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emma's Reviews > The Bell Jar
The Bell Jar
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emma's review
bookshelves: classics, non-ya, school, project-review-everything, 2-stars, unpopular-opinion, reread, nope, reviewed
Feb 27, 2016
bookshelves: classics, non-ya, school, project-review-everything, 2-stars, unpopular-opinion, reread, nope, reviewed
Read 2 times. Last read April 9, 2022 to April 13, 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.
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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.
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currently-reading updates
rereading this on the beach so i can be the edgiest girl there
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Reading Progress
February 27, 2016
– Shelved
March 8, 2016
–
Started Reading
March 10, 2016
–
Finished Reading
April 9, 2022
–
Started Reading
April 13, 2022
–
Finished Reading
Comments Showing 1-50 of 122 (122 new)
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Jess˚*•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙*˚
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Apr 09, 2022 10:18AM
When I reread The Bell Jar I caught a lot of racist imagery I missed in high school...Its hard to look past that and only appreciate the good parts imo.
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Like Jess said above, Ms. Plath was racist as hell in the book. I only read it for the first time months ago, at 25, so I can’t actually get past that. First thing I think of with this book was “Damn, she was racist as hell”.
YES IM TIRED OF PEOPLE HYPING UP THIS BOOK
Very interested in what you have to say for this one (and also interested in why people tend to really like this one and hate Catcher in the Rye)
noo i was so excited to read this
Hah! I can cross this off my "reread books from High School English" list
Amanda wrote: "Hah! I can cross this off my "reread books from High School English" list"good call, good list
Kristin wrote: "noo i was so excited to read this"it's a deeply unpopular opinion
Emma wrote: "Very interested in what you have to say for this one (and also interested in why people tend to really like this one and hate Catcher in the Rye)"i am a salinger stan so me too!
Noel wrote: "YES IM TIRED OF PEOPLE HYPING UP THIS BOOK"ME TOO, NOW
@jess @melanie she manages to squeeze in some homophobia as well
YES AMEN TO THIS REVIEW
I’ve never read it and I have no desire to as a mentally ill woman I don’t want to be more miserable lol, but I love your review
Pixie 🍜 wrote: "I’ve never read it and I have no desire to as a mentally ill woman I don’t want to be more miserable lol, but I love your review"good call!!! and thank you thank you
Hazel wrote: "Hell yes. You nailed her whiny ass."🥰
Sara wrote: "YES AMEN TO THIS REVIEW"< 3
You definitely saved me from a horrible read. Thanks
i’m on page 11 and she’s already made 2 racist remarksdon’t even want to read the rest
I just finished this book this morning and I was so afraid I was the only one being utterly disturbed by this book. I can’t agree with you more. I hated this book 😭😭😭
AMEN! and if you pay close attention it's always the same type of people that are in love with this novel and make it their entire personality without paying any attention to how controversial it is.
Oh. I thought it was gonna be a review of the book.
there is so much wrong with this review. if you get all your “critical thought” from twitter you can just say that…
You can rightfully call out an author’s ignorance, but you make a lot of strawman arguments in your critique here.
I agree with basically everything you've said.What doesn't add up for me is the homophobia.
The only instance I remember about wlw was the protagonist wondering how that relationship could work as a clueless straight girl.
But I didn't see any harm in that.
What have you noticed that screamed homophobia?
Let me know, lots of love<3
I respect your opinion, but I have to disagree with some of your points. While this book was ahead of its time with some of its themes, it was also a product of its time in terms of social issues. Ester always making it a point to note if someone wasn’t white did. make me uncomfortable. And her generally homophobic attitude was uncomfortable to read. But this book also addressed mental health issues effecting queer people. It had diversity and representation, which is in a way, kind of ahead of its time.
I get what your saying about Ester being annoying and whiny, but I think that’s another example of her capturing the experience of living with depression. When your in your head, trapped with your thought, you inevitably become at least a little self centered. Not to be mean, but because you can’t think of much beyond your own shitty feelings (or the way you feel numb).
I really like this book for a handful of reasons but I completely back this review. Most of the time this book is brought up it’s in white women feminist circles, which highlights the problems with white centred feminism. The problematic views of Ester, both in her personality and towards minorities, are largely ignored by readers. The prose is gorgeous and the book made an important impact. I enjoy reading it, but it should highlight the problem with white women’s self indulgence historically. I can sympathise for Ester and still think she’s a problematic person.
I totally agree! Just finished reading today
I highly disagree with your word of choice. In your review you wrote that Plath's depiction of depression was "clichéd" because it didn't match your experience of it. Everyone's experience of depression and mentall illness can vary but all of them are valid. Especially since the character's experience is based off Plath's own. As you said it's your opinion, and that book wasn't probably for you but I just wanted to point it out.
