Analysis of The Bell Jar The ultraconservative air of the 1950's breeds the Betty Crocker kind of woman, satisfied with her limited role in a male-dominated society, one who simply submits to the desires and expectations of the opposite sex. The Bell Jar, by Syliva Plath explores the effects of society's traditional standards on a young woman coming of age. The main character, Esther Greenwood, a nineteen year-old college student, receives messages about a woman's place in society throughout her life. Esther's aspirations of becoming a writer, specifically, a poet, are obvious. Carrying out these aspirations in the 1950's is not so clear-cut, though. Esther's environment presses her to marry, settle down, have children; to be the happy housewife. For nineteen years she puts on a facade, pretending to be the woman everyone wants her to be, trying to please her family and peers, until she mentally breaks down and attempts suicide. Her mother serves as the first of her teachers in conveying this message. For example, Mrs. Greenwood wants her daughter to learn shorthand because it will get her a living until she can marry, because it can even get her a husband. She consistently emphasizes the importance of Esther staying "pure," so she can get the best of possible husbands. So early on Esther realizes that, for most women, marriage and family comprise the main substance of their lives. Esther receives more lessons from her medical student boyfriend, Buddy Willard. He often spits out remarks like one day Esther will "stop rocking the boat and start rocking a cradle." He also says that once she has children she will "feel differently," and not want to write poems anymore, that she will be "brainwashed and numb as a slave in some private, totalitarian state." This was what happened to Buddy's mother, who, after marriage, let her husband walk all over her like a "kitchen doormat." It is his mother Buddy quotes when he says, "What a man wants is a mate and what a woman wants is infinite security" and "What a man is is an arrow into the future and what a woman is is the place the arrow shoots off from." Even the editors of Ladies Day, the magazine which awarded Esther and 11 other girls a free trip to New York due to winning their fashion magazine contest, accentuate the girls' femininity. On their arrival in New York, the editors drive the girls around from fashion shows to beauty parlors to gala lunches to publicity parties. Then, after dressing them up like Cinderellas, the editors pose them in front of a camera with a dozen other "anonymous young men with all-American bone structures." The magazine is clearly not interesting in promoting the girls' intellect that won them the contest in the first place. It is no wonder Esther becomes weary of this stale, unprofitable environment which only stifles her personal growth. Before Esther went to New York, her life was safely circumscribed. She was always "running after good marks and prizes and grants of one sort an another" for as long as she could remember. During that fateful summer in the city questions suddenly confronted her: What does being a woman mean? What female role should she play? The book presents a variety of female roles: Dodo Conway, a perpetually pregnant woman whose face glows with a "serene, almost religious smile"; Buddy Willard's mother, a professor's wife and leading citizen who constantly quotes words of wisdom; Doreen, the Southern blonde bimbo who always snags the men she wants; Betsy, the blithe, innocent, and simple Midwestern fashion model; Philomena Guinea, the best-selling novelist who endows Esther with a college scholarship; and Jay Cee, the successful fashion magazine editor. But despite Dodo's placid contentment, Jay's cleverness, Mrs. Willard's womanly wisdom, Doreen's attractiveness, and Betsy's innocence, all are essentially flawed as humans, and as women. Besides good looks, Doreen also possesses an innate vulgarity and frivolity. Dodo, though maternally content, represents no more than a flabby, misshapen animal. Mrs. Willard, though seemingly refined and cultured, actually lets her husband walk all over her like a doormat. Philomena Guinea's novels are not literary masterpieces, but endless, gossipy soap operas, while Betsy represents the empty-headed "nice girl." For all of these women, it is impossible for them to assert their independence, to stand alone on solid ground, to be their own person. These male-dependent, bubble-headed, flawed women constantly bombard Esther's mind; their world and way of life do not satisfy her needs or desires. One of the novel's key passages best describes the conflicting emotions running through Esther's mind, and shows a vision of her life branching out like a green fig tree: From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor. . . and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn't quite make out. . . 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. This passage of Esther's symbolic tree shows the amazing complexity and confusion characteristic of the choices women have to make. One common root emerges into thousands of different branches, and she faces the dilemma of choosing one and only one path. Negative images of childbirth and babies are also prominent throughout the book. In a gynecologist's office, watching a mother lovingly caressing her baby, Esther wonders why she does not feel these same maternal sensations, as biological and social roles suggest. To her, babies represent a trap, and sex as the bait. She realizes they represent life, but not the life she wants to live. She does not want fulfillment though childbirth, as many women would; she wants to fulfill herself, by herself, with no help from anybody. Between the enormous fetuses on display at Buddy's hospital ward and her neighbor, Dodo Conway, as a permanent slave to her seven children, Esther feels overwhelmed, even sickened. Babies lure Esther toward suicide by presenting to her only two options: either giving oneself completely to the child or dying. The choice to live looms so visibly and painfully that she takes matters into her own hands by attempting to kill herself later on. She also witnesses childbirth in the hospital where Buddy, works. The woman's stomach stuck up so high I couldn't see her face or the upper part of her body at all. She seemed to have nothing but an enormous spider-fat stomach and two little ugly spindly legs propped in the high stirrups, and all the time the baby was being born she never stopped making this inhuman whooing noise. The head doctor. . . kept saying to the woman, "Push down, Mrs. Tomolillo, push down, that's a good girl, push down," and finally through the split, shaven place between her legs, lurid with disinfectant, I saw a dark fuzzy thing