The Bell Jar By Sylvia Plath

It is exceedingly common for humans to use fictional writing in order to express their hardships in life. It is clear to researchers that Sylvia Plath wrote The Bell Jar for this sole purpose. Plath faced many struggles in her short life, all of which were explained in her novel. There are a plethora of studies that easily show the similarities between The Bell Jar’s Esther Greenwood and Sylvia Plath. They both faced trauma, depression, and issues with self worth.

As one of the most renowned and well-known literary critics in the world of composition, Harold Bloom has self-importantly granted himself the privilege of specifying the reasons as to why we read. From human connection to self-actualization to the acquirement of knowledge, he adheres passionately and unquestionably that “the strongest, most authentic motive for deep reading…is the search for a difficult pleasure.” Bloom, as an experienced critic, fully recognizes the task of judging a book for its merit.

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.

Suicide was a major problem among many generations of teens that grew up in brutal societies. In the 1950s, suicide was not widely mentioned, and many people suffered without any treatments. In the novel The Bell Jar, by Sylvia Plath, Esther tried to kill herself multiple times. Her life was planned by the society, and she was pressured into fitting in with others. Esther’s mental problems took over her life, and caused her to lose out on her teen years. She was a successful college student, who won scholarships, and was working at a fashion magazine. However, she went through many events that caused her to accept suicide as a way of running away from her problems. In the novel The Bell Jar, by Sylvia Plath, Esther’s mental illness began to have an effect on her when she interfered with Buddy, Marco, and Dr. Gordon.

Esther Greenwood suffered through multiple difficult times that wore down on her mental state. She fell sick from food poisoning, was electrocuted through shock therapy, and underwent dangerous suicidal thoughts. Each time when she persevered through the pain, she emerged a stronger, newly-born person. In The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath uses plot development and characterization to illustrate that often times, painful experiences are necessary for a person to progress in life.

Protagonist: Esther Greenwood. A young college girl, that is going through some hard times. She doesn't know what she wants to do with her life, which is what is giving her those sad feelings. She suffers from depression and is very suicidal throughout the entire story. She is trying to overcome mental illness.

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 Bell Jar The novel The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath centers around a college-aged woman living in the eccentric city of New York, New York. Esther Greenwood won a scholarship contest which earned her a spot as a summer intern at a women’s fashion magazine. Although Esther was grateful for her opportunity to become a famous writer, her struggle with the death of her father over ten years ago, and lacking desire to fill the role of womanhood causes Esther’s mental health to deteriorate. Upon returning home from her internship, Esther made several attempts at suicide and fails each time.

Hearing a baby’s cry lights up everyone in the room, marking the beginning of a new life. Many people view of having babies as a benefit in helping them grow into a mother, teacher, and a role model. It helps shape them into a more independent and stronger woman and motivates them to get back up when they are feeling low. Esther Greenwood, from the book Bell Jar, written by Sylvia Plath, deals with many societal pressure problems for being a woman. The expectations for her were not met because she wants to go out of the societal norms and does what she wants. It is not easy for her to get out of her shell and be who she wants because there are other women in her life that she looks up to and contemplates if she should do it. Many people plays a role in Esther’s life to help guide her to be who she wants but there are some things that stops her from making decisions. In the Bell Jar, Plath uses recurrent symbolisms, such as water, sexual desires, and the Bell Jar to represent aspects of Esther’s story as to how she handles them to get what she wants in life.

Of the two readings we were given to select from for our Midterm Assignment, I chose to conduct my initial psychosocial and diagnostic assessment on the character, Esther, from the semi-autobiographical novel “The Bell Jar”, by Sylvia Plath. The protagonist in the novel is a 19-year-old girl from the suburbs of Boston growing up in the 1950’s who has accepted a summer internship working at a prominent magazine in New York City. It is made clear from the beginning of the novel that Esther’s move has resulted in a possible adjustment disorder as she narrates her feelings of sadness, misplacement, and disconnectedness from reality.

The Bell Jar is a novel written in, 1963 written by Sylvia Plath. It is a story about a girl who under goes many traumatic life events that had the destiny to make or break her. The things she used to enjoy in life are no longer bringing joy to her life. She can’t find anything that gives her the will to go on. The Bell Jar is a story that will take reader on a journey with a girl who lets the gender roles of 1950s get the best of her. She lets people tell her what she can and cannot do and loses what it means to become your own person. The Bell Jar teaches the audience about the expectations, opportunities or restrictions on American Women in the 1950’s. As gender roles have become more diverse between a man and a woman, it is still more

Esther is one of the most significant characters etched in The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath. Esther is beautiful and skillful but uncertain since she possesses a disturbing sense of unreality. The novel is a detailed account of Esther’s descent into and arousal from madness. In other words, rather than experiencing a beneficial education that would ultimately result in a graduation to adulthood, Esther learns from madness and graduates from a mental school. Throughout the story, Esther acts in opposition to the society in which she lives. The public wants Esther to stay as a virgin until after her wedding. However, Esther notices the speciousness of this conception, hoping to relinquish her virginity prior to marriage. Hence, she commences a journey for a loveless sexual experience as society fails to supply her with an opportunity for benign sexual experimentation. Of all the chapters in the novel, Chapter 7 is the most essential episode that affects Esther’s thoughts based on virginity and sex to form a foundation that she abides by until the end of the 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 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.

According to The Broadview Anthology of British Literature, “There was much debate concerning the proper place of women and the ideal characteristics of femininity throughout the nineteenth century” (610). The Victorian Era formally followed the reign of Queen Victoria in England from 1837 to 1901, but the era is not so rigidly set. The ideologies, values, and mores associated with the Victorian Era were present before Queen Victoria, and then followed into America and also lived sixty years past its recorded date of death. In the United States during the 1950s and 60s, the idea of femininity was still being explored, just as it was a century prior in another country. Women in the Victorian Era and in 1950s and 1960s America experienced

Depression is a four-letter word. Despite its prevalence, people just do not talk about it due to its stigma. Depression manifests itself in sufferers with recurrent thoughts of death and dying. Sometimes these thoughts progress into thoughts and even plans for suicide. In The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath writes from the protagonist’s point of view, who is known as Esther Greenwood; therefore readers witness first hand Esther’s personal journey as her thoughts become increasingly centered on death and she becomes disenchanted with what the world has to offer. As a novel about suicide and death, it is also oddly obsessed with babies and birth. Death and birth are ways for Esther to think about the most extreme transformation of herself in which the death of everything she resents about herself is to be reborn into a self entirely new and authentic, expelled of all the hypocrisy, inadequacy, and fear of domestic life. Esther 's attempted suicide is just the most radical situation she seeks out in order to undergo a transformation of herself. In The Bell Jar, Esther Greenwood’s descent into the pits of depression as the protagonist is revealed by the images and symbols of death and birth that permeate, and her suicide is a metaphor for her attempt at self-transformation, a rebirth into a more authentic self.