Paracharacterism In The Bell Jar

As the author of the book The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath’s writing can be associated with her real-life struggles. Living as a woman in the 50’s, Sylvia’s realities helped her paint a truthful picture of what it was like to be a woman with depression during this time. Although her openness to express her real-life struggle through text was remarkable, this topic of mental health and depression was unheard of at the time. Esther Greenwood, the main focus throughout The Bell Jar, resembled the life of Plath for her unsteady and rebellious characteristics that often break the social conceptions of what it meant to be a woman with depression. On page 96, Esther stands on top of a mountain with a colorful stream of consciousness that is detailed and fervent as she considers skiing down the mountain. Plath uses imagery and figurative language to convey her feelings of being out of control and absolutely isolated, revealing how women during this time period were forced to keep their true thoughts and emotions to themselves regardless of their mental condition.

During that time period it was expected that women would ”Simply hang around in New York City [or some other city or college] to get married to some career man or other” (Plath 4). Esther Greenwood chose not to have this life. She wanted to be free to explore the world and have her own career. Esther often said “What I always thought I had in mind was getting some big scholarship to graduate school or a grant to study all over Europe, and then I thought I’d be a professor and write books of poems or write books of poems and be an editor of some sort" (Plath 32). In her mind, Esther does not see a life where she stays at home all day and cooks/cleans for the man of the house. She wanted to live the good life and have a man willing to follow her while sharing the work. When the book was published in 1963, women were still expected to do the cooking and cleaning. The Bell Jar was able to knock down some of those expectations by telling the story of a women who would have none it. Those criticisms of society made the book become popular among women and allowed it to come to life even

The pain and trauma that stem from Esther’s illness have warped her view of the world around her. However, this symbol also represents the pressures put on women in the 1950s to be what was considered ideal for women during this era. The bell jar “suggests more than Esther’s inner alienated world”, it also “signifies society which destroys Esther” and “symbolizes ‘scientific punishment’ for non-conformists” (Evans 105). She “must combat the additional alienation of being an aspiring woman in an era of strict limitations for women” which only hinders her further from her goals in life (Axelrod). While many women at the time planned on marrying and settling down, Esther does not view these expectations for women in the same way and instead wishes to be her own independent person. While working as the guest editor of Mademoiselle, a fashion magazine, Esther “suffocates under the bell jar forced on her by a competitive, male-oriented society”(Evans 105). During the fifties women were not expected to have successful careers in general and the male dominant world held a high level of competition; while trying to come out on top in this society Esther ends up cracking under the intense pressure. Representing both the stifling social limits set on women and the protagonist’s dismal mental state, the bell jar is a robust symbol in this novel.

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 and images of life and death pervade The Bell Jar. Esther experiences psychological distress which is a 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

In light of the semi-autobiographical novel known as The Bell Jar, written by Sylvia Plath, there are apparent literary devices in which emphasize the novel thematically. Historically, the novel was published during the heart of the burgeoning feminist movement in the United States of America around 1971. Thus, it rendered Plath to become an icon of the feminist movement due to publication of such a novel that detailed the coming of age story from a woman’s perspective who struggled with external and internal complications in which thwarted her ability to grow and transform as a woman in the restrictive society of America in the 1950s. The story is loosely based upon Plath’s personal experiences disguised under a woman known as Esther Greenwood,

Esther’s problems started during the summer when the Rosenbergs were electrocuted. Her reaction was evidence when she stated that, “the idea of being electrocuted makes me sick and that all there was to read about in the papers—goggle-eyed headlines staring up at me on every street corner and at the fusty, peanut-smelling month of every subway” (Plath, p.1). Esther’s pressure started to mount up that summer. For example, Esther wanted to enjoy herself when in New York but instead she was stressed with unpleasant memories of the Rosenbergs. Because of the Rosenbergs’ forthcoming executing, she viewed 1950s America as unfair and dark causing suffering (Plath, p.1). Again, she felt pressured on how to behave as a female by the society around her. For example, her mother sends her a pamphlet on female sexuality when she was in New York and reminded her to keep her virginity. Lastly, Esther found herself surrounded by eleven other girls who came from a wealthy family background. Esther felt stressed when she could not afford all what the other girls could.

Sylvia Plath’s novel, “The Bell Jar”, tells a story of a young woman’s descent into mental illness. Esther Greenwood, a 19 year old girl, struggles to find meaning within her life as she sees a distorted version of the world. In Plath’s novel, different elements and themes of symbolism are used to explain the mental downfall of the book’s main character and narrator such as cutting her off from others, forcing her to delve further into her own mind, and casting an air of negativity around her. Plath uses images of rotting fig trees and veils of mist to convey the desperation she feels when confronted with issues of her future. Esther Greenwood feels that she is trapped under a bell jar, which distorts her view of the world around her.

