Plath gave birth to her first child, Freda, the following year. The same year, she published The Colossus, her first volume of poetry. Her second child, Nicholas, was born in Hughes and Plath separated shortly afterward; her instability and his affair with another woman had placed great strain on their marriage. Plath and her children moved to a flat in London, where she continued to write poetry.
The poems she wrote at this time were later published in a collection titled Ariel In February , she gassed herself in her kitchen, ending her life at the age of thirty-one. Plath most likely wrote a first draft of The Bell Jar in the late s. The other man in her life, Yale boyfriend Buddy Willard, troubles her spirit in other ways, too. Finally, another doctor gives her the longed-for diaphragm.
In other words, The Bell Jar was written fast and urgently. Specifically with suicide, and specifically about the virtue and pureness of women compared to men.
So I guess that is why The Bell Jar is often compared to The Catcher in the Rye , with it's discussions and writings of often controversial titles. Setting off a new generation of writers, styles, and people. There are moments when I could make a few direct comparisons between the two. With Esther slowly seperating herself from socialization and sinking deeper into her own thoughts and depression.
Analyzing things that go on around her and her surroundings. Very reminscent of Perks. If you feel you're suffering from depression, madness, confusion about topics pertaining to society and sex, or just looking for a good read, The Bell Jar is definetly the book for you.
I also advise, if you're seriously suffering from depression, to get help for yourself. There is no shame in it, and getting help is better than ending your life. Even if you need to go on medication, DO NOT feel ashamed, especially if it's going to help you even more.
View all 40 comments. I feel like I owe Sylvia Plath an apology. This is a book I actively avoided for years because so many people namely female classmates who wanted to be perceived as painfully different or terminally misunderstood or on the verge of absolutely losing their teenage shit lauded the virtues of this book and how it, like, so totally spoke to them in places they didn't even know they had ears. My own overly judgmental high-school self could not accept even the remote possibility of actual merit lurk I feel like I owe Sylvia Plath an apology.
My own overly judgmental high-school self could not accept even the remote possibility of actual merit lurking between the covers of something that such bland, faux-distraught ninnies clung to like a life raft.
I should probably also apologize for referring to every pair of oven mitts I've ever owned as a pair of Sylvias but I think the lady scribe in question was too mired in real problems to care all that much about my sick amusement's crass reduction. Old biases die hard: I couldn't help but brace myself for a trivial tribute to mental imbalances, White Girl Problems and petty complaints disguised as life-ruining moments.
What I got was an utter lack of histrionics and a sincere, to-the-point road map of one talented young lady's fight against her inner demons. Sylvia's alter ego Esther Greenwood let's all take a second to appreciate the sly cleverness of trading "Sylvia" for the fictional surname "Greenwood" is so straightforward in addressing her despair that I couldn't help but extend more sympathy than I thought I could muster to her understated suffering.
If nothing else, this book taught me that my own bouts of the blues are simply me being human and could be so much more debilitating: For that clarity of self-awareness alone, I am grateful. Reading this as I neared the "Infinite Jest" finish line offered necessary perspective that helped me get a better idea of what it must have been like inside such a messy head.
While she encountered precious little understanding in both her personal life Mrs. Greenwood's inability to see her daughter's problem as her daughter's problem instead of wondering what she did wrong just rubbed my modern sensibilities the wrong way and from the medical professionals who were tasked with helping her rise above the sinking despair she couldn't escape, I finished this fictionalized semi-autobiography 50 years after its publication with a keener understanding of what Sylvia Plath endured than I'm comfortable with.
View all 66 comments. From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked.
One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn't quite make out.
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. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet. Please read it. It's impeccable.
Note: it definitely shows it's age with some racist descriptions of things which was a bummer and reminded me how lucky we are to live in View all 19 comments. Nov 08, Scarlet rated it really liked it Shelves: favorite-author , most-loved , it-stays-with-you , for-my-future-library , classics , lush-writing. She would be called Elaine. I counted the letters on my fingers. There were six letters in Esther, too. It seemed a lucky thing. Did she, like Esther, sit on a breezeway in an old nightgown waiting for something to happen?
