The Bell Jar
Suicidal in nature, perturbed in mind, and aimless in direction, Sylvia Plath fumbled her way through her adult life. The main character, Esther Greenwood, portrays Plath in her first and only book. Sylvia Plath conveys her touching story of losing herself, and her will to live, as well as her recovery in her heartbreaking novel, The Bell Jar.
Plath was not always such a disturbed person. She was born October 27th, 1932 (¡°Sylvia¡± n.p.). Her mother was a German and English teacher and her father emigrated from Germany at age sixteen to study ministry, and later, science. Sylvia was very close to her father, Otto Plath (Malmsheimer 527). In 1940, Otto, who had neglected to take care of his diabetes, fell ill and died that November. At this point in her life, Sylvia made a 180¢ª turn from being a happy, healthy child, to a shattered, lonesome soul (Malmsheimer 529).
Sylvia had little interaction with those outside of her household as a child. Her social circle included only her parents, maternal grandparents, her brother, and a few of her neighbors. She lived in the suburbs of Winthrop, Massachusetts near Boston and her father ran their household (Malmsheimer 528).
Sylvia¡¯s first publication was a short poem in the ¡°Boston Sunday Herald¡± at the tender age of eight years (Malmsheimer 529). In junior high school, Plath decided that she wanted to be a writer. She stuck with that idea for the whole of her brief life.
Plath graduated from Gamaliel Bradford High School in Wellesley, Massachusetts (Volkman 311). From there she went on to earn the Wellesley Smith Club Scholarship, the
Neilson Scholarship, and the Olive Higgins Prouty Fund Scholarship. In the fall of 1950, Plath enrolled in Smith College. Her first year there she was published in Seventeen Magazine and won the third place prize for their short story contest (Malmsheimer 530).
Ten years after Plath¡¯s award winning short story, her first collection of poems The Colossus and Other Poems, was published in 1960 (Malmsheimer 529). Plath attended Cambridge University in London, England. It was here that Plath met her husband, Ted Hughes, a fellow poet. They were married June 16th, 1956 and had a daughter, Frieda, and a son, Nicholas (Volkman 314). Sylvia later became aware of an affair her husband had been engaging in. This caused the couple to separate (Volkman 316).
The separation from Hughes caused Sylvia great distress. She had previously been hospitalized for attempting to take her own life (Volkman 312).
Sylvia Plath showed interest in writing at a very early age. Plath published her first poem when she was eight years old. Sylvia Plath continued writing and published numerous stories and poems before the age of twenty. After graduation in 1950, Plath received the Olive Higgins Prouty Scholarship from Smith College (Smithipedia). At the private college, Plath managed to excel in school and write over four hundred poems while suffering from depression (allpoetry). It was at Smith College, where she attempted her first suicide. Plath graduated from the school in 1955 and moved to Cambridge, England to continue her studies (AAoP).
Aurelia Schober, Plath’s mother, was studying at Boston University when she fell in love with her professor that taught German and biology, Otto Plath, whom she would marry in January 1932. Later in that same year on October 27, Plath was born to the couple. Plath’s father passed away when she was only eight. (Academy of American Poets) From then on, Plath began publishing her poems. In everything she did, she strived towards being flawless; she had straight A’s, was a good daughter, and earned prestigious prizes (Gilson). Schober aided in pushing her daughter towards excellence and always made sure Plath knew how proud she was of her. In fact, Sylvia’s mother collected her daughter’s achievements and praised her highly for them (Liukkonen). By 1950, she had been given a scholarship to attend Smith College and had hundreds of publications, which she would add to substantially in the time she spent at Smith (Gilson).
Sylvia's genuine emotion that shines through her work is rooted deep in her childhood. Sylvia was a perfectly normal child that enjoyed life until at age eight when she lost the closest person to her. Her father, Otto Plath, died from complication with diabetes. (Kehoe 1) Sylvia had been his favorite and hit her the hardest. The toughest part was that because of her age she was not permitted to go to the funeral so she was never able to let go and say goodbye. She never fully recovered and later in life became convinced that the majority of her pain was caused by losing her father. A. Alvarez, a friend and critic, stated years later “The death of her father, whom she loved, who abandoned her, and who dragged her after him into death.” (Kehoe 1) She tried to pick the pieces up and move on. She moved on to become a good student. In all her years of s...
Plath is a very personal poet. She also uses symbolism throughout the majority of her poetry and prose. Plath writes based on everyday occurrences during her lifetime. Most of her work is actually diary entries without punctuation. Plath gets most of her inspiration from her everyday life. She enjoyed writing about the things that happened day to day.
