Smith College

hate essentially everyone and everything that had once meant something to her. It turns her into a hollow shell. She makes an attempt to seem normal and portray the talented girl she has always been, up until then. “How did I know that someday – at college, in Europe, somewhere, anywhere – the bell jar, with its stifling distortions, wouldn’t descend again” (Plath 241)? Even though

In the article titled, “Sylvia Plath” the author, Sarah Ann McGill states that, “ Plath's intelligence and hard work earned her a scholarship to Smith College, an all women's institution, in 1950. She continued to soar above her classmates.”(McGill). Plath was a great writer during her time and it even was able to get her scholarships to go to the school she wanted to go to. After school Sylvia ended

Treatment of Madness in The Bell Jar and The Yellow Wallpaper   Mental illness and madness is a theme often explored in literature and the range of texts exploring these is tremendously varied. Various factors can threaten a character's sanity, ranging from traumatic events which trigger a decline to pressure from more vast, impersonal sources. Generally speaking, writers have tried to show that most threats to sanity comprise a combination of long-term and short-term factors - the burning

Personal Ambition and Self-Respect in The Bell Jar Inspired by Mary Jane Ward’s The Snake Pit, The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath was released in 1963 and discusses a great deal of how difficult it was to be a woman in the 1960s. The 1960s was a struggling time for women; society set standards that women felt obligated to follow. Society told women that their only jobs were to get married, have children, and become homemakers, and if a woman did not fall under all of these categories, she was considered

The bell Jar by Sylvia Plath is a bildungsroman fictional novel, and documents a first person account of Esther Greenwood’s struggle with depression from her late teens to early twenty’s. During Esther’s final path of destruction, her encounter with Marco leads her to one of many revelations about societies expectations for women and this reality along with many other factors sends Esther to her near demise. Before Esther’s encounter with Marco she was experiencing life in New York through

After reading the poem “Daddy” written by Sylvia Plath an American poet, best known for her dark, and confessional writing. Sylvia Plath lets you understand her thoughts through her writing, for example poems like “Daddy” and her novel The Bell Jar. More and more people learn about her work by reading her poetry or novels today. For one reason, this poem gives many emotions to the reader. By reading “Daddy” you can sense sadness, hopefulness, a broken child, while others may argue it is a cry for

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

Wit is a one-act play written by American playwright Margaret Edson, which won the 1999 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Edson used her work experience in a hospital as part of the inspiration for her play. Productions Wit received its world premiere at South Coast Repertory, Costa Mesa, California, in 1995. Edson had sent the play to many theatres, with SCR dramaturg Jerry Patch seeing its potential. He gave it to artistic director Martin Benson, who worked with Edson to ready the play for production

Flannery O’Connor was an extravagant author who lived a tough childhood. She lost her father to lupus at a young age, but continued to strive for excellence. She attended grammar school, high school, college, and earned a fellowship to Writers’ Workshop at the University of Iowa. At age 22 she was ready to start her writing career. Some of her best work was written in the twentieth-century. One of her books even won the National Book Award. She was clearly a writer of success. Unfortunately, Flannery

The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath also addresses the tensions between expectations regarding traditional female roles and the increasing demands and opportunities of paid labor. In the summer of 1953, The Bell Jar opens. Esther Greenwood, a brilliant young woman, is functioning as an editorial intern at a famous women’s magazine in New York city. Although Esther has an academic promise and aspiration, she feels demoralized about her future and disconnected from society. In addition to her early symptoms