The Bell Jar

Trees represent her life because they aren’t simple. Trees are large and strong, their roots are in the ground and their leaves sway in the sky. At first, Melinda’s life was as solid as the tallest tree in the world. “This was the girl who suffered through Brownies with me, who taught me how

One of the devices Plath uses to persuade her audience of the negative effects of gender roles is symbolism. The fig tree is an important symbol in chapter seven. Esther describes it as “a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children and

“’The next time you work on your trees, don’t think about trees. Think about love, or hate, or joy, or pain – whatever makes you feel something, makes your palms sweat, or your toes curl. Focus on that feeling.’”(122) In the book speak there are many examples of symbolism. The one that stands out the most is the tree as it is mentioned very frequently in almost every chapter of the book. It represents that growth that she goes through as a character from the beginning of the book to the end and her mental recovery after the traumatic event of being raped. The different representations we see of the tree correspond with the state she is in and the emotions she is feeling at that part in the book. When she is struggling with her life she

In the book Speak the Trees describe life and growth for Melinda. In the beginning of the novel, Melinda is assigned to draw trees for a year long art project. She struggles to draw realistic trees, frustrated that she “can’t bring it to life”. This represents her depression and struggle. The tree symbolizes the danger Melinda’s faces in letting her pain overtake every aspect of her life. As Melinda begins to heal, her tree drawings become richer and more detailed, symbolizing her own growth.

During The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath used similes to highlight Esther's characteristic of a wallflower during her trip to New York. After Frankie, one of Lenny's friend abandones Esther, he is forced to take her and Doreen to his apartment. Lenny obviously wanting privacy with Doreen he asks her to go but Doreen defends Esther and says she will only go with the do any of her friend. From there on, Esther feels unwanted and ignored while she spends time at Lenny's place. Plath describes Esther's abandonment while Lenny and Doreen dance, “I felt myself shrinking to a small black dot against all those red and white rugs and that pine paneling. I felt like a hole in the ground” (Plath 16). Esther feels left out while her best friend and a stranger dance. The simile expresses how she felt invisible and ignored. The author tries to relate to the reader who once in their life may have felt outcastes or left out. Esther has a tendency to feel terrible about herself. From the beginning of the story, she explains how she feels different and not in the right place. The author wrote, “The city had faded my tan, though. I looked yellow as a Chinaman. Ordinarily, I would have been nervous a about my dress and my odd color, but being with Doreen made me forget my

The Bell Jar, a coming of age, semi-autobiographical novel, by Sylvia Plath follows the life of a troubled young girl named Esther Greenwood, her slow descent into mental illness and then her subsequent recovery. The second half of the book details Esther's mental breakdown, her incarceration and stumbling recovery whilst the first half uncovers the protagonists, narrators day to day struggles which go on to contribute to her eventual breakdown . Throughout the novel, the reader comes to understand that Esther feels there are few choices; in character a woman must be either the virgin or the whore, both of which are demonstrated by Esther's friends, Betsy and Doreen. This presents one of the key internal conflicts the protagonist, Esther battles.

The tree represents everything Melinda has worked for that year. It represents the rape, the hate, the obstacles, the dilemmas. It represents the perseverance, the imperfectness, the strength, and the growth. The tree represents Melinda's transformations by showing what she has

Trees represent life because they aren’t simple, trees are large and strong, their roots are in the ground and its leaves sway in the sky. At first, Melinda’s life was as solid as the tallest tree in the world, the Hyperion. “This was the girl who suffered though Brownies with me, who

After the lacrosse team told everyone what Andy did to Melinda, suddenly Melinda was popular. Mr. Freeman refused to give Melinda a grade until she handed in her tree. Melinda spent the last day of school getting her tree right. This is shown through the following quote: “My tree is definitely breathing; little shallow breaths like it just shot up through the ground this morning…Roots knob out of the ground and the crown reaches for the sun, tall and healthy. The new growth is the best part” (196). This relates to how Melinda now has courage to stand up for herself. “I reach in and wrap my fingers around a triangle of glass. I hold it to Andy Evans neck. He freezes. I push just hard enough to raise one drop of blood…His lips are paralyzed. He cannot speak. That’s good enough” (195). These quotations demonstrate that Melinda built courage to stand up for herself, and she shows that by confronting Andy Evans. Her standing up for herself represents that she is fed up and she doesn’t not want to be vulnerable any more. She felt that the only way to make things change is by speaking. In conclusion, Melinda drew a tree which wasn’t perfect but it was alive much like herself. The tree symbolized her recovery from the

At first glance, the term “bell jar” does not particularly stand out except as the title of the novel. However, upon further scrutiny and thorough reading, readers can deduce that this term actually has a negative connotation throughout the novel due to the fact that Esther, the main character, literally feels confined inside a bell jar with no way to get out. Written by Sylvia Plath, the novel The Bell Jar focuses on how restrictions of society suffocate Esther to the point where she is unable to handle the stress anymore. Plath uses symbols in her novel such as the bell jar, fig tree, mirror, and numerous newspaper headlines in order to emphasize Esther’s inner struggles coping with the restrictions of society, and also how she finds connections

Speak has a bunch of themes and symbols. A tree is what represents the main character, Melinda. Melinda goes through a lot throughout her freshman year and learns a lot with it. A tree grows and has its moments and that is what Melinda story is life. The tree is a perfect way to represent her in the book and show how she deals with school, her family, and her own daily problems she encounters.

She is captivated by the way the bee interacts with the tree and identifies it as an ideally harmonious relationship. Janie is “stirred tremendously” by the tree because it intoxicates her with the beautiful interactions of nature (10). The bee and the tree symbolize a union in which there is neither control nor command, but rather an effortless interaction. She becomes enthralled with the concept of harmony and embarks on a journey to find the perfect relationship between her and a man. As the motif reoccurs, it parallels the growth of Janie’s expectations of a relationship and who she shares it with; she longs for the man who she can experience harmony with.

“The gardener croons, it is your nature to be small and cozy”, “how lucky, little tree, to have a pot to grow in” or by the sarcastic description of the tree’s pot as being ‘attractive’. Piercy illustrates a gardener who dictates the appearance and growth of a bonsai tree, and compares this relationship to the way men treat women in society. Her opinions of men are represented within

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.

In Sylvia Plath’s autobiographical novel, The Bell Jar, Plath journeys through the mental deterioration and reconstruction of Esther Greenwood. Sylvia Plath, college educated and highly independent when she was a young adult in the fifties, was often described as “the girl who wanted to be God.” (Barnard) Plath always had a passion for English and writing, and in most of her works, she exhibits dark and unnerving themes. Assumingly, this dark tone is derived from her father’s death and cruel departure from her beloved home near the sea when she was eight years old. Plath also had to surmount her constant repression of personality as people, men in particular, criticized her for being too “brainy”. While being a renowned author, Plath is most known for her abstract poems and novels that showcase intellectual and deranged topics. (Barnard). The Bell Jar is no exception to this standard. Much like Plath herself, Esther Greenwood is depressed and has a cool and detached manner. Esther’s mental state, or lack thereof, is diminished by doubtful attitudes of others and finally rebuilt through the trusting and deserved therapy of Doctor Nolan. The novel narrated Esther’s downward spiral as she goes from able-bodied and healthy to detached to suicidal and, finally, to her recovery. As Esther’s city- based internship is coming to an end, Esther begins feeling inadequate and unhappy. As her depression deepens, coddling and condescending people send Esther into a negative spiral. After