The Bell Jar: Book Review

By Connor C.

     Sylvia Plath’s, The Bell Jar is a story about a small-town high school girl who travels to New York to become a writer. While there, Esther Greenwood, the main character of the book, encounters many experiences that enviably result in her mental breakdown, half way through the book. She returns home in hopes to attend therapy and eventually return to the brilliant writer she once was. Will Esther be able to recover from the negatively life-changing experience she had in New York? Will she be able to continue on her normal life like before she left? Or will her madness consume her and send her into a slow spiral into a fatal depression? By reading The Bell Jar, the reader will be held captive in Plath’s first-person narrative by her ability to make the mind of a mentally insane woman seem more rational than of the sane.

     Sylvia Plath is the testament to a great writer. She writes with a passion for change while on a level of a personal conversation. Plath starts the book with the reader immediately in the mind of Esther Greenwood and makes her irrational way of thinking seem normal and seamless. Plath does not process through Esther’s thoughts and ideas chronologically, which does make the book difficult to understand at times, however, Plath does not leave the reader confused for long. To catch the reader up to each sporadically told event in Esther’s life, Plath gives vivid imagery and includes almost too much detail; mainly crude and vulgar descriptions. When telling of Esther’s stories, Plath makes the words come to life through her descriptive words and imagery. The only major fault I noticed was Plath’s lack to have a clear transition from life before and after Esther’s mental breakdown. The reader had been in Esther’s mind the entire first half of the book so all of Esther’s thinking, rational or not, seemed normal. So when Esther started having disturbing thoughts, nothing seemed unusual. The only distinguishing factor was her transition from New York back to Minnesota. Plath uses sarcasm, bluntness, and Esther’s character and madness to express her negative feelings toward society; such as hypocrisy and sexism. Overall, The Bell Jar is a suspenseful read. The reader is never sure of the next scandal Esther will be involved in and of her future stability

     The Bell Jar seems to be saturated with Plath’s personal experiences and emotions. Esther starts off in the book as a young, naïve teenage girl who had been sheltered all her life. Once arriving in New York, she is overwhelmed with reality and the corrupt world around her. The struggles of the new city, relationships, and her confusion on her place in life, affected Esther forever. New York changed Esther’s perspective on life that eventually led to her madness. Esther’s struggle of breaking free from the typical mold of a woman in the 1950s is shown in The Bell Jar. Through Plath’s detail, the reader is able to relate and feel the pain of Esther and experience her slow spiral into suicidal depression. Every disturbing thought and suicide attempt makes Esther’s depravity more evident.

     Plath includes a prevalent theme throughout the book of feminism. Woman of the time were inferior to men and were expected to become housewives after attaining their college degree. Plath mocks the expected role of a woman throughout her entire book. She first does this by telling of Esther’s first-hand experience with a woman giving birth. She tells of the abnormal-like nature of the pregnancy by stating:

The woman’s stomach stuck up so high I could not see her face or the upper part of her body at all. She seemed to have nothing but an enormous spider-fat stomach and two little ugly spindly legs propped in the high stirrups and all the time the baby was being born she never stopped making this unhuman whooping noise. (120)

Esther not only mocks the idea of motherhood and pregnancy but also identifies the main male characters of the book as cowards and hypocrites. Plath successfully captures the struggles of the common 1950s woman and their confined role in society. Plath also identifies her main target of the book, feminism in society, and effectively uses her story to make a change.