Book Review: The Bell Jar
What starts as the story detailing the ambitions of a young woman slowly meanders into pure unadulterated rage. Rage on my part as the treatment of women's mental health, abuse and sexual harassment made my soul ignite with rage. Pure unadulterated Rage. Sylvia Plath, you would’ve loved Bessel Van der Kolk’s ‘The Body Keeps the Score’, that, and a healthy dose of empathy, is what you needed. Not electroshock therapy, not a guilt-tripping mother over medical costs or attitudes to mental health so archaic they make Victorian asylums look like a trip to Kew Gardens on a summer's day. And I say ‘Sylvia Plath’ instead of the book's character ‘Esther’ because this book is somewhat autobiographical. Parts of the book that are too graphic to be purely fictional and not based on life experience. This book reflected too much of her real life - so yes, Plath deserved more.
One of the book's main draws is that it starts off like any other. Esther sounds like any other bright young woman wanting to forge a new path for herself. Or literally any woman wanting to forge a path for herself. Plath makes a relatable character without the kitsch of trying to make a relatable character. Some authors do it in a way that is just cringe. But Plath is holding a mirror up to us; Esther could be any of us. How many of us have gone out into the world, ready for anything? Running after internships, scholarships, chasing grades and careers and dreams? Answer: all of us. It’s not like we knew who we were back then - but we do know what internalised misogyny is, sexual harassment and assault are. All of which she faces. With her boss (a woman) at the magazine, she deals with internalised misogyny from a woman in power who has had to conform to type to get ahead and then gets assaulted by a man who is an acquaintance of her friends. No wonder she considers life like a ‘bell jar’ as it starts to become suffocating. This is the first stage of Esther's meandering into psychosis.
The question that Esther faces is ‘Who am I?’ And who hasn't asked themselves this at any and all points in their lives? Because we all aim to be something or somebody, and Esther realises that her whole persona is based on her academic success - what is she without it? What is the plan? And further down the psychosis path we go, next stop male psychologist who knows everything about women without having to listen to a word they say. Roll in the electroshock therapy. Ted Hughes would later say that this novel is the result of the harm electroshock therapy had done. But I guess we’ll never know.
While it is supposed that with the right help, Esther does get better (and with a female psychiatrist, no less), yet the ending is inconclusive, and you still feel off balance. Or at least I did, still reeling from the contents of the book. Maybe that's the point, maybe that's why it is one of the premier feminist books of the 20th century, because, sure, we’ve made leaps and bounds with women’s rights. But you can’t blame Sylvia for why she falls into depression. Anyone in those awful circumstances would.