her appearance instead of her qualifications. This is shown when Doreen refers to Cee Jay as not caring about whether Esther has her story turned in on time because Cee Jay is, “ugly as sin” (Plath 5). After this observation is made Esther contemplates how well, Cee Jay does her job when she refers to her as, having “brains” (Plath 6). This is a clear assessment of women’s inferiority in the mid 1900’s, these women of high positions were seen as ugly and masculine (Friedan 58). When Esther meets Dr. Nolan, a female psychologist, she is surprised because she hadn’t realized women could be a psychiatrist or become Doctors. With this encounter Esther realizes women can be very successful in career’s of art and science -careers deemed masculine by society- she realizes it’s okay to

One is often enticed to read a novel because of the way in which the characters are viewed and the way in which characters view their surroundings. In the novel The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath, Esther Greenwood is a character whose "heightened and highly emotional response to events, actions and sentiments" (Assignment sheet) intrigue the reader. One of her character traits is extreme paranoia that is shown in different situations throughout the novel. As a result of this, she allows herself to be easily let down, as she believes that all events that are unsatisfactory are directed towards her. Finally, it is clear that she attempts to escape this notion by imagining an idyllic yet impossible life that she

The events in New York introduce us to the beginning of Esther’s psychological transformation. The story first inaugurates with the

Esther’s mother and society’s expectation as a woman, which is to be a good wife and a mother, suffocate and demoralize Esther’s dream as a professional writer. Esther’s mother wants her to “...learn shorthand after college, so I’d have a practical skill as well as a college degree” (Plath 40). Her mother believes that Esther cannot further advance her education as a writer and simply wants her to be a secretary since professional career for women was uncommon and discouraged because it disturbs the role as a married woman. These pressures often obliged her to fall into the societal expectations, to give up her higher education, and to marry somebody. However, she knew that the marriage and the babies were not for her, “because cook and clean and wash were just about

and she ends up at the psychiatric ward. At the psychiatric ward, Esther ponders about her current status and how she got there, she says, “What was there about us, in Belsize, so different from the girls playing bridge and studying in the college to which I would return? Those girls, too, sat under bell jars of a sort” (Plath 237-238). In this comment, Plath’s voice is more directly heard, as she makes the generalization that all women live under a bell jar, in the sense that social conventions do not allow for individual expression and reduce women to have a supporting role (specifically toward men) rather

Driving to the UN with Constatin, Esther has a significant realization: “I thought how strange it had never occurred to me before that I was only purely happy until I was nine years old”(Plath, 39.) Plath goes on to write about the various things Esther did growing up. “ Girl Scouts and the piano lessons and the water-color lessons and the dancing lessons and the sailing camp”(Plath, 39.) all of these activities can be generally associated with activities that most girls complete upon growing back. All of these stop once her father dies. Esther becomes a character that criticizes and questions the role of women in society.

To Esther, the world seems quite unfriendly, and the novel documents her desperate search for identity and reassurance. Nevertheless, Esther is intrigued by the world around her, and at the start of the book she is seen with a wondrous outlook on life that is reflected in the metaphors throughout the novel (Coyle). In the first half of the book, Esther is fascinated by the medical practices of her boyfriend, Buddy, as well as by current events in the newspapers and the thought of her own future family. As the story progresses, however, Esther becomes indifferent about life, and she develops bitterness toward everything that appears to prevent her from achieving things she wants (Huf). As Esther’s mental state worsens, the metaphors and similes presented to the reader begin to have negative connotations

Throughout the story “The Bell Jar” by Sylvia Plath, Esther’s mental health deteriorates overtime due to various factors in her social environment such as double standards. The novel begins with Esther’s internship at the Ladies’ Day magazine in New York City. Despite living the life every girl wishes to live, Esther is dejected and feels disengaged with the environment around her; thus resulting in the beginning of an identity crisis. Through the events of the story, gender double roles in the areas of education, careers, virginity and marriage affect Esther’s life significantly and it consequently leading to Esther’s confusion with her identity within the society. During the 50s, women were seen to be inferior to and dependent on men as

Sylvia Plath uses many literary devices to convey her purpose in The Bell Jar such as symbolism. The Bell Jar itself is used as symbolic representation of the emotional state Esther is in. The glass jar distorts her image of the world as she feels trapped under the glass. It represents mental illness; a confining jar that descends over her mind and doesn’t allow her to live and think freely. Symbols of life and death pervade The Bell Jar. Esther experiences psychological distress which is a major motif in the novel. The death of Esther’s father and the relationship with her mother is a possible reason for her illness. Sylvia Plath expresses the difficulties Esther faces and parallels her struggle with depression and illustrates it using various symbols such as a fig tree, mirrors, beating heart and a bell jar throughout the novel.