I had the same thought, actually i thought it was a better story, because it is way to hype and my expectation were high af, but it's pretty anoying
i agree on this review about the fact that there is a slight racism and homophobia (mostly lesbophobia) in ester’s words and while i agree that when the book was written it was another time, because while there was already gay and lesbians march, bisexuals visibility etc. people still ignored all of it and also, we have to consider that there wasn’t any social media so many still didn’t know about those things and news. but while that i felt really uncomfortable anyway reading some words and i wonder why no one ever talk about this, then i realised that who brought up this book are straight women who never noticed those things since it’s not their issues. in another hand i disagree about how you description of depression, ester can be annoying and whiny, but some depressed people are like that, some not because anyone deal with mental illness in different way. still your review has good points
I agree with the aspect of depression does look very different than what was depicted in the book and a tad romanticized in a way. However it’s important to remember depression is not always the same for everyone. And yeah we can’t blame the bad things we do or the bad things in life on others or on mental illness, but in a depressed and far gone irrational mind, we don’t always remember that. & that’s why I love this book, it depicts the parts of depression that aren’t always experienced but are real. I’m not saying that she doesn’t have her moments that are off putting, but that depression often makes us angry and bad people we don’t wanna be. Her writing depicted that very well, showing how the monster of depression can change and taint your perceptions in that way. It made me feel less alone in my journey. Having mental illness doesn’t mean you can be a sh*t person, but I don’t think it was a takeaway that you can be just that it can make you one sometimes. In my journey to recovery, I had to face a lot of guilt from the bad person I used to be & for a long time did not feel I deserved my life because of how bad of a person I had been. Reading this story I felt less alone in that issue that can be sometimes had with depression & less angry with myself I went through something like that. I’m a changed person today, but this aspect of her story made me feel validated. Not saying it’s okay but that it’s something people with depression have to work on sometimes.
These were some of my exact thoughts. I’m also a senior in high school having a rough go of it. There are some genius paragraphs in The Bell Jar (the fig tree one being my favorite as well) but the book fell short for me. I feel as though I relate more to the author than the character.
I def thought she was racist too, and fat-phobic, but I understood her growing insanity due to insomnia and other causes. I don’t think she outright blamed everyone for her mental illness. I think she acknowledged her lack of skills and experiences to be in the real world, which worsened her anxiety. Also, it’s progressive for her to be questioning chastity and women’s role, in comparison to that of men, which harbors her fear of motherhood and marriage. The social circles of people then are different than modern days that while it’s true for you to lay in bed and dumb scroll TikTok, it’s common for people then to socialize with their gossiping neighbors, and their neck to neck high school and family friends. Hence, she would be meandering from place to place, gathering leaflets and abnormal psych books to learn about her conditions and draft a suicide plan or drowning while at a gathering. Not everything is accessible on ur phone then. Moreover, for people with insomnia, they are restless for not being able to sleep for a while, meaning that they’re not gonna try and lay in bed, knowing that they can’t fucking sleep, so no she won’t be scrolling on TikTok.
Sorry, but may you explain to me why this was disturbing to read and not My year of rest and relaxation? For what I read, The Bell Jar is about a white privileged girl who has depression and doesn’t reject receiving help. It shows how depression works, how it feels, and how it was treated and those times. And even with the passage of time, it’s still relatable. That’s why people from around the world still read the book. My Year of Rest and Relaxation is about a white privileged girl who has depression who denies using her resources to ask for help. Instead, she takes drugs for sleep. As if sleeping can make the sadness go away. Spoiler alert: it doesn’t.
The Bell Jar it’s a semi self biography of Plath. It literally published a month before she killed herself. It’s more relatable because it actually happened and it can happen to anyone. It was written in the 20th century, of course there was a lot of racism, homophobia and misogyny in the workplace. It still exists these days. But it was way more often back then, so what’s so shocking?
You said that you didn’t know that being mentally ill allowed people to be mean and annoying, but isn’t the protagonist of my year of rest and relaxation like that? Even more, may I say. And also, yes, as a lot of people said, depression shows itself in many ways in each person. There's people who are unbearable, and others who are submissive. (And I think that even if they don’t have depression, the people who are annoying and mean to others suffer. Because no one would hurt other people for no reason at all).
You said you didn’t liked grand gestures of depression but, the protagonist of myorar didn’t take drugs that make her do terrible, questionable and disturbing things to herself and others? Isn’t that dramatic and way more awful than throwing clothes in the city?
My year of rest and relaxation literally romanticized mental illness by even putting an option to “battle” the sadness: sleep for a year, do nothing, take drugs, don’t ask for actual help, don’t care about the mental health system. That it’s demoralizing.
Plath’s just share her experience, she's not trying to make you take drugs or kill yourself.
>"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."
