Analysis of "The Bell Jar" by Sylvia Plath
Analysis of "The Bell Jar" by Sylvia Plath
The Bell Jar, by Sylvia Plath sets itself during a 6 month period in the life of the main character that is Esther Greenwood. The beginning of the novel begins during the summer in which the Rosenbergs were executed in New York, which the year was 1953. Eisenhower was president at the time.
The story is first set in New York in a hotel for women with the fictional title of Amazon, and in the offices of a women’s fashion magazine. Later, the main character returns to her home in the suburbs of Boston. She receives outpatient shock treatment in Walton, Massachusetts. Then she spends a short time in a city psychiatric hospital, which was probably in Boston, and then was moved to a private hospital in New England. It had three main houses and it was ranked according to the health of its patients.
Esther Greenwood was a talented and sensitive young woman who is living in a world in which talented and sensitive women are urged to be wives, mothers, fashion hounds, and experts at taking short hand. Esther attempts to commit suicide, but is discovered and put in a psychiatric hospital where she must work on resolving her issues in order to heal herself. To overcome suicide, Esther finds a way to exist as a writer in her society. She writes her autobiography.
Esther Greenwood is one of twelve young women who have won a prize to live in New York and write for a women’s fashion magazine. Esther does not fit into the world of high fashion. She is from a small town in the suburbs of Boston and her family has been relatively poor. She becomes friends with another outcast sort named Doreen. She and Doreen exist on the fringes of the fashion magazine activities. One night, Esther and Doreen go to a bar with a man who is attracted to Doreen. Esther ends up getting drunk and walking home alone. When Doreen comes home, Esther realizes she does not want to be her friend any more.
Esther’s supervisor, who is the fiction editor of the magazine, tries to encourage Esther to apply more energy to her career, but she finds it impossible to do. She begins to feel as if she does not have a direction in her life. What she has always wanted to do was...