The next step was to find the proper sort of man.” My personal notice on Esther’s empowered attitude of not needing nor wanting the metaphorical ‘safety net’ of a man and children I found to be profoundly contradictory in comparison to her other altruistic attitude

The Bell Jar and Its Affiliates Frequently, a writer will express the same symbols and themes in a variety of their works. This is the case with Sylvia Plath, who not only wrote a multitude of poems, but also wrote the renowned novel, The Bell Jar. Three of Plath’s poems that share similar elements to her novel are “Lorelei”, “Daddy”, and “The Applicant”. These ideas include death beckoning the characters, an unstable family unit, and sexism towards women. The poems “Lorelei”, “Daddy”, and “The Applicant” can be compared to Plath’s novel The Bell Jar, by examining the key themes and characteristics of the works.

Esther Greenwood distinguishes a psychological space of the bell jar which separates her self from the 1950’s America. Esther’s disillusionment of social and gender standards allows her to believe that there is air to breathe out side this confinement. To purposely live in a emotion of isolation and indifference in order to obtain her sense of security, Esther has form a psychological space around her which is the bell jar. However, it has come to the readers attention that the protagonist has a need to realise that feeling of being reduced to an object as a human being brings an institutional

Budick considers the fig tree as not only a representation of Esther’s involvement with Buddy, but as a symbol of choices that face Esther as well. In the novel Esther imagines each fig on the tree as a different path she can take in her life. She wants to choose all of them, however she can only choose one. As the heroine is plagued with uncertainty on which path, or fig, to choose, all of the figs die and fall from the tree. Esther associates this with the possibilities in her life slowly disappearing as time passes. Another critic, Marjorie Perloff, relates to Plath’s character,

Sylvia Plath is one of the most popular poets during her time of living. She wrote many poems and even wrote one single novel. She was able to take events in her life to influence the way she wrote. Sylvia Plath even based the main character of the only novel she got to write The Bell Jar on herself and her own experiences. Sylvia Plath suffered through many events that had to do with her health, but she was able to recover from those and it inspired her writing. Much of her writing reflects the suffering that she went through emotionally, physically, and definitely mentally. With her writing and personal life the author of The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath, is able to develop the theme of being successful and overcoming the hard parts of life no matter what the obstacles are.

A woman’s place was thought to be in the home, catering to her husband’s every demand and having babies. If they were not housewives, they were supposed to be secretaries, one of the few jobs seen as fit for a woman. Esther struggled tremendously with this idea. She had no desire to be a housewife under the thumb of a man nor did she want to be a secretary. Esther thought being a housewife “seemed a dreary and wasted life for a girl with fifteen years of straight A’s” (Plath 84). She wanted to be an independent woman and author. This conflict between what she wanted to do and what she felt obligated to do as a woman caused a lot of anxiety for her. “I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn’t make up my mind which of the figs I would choose” (Plath 77) thought Esther. The figs were a metaphor for the different options she had in life. She was unable to choose one due to her inability to figure out who she wanted to be. Society discouraged the kind of woman she wanted to be and encouraged the kind she didn’t. Societal expectations significantly affected Esther’s depression. The anxiety she felt due to her inability to choose what she wanted worsened her

Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar explores the life of nineteen-year old Esther Greenwood, an English major who is rather disdainful toward the 1950’s society she lives in. Esther does not desire to be controlled by society’s gender-based constraints. To add on, Esther feels greatly oppressed by the patriarchal framework constructed. The existence of the “authentic self” is absent in Esther’s life as she embarks on the search for her identity. Despite her successes in school, Esther slowly begins to descend into a mental breakdown since she cannot come to terms with her authentic self. Throughout The Bell Jar, Esther’s identity is constituted through a series of masks, costumes as well as performances. By the end of the novel, Esther escapes from the bell jar by eradicating abnormal and queer desires and recovers by possessing the performance of conforming to the disciplining structures of heteronormative expectations.

The Bell Jar, Written by the Author Sylvia Plath takes place in 1940’s and 1950’s, and brings up the topic of male oppression and the absence of feminism, and the toll it can take on women, specifically the main character Esther. The novel also embarks upon the topic of mental illness, and electrical shock therapy, during this era, and how it affected the character of Esther. What is interesting is that the novel had numerous parallels to the life of its author, which she portrayed through the character of Esther. Like Plath, Esther lost her father at a young age, they both were intelligent where they worked at an internship at a women’s magazine in New York, both were effected by a mail dominated society, and also both suffered from mental