Is that why she chose the name Esther? For luck? It's impossible to read The Bell Jar and not be affected, knowing what happened to Plath. I mean, it's everywhere. She is everywhere. All of Esther's musings are Plath's own.
It's eerie. There's hardly any comfort even when Esther is freed from the bell jar; on the contrary, it's a brutal reminder that this book is ultimately, part fiction. Plath's poetic prowess shows through her writing - especially the descriptions.
They are so simple yet so fitting. There is one in particular I loved, where Esther compares her life to a fig tree See the first status update. Here's another: "I saw the years of my life spaced along a road in the form of telephone poles, threaded together by wires.
I counted one, two, three Esther's or Plath's? Depression is so often mistaken as a form of sadness. This woman, however, is not sad. She is empty. She is a shell. She contemplates killing herself with a kind of ease that's unnerving. The Bell Jar did not make me cry but I wish it did. What I'm left with now is a deep sense of unhappiness that I don't think tears can fix. Why is it that the most talented always fall prey to the bell jar?
It's such a waste. View all 48 comments. Apr 10, karen rated it liked it Shelves: books-everyone-loves-but-me , littry-fiction. View all 61 comments. I've never shied away from depressing material, but there's a difference between the tone serving the story, and a relentlessly depressing work that goes entirely nowhere.
I know it can be viewed as a glimpse into Plath's mind, but I would rather do a lot of things, some quite painful, than read this again. It hurt to get through it, and I think it's self-indulgent and serves no real artistic purpose.
Which is truly a shame, as I love a lot of Plath's poetry. My dad went mad in the early seventies when my mom filed for divorce and took up with another man after 12 yrs of marriage. He ended up in a place called Glenn Eden here in Michigan and went through a dozen or more electric shock treatments, I remember visiting him through a window from outside the place. He eventually recovered and remarried, led a normal life, but this book was kind of frightening to me, remembering that time, the atmosphere of such a place, and the stigma of mental illness.
I My dad went mad in the early seventies when my mom filed for divorce and took up with another man after 12 yrs of marriage. The writing was so good, I was feeling her. View all 96 comments. Jan 16, J. Sutton rated it it was amazing. But the story is definitely about Esther, her ambition, and her own feelings of inadequacy, even though viewed from the outside Esther would be seen as a success. The repeated questions after she is being treated for her depression about who will marry her now only reinforce the notion that for the intelligent and talented Esther Greenwood, there had never been a good way to extricate herself from a trap that she had always seen coming.
Very compelling narrative! View all 9 comments. I think we ought to read only the kind of books that wound and stab us. If the book we are reading doesn't wake us up with a blow on the head, what are we reading it for?
A book must be the axe for the frozen sea inside us. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor… and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was Amid the impending commotion, the ancient state of confusion hovering over this land, a tree has already started to sense the chaos.
A fig tree is losing its branches, one by one, as the storm unleashes its fury and time passes us by. Crystals are besieging us. The captives in the world of glass feel it all. Later I understood how excruciatingly personal her poetry was, thus missing a plethora of subtle vocals, strong undertones, harrowing melodies. After reading about her life and watching a biopic, the connection was absolutely different regarding, for instance, the same two poems I had read months ago.
There may be a lack of lyrical substance, of the mellifluous quality in language worthy of all praises, but to me, the beauty of her verse lies on her honest display of emotions through complex and raw imagery. I find that openness refreshing. How unsafe it is to be on the brink of vulnerability, with a bunch of emotions for one person or a whole world to see.
And yet, how brave; giving free expression to such feelings, turning them into creative energy. How invigorating. Even when no one is listening to anyone. Not even the ones who complain about how deaf the world is.
Under these circumstances, I decided to revisit her poetry someday. The trouble was, I had been inadequate all along, I simply hadn't thought about it. I dreaded this review; I knew that from this novel would emerge a personal journal barely touching upon the merits of the book. In this novel, I found indecision under the apposite metaphor of a fig tree; undying portions of time where absence is a unilateral reality, and the inability to fit the standards to which a woman is supposed to belong — a perpetual rift between professional development and motherhood.
