I do not believe it's easy to talk about The Bell Jar and I feel like I have yet to fully understand it - the novel and its author too. But I also feel that if I do not get the words on the page, no matter how messy, it will haunt me until I do.
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| ★★★★★ |
"The trouble was, I had been inadequate all along, I simply hadn't thought about it."
We picked Plath's novel for the IRL book club after we finished the first volume of Simone de Beauvoir's Second Sex and at the time we had no idea how much both of these books together would affect us and open tremendously important discussion about gender roles, femininity, feminism, and mental health.
"I buried my head under the darkness of the pillow and pretended it was night. I couldn't see the point of getting up. I had nothing to look forward to."
Female Independance
The novel follows Esther Greenwood as she is spiralling into depression, describing her life as being suffocated by a bell jar. We follow her from her magazine internship in New York City to her return home, her attempted suicides and eventually the treatments she receives. However the story is not linear and we learn a lot about Esther from her flashbacks to college and her relationship with Buddy Willard.
The main themes of the novel are female independance and societal pressures, which go hand in hand even in our times. What can a woman be in the oppressive patriarchal American world in the 50s other than a mother and a housewife?
"That’s one of the reasons I never wanted to get married. The last thing I wanted was infinite security and to be the place an arrow shoots off from. I wanted change and excitement and to shoot off in all directions myself, like the colored arrows from a Fourth of July rocket."
Plath's Poignant Musings
At first I did not know that the novel is semi-autobiographical and I also did not know that soon after its publication in the UK Plath took her own life. Going into it not knowing any of these things protected my enjoyment of Plath's brilliant writing from certain expectations.
Because her writing is that good! I don't think I ever read a novel that surprises depression so well without actually being depressive itself.
"I wanted to tell her that if only something were wrong with my body it would be fine, I would rather have anything wrong with my body than something wrong with my head, but the idea seemed so involved and wearisome that I didn’t say anything. I only burrowed down further in the bed."
I was surprised how direct the novel was - about mental health, about suicide. It does not hide behind metaphors and imagery, it shoots straight to the heart.
If I would have read this novel as a teenager I don't think I would've gotten along with Esther because it's often so hard to like the characters that mirror ourselves so well, isn't it? But now I understand and appreciate her. She is an unlikeable character that I love. But I also have a thing for misunderstood female characters from that period anyway.
"Whenever I'm sad I'm going to die, or so nervous I can't sleep, or in love with somebody I won't be seeing for a week, I slump down just so far and then I say: 'I'll go take a hot bath."
"I am sure there are things that can't be cured by a good bath but I can't think of one."
The edition I have of The Bell Jar has an introduction that compares Esther to Holden from Salinger's Catcher in the Rye, a book I read and hated as a teenager... this makes me wonder, would I perceive Holden differently now? Should I attempt to reread one of the books I enjoyed least? Curiouser and curiouser.
If This Is Girly Writing Then I Want More
As I said, I went into the novel without any expectations and knowing as little as possible. When I learnt more about it I was left wondering if the success of this novel was influenced by the real life events surrounding it, and of course they did in a way, but having read it without knowing them and enjoying it so much I strongly believe this book has value regardless of what happened outside the book.
So of course I went into researching what people had to say at the time of its publication and surprise, surprise, it was criticised for being too "girly". If this is what girly writing is, then I want to read more of it! It's no secret that in many areas women have to work twice as much as men for the same recognition - this is why we see genres as "chick-lit" or "women's fiction" (what does that even mean) but there is no equivalent for prose-written-by-self-entitled-dudes, usually those are categorised as "literary fiction". Her writing is cold and poignant, but it also feels so real... It's an impeccable book written stunningly!
"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."
The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath was first published in 1963
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