Neither of these happen in the book, have you even read the book or are you just forcing yourself to have an awful take on it because you want to be contrarian? Funny you're like "rereading this on the beach so i can be the edgiest girl there", cause you unironically are trying to be the edgiest girl here :)
The protagonist attempts suicide several times and is committed to several asylums. How on earth are reading this as how a person is meant to be? Esther Greenwood is a deeply, deeply disturbed young woman and is in no way, shape or form meant to be a role model. And reducing the erratic and uncontrollable behaviour of mentally ill people to "being mean and annoying" really shows the amount of empathy you possess. I truly hope this desperately contrarian review does not discourage anyone from giving this modern classic a go. And in case anyone was wondering, you don't have to be a teenage girl to enjoy this.
the lack of empathy you have for those struggling with mental illness is astounding...
Whimsically throwing shirts in New York? Are you talking about the scene where she’s getting rid of the outfit that she was sexually assaulted in? You cannot be serious…
not a strong criticism of the book or its depiction of mental illness. the book was semi autobiographical so you cant really compare your tiktok scrolling depression to that of sylvias/esthers. also, wasnt the fig passage more about the opportunity cost of life, not necessarily mental illness?
also, how does the book condone being mean and annoying if youre mentally ill? flawed mentally ill narrator (which is also like 90% of america lmao) is not an endorsement of these qualities.
Not sure why you’re getting so much hate for this review… I entirely agree w you—coming from someone who battles with severe depression and was institutionalized for it. Yes, I know, not everyone’s experience with mental illness is the same, but bottom line, mental illness doesn’t serve as a pass to be unnecessarily and unapologetically terrible to other people. Obviously, mental illness deserves some grace and compassion, a level of understanding and forgiveness. But just because you’re mentally ill doesn’t mean the world revolves around you… you can’t just be an awful person and sweep that under the rug because you were having a tough day 😭 I understand that depression can oftentimes involuntarily turn us into people we’d normally despise, but Esther doesn’t even care… very little regret, remorse, or even second thought about how terribly she views and treats others. And what’s ridiculous is she never gets any backlash for it. I’m sorry, but that’s just not how the world works y’all 😓 At some point, you do have to face the consequences of your own actions, and when you mistreat people, they’re not obligated to stay by your side and you don’t get rewarded for it. I think what’s frustrating to me is that Esther just… gets away with being an awful person, which creates this false perception of reality for vulnerable readers in which you can indulge in hurtful behavior and the world forgives you immediately, making your behavior ok. It’s not just about self-repentance or guilt… your actions have material consequences beyond how you alone feel. She’s a bad person, doesn’t acknowledge or care that she’s a bad person, and then everything works out alright in the end where the only consequences she faces are the self-imposed ones.
While I definitely related to some intimate aspects of how Plath depicts mental illness, the novel ultimately came off to me as the privileged white woman’s fantasy of depression.
(also, the racism and homophobia are definitely jarring. yeah yeah, i know that it’s contextually expected within that era, but i don’t think that makes it any less off-putting or unsettling to encounter for to queer and/or poc readers….)
I don't think Sylvia Plath owed 2023 people an explanation for her struggles with depression, nor did she have to elude the impacts of societal pressures on her writing just so "we" would find it interesting in the future. 🙄 You have to start seeing her for what she was, not what you expect her to be.
Sophia: The actual nerve to call this her 'fantasy of depression' when she took her own life after publishing this book... Really shows the level of empathy some people have. And the fact that you reduce the characters experience to "having a tough day" makes me think you don't know as much about depression as you claim to do. Tina: Well said.
The idea that Plath wrote this to excuse poor behaviour is ludicrous.
It’s like you don’t understand that books are never going to age well when judged by the conventions that exist 70 YEARS! in the future. Jesus Christ.
It doesn't matter if it was cliché or not, it was Sylvia Plath's experience with mental illness projected into a character she created but was pretty much her. And everyone's experience with mental illness is valid, even if it doesn't include watching Tiktoks all day...
I never imagined the throwing the clothes out the window scene as whimsical where her hair is *flowing* - I always imagined her as a crumpled mess surrounded by a mess of clothes that she can’t order (much like her life) which she then starts chucking out the window (getting rid of her life) - it’s not there to make mental illness look cool, if you saw someone starting to throw their belongings out a window as you were walking by, I can guarantee you, you would think that person was a bit strange
EXACTLY. I hated her character so much
SPOT THE FUCK ON. I was reading this book and thinking "Am I missing something?" The book was a slow drag, I kept waiting for something within it to resonate with me, excite me or at least pierce my heart but felt nothing just annoyed. Seeing how this is a depiction of someone's journey with mental illness I didn't expect it to be so bland.
SPOT THE F*CK ON. I was reading this book and thinking "Am I missing something?" The book was a slow drag, I kept waiting for something within it to resonate with me, excite me or at least pierce my heart but felt nothing just annoyed. Seeing how this is a depiction of someone's journey with mental illness I didn't expect it to be so bland.
