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A review by kierscrivener
The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath
5.0
"I guess I should have been excited the way most of the other girls were, but I couldn’t get myself to react. I felt very still and very empty, the way the eye of a tornado must feel, moving dully along in the middle of the surrounding hullabaloo."
Esther is a character I saw a lot of myself in. Her feelings, restrictions, tangents and struggle with mental illness are things I find akin to myself. It potent and you can tell Sylvia Plath is telling from her own experiences. The real emotion and thoughts are refreshing. Nothing to hide it. I also love books that are meandering and allow development.
I love the simplistic feminism in this book. Characterized only by her thoughts and how they whirl. I like the beautiful development of themes of restrictions, roles and how the motif of blood work in and her finally gaining freedom and choice in her life even at the cost of blood.
That it isn't a novel where everything falls into place and the world is brighter and fresher.
"To the person in the bell jar, blank and stopped as a dead baby, the world itself is the bad dream."
And later on her mother calls it a bad dream and she thinks "A bad dream. I remember everything." There is a refreshing honesty to this book. I adore it. And the bell jar captures mental health so well.
The fig tree is symbol that meant a lot to me as it shows the restrictions in life then and even now. That you have so many ideas and possibilities and you do not know which path to take and then they all seem to die as you wait.
And the bath is glorious something I always do. I feel like Sylvia Plath and I would have been kindred friends in another life.
"How did I know that someday—at college, in Europe, somewhere, anywhere—the bell jar, with its stifling distortions, wouldn’t descend again?"
This is grim and sad ending as history tells us months after this novel was published, Sylvia's bell jar descended and this time she was not saved.
Esther is a character I saw a lot of myself in. Her feelings, restrictions, tangents and struggle with mental illness are things I find akin to myself. It potent and you can tell Sylvia Plath is telling from her own experiences. The real emotion and thoughts are refreshing. Nothing to hide it. I also love books that are meandering and allow development.
I love the simplistic feminism in this book. Characterized only by her thoughts and how they whirl. I like the beautiful development of themes of restrictions, roles and how the motif of blood work in and her finally gaining freedom and choice in her life even at the cost of blood.
That it isn't a novel where everything falls into place and the world is brighter and fresher.
"To the person in the bell jar, blank and stopped as a dead baby, the world itself is the bad dream."
And later on her mother calls it a bad dream and she thinks "A bad dream. I remember everything." There is a refreshing honesty to this book. I adore it. And the bell jar captures mental health so well.
The fig tree is symbol that meant a lot to me as it shows the restrictions in life then and even now. That you have so many ideas and possibilities and you do not know which path to take and then they all seem to die as you wait.
And the bath is glorious something I always do. I feel like Sylvia Plath and I would have been kindred friends in another life.
"How did I know that someday—at college, in Europe, somewhere, anywhere—the bell jar, with its stifling distortions, wouldn’t descend again?"
This is grim and sad ending as history tells us months after this novel was published, Sylvia's bell jar descended and this time she was not saved.