The disparities between the world of a man and the encapsulated universe of a woman in midth-century America. Or any place, any time. Such differences constitute a theme that is deeply explored in this book, and from all perspectives, such as work and sexuality. Whether she knew it or not, Philomena Guinea was buying my freedom. However, the way her mind worked was much more profound than a trendy dislike composed of empty words.
It was a search for identity in a society ruled by men and in which she felt inadequate most of the time. The trouble was, I hated the idea of serving men in any way. I wanted to dictate my own thrilling letters. It is certainly striking that this novel, which deals with complex themes under such a stifling atmosphere, could also make me smile.
Esther has a unique sense of humor and some of her comments regarding a vast array of things were rather amusing. Under the night that never seemed to end, trying to illuminate the long corridors of her mind, accompanied by voices, electricity and despair, she made me her confident and brought me smiles to pass the time.
There are some fissures that should prevent me from giving it a 5-star rating. I am grateful for the story she shared. And for the fate she forged for her character. I took a deep breath and listened to the old brag of my heart.
Despite the darkness in which this book is immersed, a sense of hope still lingers even after finishing this somber journey. Fig trees are on solid ground, awaiting for courage, a leap of faith, life-changing decisions — meaning, beauty, uniqueness. The silence, a limpid layer which allows to admire the now splendid azure sky, is no longer an ominous sign. As a small stone is thrown into a pond, causing violent ripples that soon vanish while the former serenity is restored, such silence is interrupted briefly by the sound of glass breaking.
In the midst of too much consciousness, those small shivers are a vital part of the ritual for being born twice—patched, retreaded and approved for the road. View all 38 comments. Originally published under the pseudonym "Victoria Lucas" in , the novel is semi-autobiographical, with the names of places and people changed.
The book is often regarded as a roman a clef since the protagonist's descent into mental illness parallels Plath's own experiences with what may have been clinical depression or bipolar II disorder.
Plath died by suicide a month after its first UK publication. The novel was published under Plath's name for the first time in and was not published in the United States until , in accordance with the wishes of both Plath's husband, Ted Hughes, and her mother.
The novel has been translated into nearly a dozen languages. The novel, though dark, is often read in high school English classes. View all 3 comments. Perhaps the genre should be called autobiographical fiction is that already a thing? Because of this, I was very glad that the book included a short biography of Plath at the end to compare her life experiences and her experiences with writing it to the final product. While now it might only seem somewhat shocking and controversial, at the time I am sure it was a book that people may have had to sneak so that others did not realize they were reading it.
For those who watch the show Mad Men, I was reminded of the characters Peggy and Joan in the first few seasons who are trying to breakthrough to do the work the men do but are often talked down to as they are expected to be secretaries and housewives. The second half of the book deals with depression, mental decay, and suicide. I felt so bad for Esther. She had issues, she needed help, and the help she received was so wildly inappropriate, it was infuriating.
Men who had the same issues were not treated the same, even some that were truly mentally disturbed, while a woman battling with what might have only been mild depression or manic behavior might find themselves locked away and receiving shock treatment. It should be very telling that Plath originally released this under a pseudonym because she was afraid of the response she would receive. If you have to hide reality behind a fake name and fictionalization, then I think that proves there is something very wrong with reality.
The Bell Jar is a must read. Some of the content may be hard to swallow, but it is a very powerful statement that will help humanity learn from its mistakes and avoid repeating them. View all 29 comments. Dec 27, Matt rated it really liked it Shelves: classic-novels. He dragged out a table on wheels with a machine on it and rolled it behind the head of the bed.
The nurse started swabbing my temples with a smelly grease. As she leaned over to reach the side of my head nearest the wall, her fat breast muffled my face like a cloud or a pillow. A vague, medicinal stench emanated from her flesh. Gordon was fitting two metal plates on either side of my head. He buckled them into place with a strap that dented my forehead, and gave me a wire to bite.
Sylvia Plath wanted to write a bestseller like The Snake Pit. Like Sylvia Plath, Esther Greenwood tries to die by suicide and is sent to a hospital. The Bell Jar was rejected by American publishers. The Bell Jar was published under the pseudonym Victoria Lucas. The Bell Jar was made into a movie in For better or worse, here it is. A version of this story originally ran in ; it has been updated for
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