People sometimes view others as having everything going for them, but they have no idea the personal hell that someone is going through. The Bell Jar, by Sylvia Plath is an example of a young lady who appears to have a bright future, but cracks under pressure put on her should by herself.
Summary of the story
Esther Greenwood is a college student who earns the chance to intern at a magazine in New York. It is at this internship that Esther ideas and views of the world change in her mind. She begins to see people as fake or not pure. Basically as a shelter girl from the suburbs, Esther enters the city and meets other people, and realizes life and the world is not as she once thought.
She had worked hard as a student, and was an excellent writer, but her drive began to fizzle as the internship came to a close. She returns home only to fall into a depression, feeling as though she can not write. She suffers from insomnia and does bathe. Her thoughts begin to consist of suicide. She contemplated different ways that she could do it.
After spending time in a local hospital until the famous novelist Philomena Guinea who is the sponsor of her scholarship finds out about Esther and then sends her to a better treatment center. There they she is able to get to the bottom of her issues.
The bell jar is a re-occurring symbol in the novel. Esther’s friend Buddy Willard (who is also mentioned through many flashbacks) is a medical student who shows Esther fetuses held in bell jars as specimens for class. She then used the fetuses in the bell jars in metaphors about her mental condition.
Similarities of The Bell Jar and the author's life
The Bell Jar is loosely based on the Plath’s life although it is not an autobiography. Plath found herself going through some of the similar issues that she wrote for Esther Greenwood. Some details about Esther a blatantly reflections of herself. Some of the issues kept Plath from getting The Bell Jar written and published. It was first published in 1963 under the pen name "Victoria Lucas". Sylvia Plath actually committed suicide the same year that the book was published.
The Bell Jar takes a reader through a young lady’s growth into womanhood except the normal coming of age story is not what you get, instead the reader is involved in a mental breakdown. It is written in first person and Plath has Esther tell her story so well that her revelations of insanity almost seem rational. Although the many flashbacks in this novel can leave a reader confused, and wondering: "Where did that come from," but that is that what shows the building of Esther’s mental breakdown.
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