Plath was born in the seaside town of Winthrop, Massachusetts during the year of 1932. In her first eight years of life, Plath was troubled with the birth of a new sibling, the death of a parent, and the start of a war. These eight years were the calm before the stormy life of Sylvia Plath. As an only child, Plath felt threatened by the new baby in the family. Her new sibling, Warren, sparked a disdain for children that Plath would harbor for the rest of her life. In 1940, Plath’s father died and essentially robbed the children of a proper relationship with their mourning mother. The family moved inland where Plath focused on writing poetry until she began to attend Smith College in 1950.
Sylvia Plath was the daughter of Aurelia Schober and Otto Plath. Her mother was a teacher at Boston University and her father was a Bee Entomologist. She had one brother named Warren. Sylvia Plath began writing at a very young at the age of eight. She submitted her first poem into the children’s section of the Boston Herald in 1941. The poem was named “Point Shirley” this story was about the description of her grandparents’ house when she moved to Point Shirley, Massachusetts. A week after she turned eight, her father died on November 5, 1940 due to untreated diabetes after his foot was amputated. She then turned to her writing and sealed herself off from society. She became depressed and tired to commit suicide. She later wrote the poem “Daddy” in 1962, to describe what she thought of her dad.
"About." Personal Blog, n.d. Web. 15 Nov. 2015. [When finding an explanation for the similarities between the writers, it is important to play close attention to biographies. In case the psychoeconomic factors that Ruonco describes are true, then biography constitutes most of the development of the Sylvia Plath affliction. Moreover, the biography provides an insight into the views of the author for a better and more accurate understanding of her poetry. Furthermore, it is imperative to use her auto-statement since she referres to her "muse" as something out of her control which can be traced to Kaufman's
Middlebrook, Diane. Her Husband: Ted Hughes and Sylvia Plath--A Marriage. Boston: Penguin (Non-Classics), 2003. Print.
Kehoe, John. "Young, Talented, And Doomed: The Life Of Sylvia Plath." Biography 3.5 (1999): 88. Academic Search Complete. Web. 1 Apr. 2014.
Dickie, Margaret. 1979 Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes. Urbana: the University of Illinois Press. [http://www.usm.maine.edu/~jkuenz/391/lazarus.htm, accessed 6 May 2007]
According to “Sylvia Plath” Sylvia Plath struggled with severe depression throughout her life. She first experienced depression during her third year of college because of insecurities and self-esteem issues. Furthermore, Plath’s troubled marriage with Ted Hughes fueled her depression later in life; he had cheated on her with a younger woman and left her to raise their two children. Once again, she was overcome by self-esteem issues and anxiety that led her down a dark path. Plath attempted suicide three times, and she succeeded on her third attempt at the age of thirty. She died
The poem, “Mad Girl’s Love Song”, highlights Sylvia Plath’s struggle with depression and her mental illness. As a form of expression, Sylvia Plath wrote “Mad Girl’s Love Song” in 1953, her last years of her life. Six years into Plath’s marriage with English poet, Ted Hughes, depression started to kick off in her life. Hughes began seeing other women and not responding to Plath as her husband. According to the Poetry Foundation, “She let her writing express elemental forces and primeval fears”. Plath’s poetry slowly became more violent and intense. Many people like to blame Hughes for her mental illness. In 1953 Plath decided to end her life by using her gas oven.
The glass of which a bell jar is constructed is thick and suffocating, intending to preserve its ornamental contents but instead traps in it stale air. The thickness of the bell jar glass prevents the prisoner from clearly seeing through distortion. Sylvia Plath writes with extreme conviction, as The Bell Jar is essentially her autobiography. The fitting title symbolizes not only her suffocation and mental illness, but also the internal struggle of Plath's alter ego and novel protagonist Esther Greenwood. The novel illustrates the theme confinement by highlighting the weaknesses of both Esther and Plath.
Sylvia Plath, an innocent scarred by her memories, shares her story through her considerably dark poems. On October 27, 1932 in
Plath’s father died early in her life leaving her with unresolved feelings, and this brought a lot of troubles later on in life. Sylvia was a great student but when she was overwhelmed with disappointments after a month in New York, she attempted suicide (“Sylvia Plath”). After receiving treatment and recovering, she returned to school and later moved to England where she met her future husband, Ted Hughes (“Sylvia Plath”). Their marriage with two children didn’t last when Ted had an affair. They separated and Ted moved in with the new woman, leaving Sylvia and their two children. Battling depression during this time, Sylvia soon ended her life. She left behind numerous writings that many might see as signs of her depression and suicide attempts.