appear. In this scene childbirth seems like a frightening ordeal, in which the "dark fuzzy thing" emerges from between the woman's legs. The pain of Mrs. Tomolillo is quite apparent with her "spider-fat stomach," "ugly, spindly legs," and "inhuman whooing noise." The child itself is streaked with blood and "blue as a plumb." It is like a foreign object that violates the mother's body. After observing the "sewing up of the woman's cut with a needle and long thread," Esther wonders "if there were any other ways to have babies." All of these conservative messages about the roles of women in society take their toll on Esther's personality. On the outside, people see Esther as the fashionable college girl with her patent leather bag and matching pumps; the brainy English major, who is equally comfortable on the party scene or behind the books. These images confirm the fact that Esther has always played the roles others wanted her to play. For her mother is "the perfect good girl." For Mr. Manzi, her physics professor, she is the model student, though secretly she loathes physics. For Buddy, she is only sweet and agreeable. For Doreen, Esther seems tough and sophisticated. For Betsy, she is the fun girl who enjoys sappy movies. Finally, Esther breaks down when she attempts to paste a forced smile on her face while modeling in front of the Ladies' Day photographers. Dissolving into tears, the whole artificial facade of the past 19 years crashes down on her. Before leaving New York, Esther abandons all of her fashionable clothes provided by the magazine, letting each item float down over the city from the top of her hotel. This action represents the renouncing of the feminine standards, and obliteration of the self. After her distressful month in New York, Esther returns to Massachusetts, where she attempts suicide in the basement of her house by swallowing a bottle of sleeping pills. The years of gender inequality messages, false identities, and artificial contentment weigh her down, as she finally takes matters into her own hands.
Bram Stoker’s Dracula includes themes of death, love, and sex. Stoker’s use of empiricism utilizes the idea that everything is happening “now”. The book offers clear insight into who is evil without explicitly saying it. Stoker’s interest in empiricism uses British womanhood as a way to distinguish between good and evil.
The novel Dracula by Bram Stoker has plentiful examples of key concepts we have examined in class including: Purity and impurity, magical thinking, strong emotions such as disgust and shame, , formalization, and myth. In this essay I will summarize events that take place within the novel when the protagonists deal with Dracula and then relate these events to the key concepts to demonstrate why the characters view him as dangerous, and therefore something to be avoided completely.
In Plath’s The Bell Jar, imagery is used to show the contrast between Esther’s internal self and the external society. The bell jar, that slowly descending over her, is a symbol for the growing isolation Esther feels as her depression worsens throughout the novel and also the alienation she receives as a result of a societal stigma associated with mental illnesses such as depression. Within the first half of the novel, there are many dark images, such as the dead babies in
...es these primitive standards, she becomes melancholy because she does not attune into the gender roles of women, which particularly focus on marriage, maternity, and domesticity. Like other nineteen year old women, Esther has many goals and ambitions in her life. Nevertheless, Esther is disparaged by society’s blunt roles created for women. Although she experiences a tremendous psychological journey, she is able to liberate herself from society’s suffocating constraints. Esther is an excellent inspiration for women who are also currently battling with society’s degrading stereotypes. She is a persistent woman who perseveres to accomplish more than being a stay at home mother. Thus, Esther is a voice for women who are trying to abolish the airless conformism that is prevalent in 1950’s society.
‘Dracula’ is a novel that probes deeply into people’s superstitions, fears and beliefs of the supernatural. The creature Dracula is an evil being with no concern for others, he kills for his own ends and cannot be stopped, and this is what makes ‘Dracula’ truly frightening.
The vampire had been depicted as the epitome of offensive and seductive behavior in their early representations. It has suffered an enduring image of something inhuman and monstrous that feeds and thrives at the expense of others. As David Punter and Glennis Byron have asserted, “Confounding all categories, the vampire is the ultimate embodiment of transgression” (The Gothic 268). The transgressive behavior of the vampire was first observed with Stoker’s Dracula. Although this figure is attractive to us in many ways, with his intelligence and immortality, the Count is primaril...
The theme to this book is identity, all Esther really wanted to do was fit in. She figured that there was something wrong with her, with others, with society, that she didn’t want what other’s wanted. She didn’t want to get married unlike every other girl that got married because it was the norm. Esther didn’t find it fun nor got the reason why she would have to. The quote connect to identity because Esther wanted to be the same as everyone but she wasn’t she worked hard throughout school and work in order to succeed in life with or without a man. Ester’s identity was being a hard worker, an overachiever, someone who has high ambitions. So when she started to slowly distance from that identity she pretty much ended up in the unknown for her. With the pressures to fit in and be like everyone else with the fact that she was somewhat losing her identity she panicked and tried to go everywhere which eventually took a toll on her mind and body.
Mina Murray was engaged to Jonathan Harker and when Dracula kept him prisoner, the Count wrote letters to Harker’s boss and pretended to be Jonathan and to inform his boss and his fiancé that things were going good with his business trip. The Count was giving Mina and Jonathan’s boss false hope and keeping Harker prisoner at his castle. Dracula would even dress up in Harker’s clothes and mail the letters so it would not arise any suspicion. The Count seemed to only focus on turning women into vampires and he used the men to lure the women into his trap. Therefore, that is why he was keeping Jonathan alive. Everything Dracula did was made with lots of forethought. Such as when Lucy a young woman who also was a friend of Mina was mysteriously getting ill and sleep-walking during the night no one knew what was happening to Lucy because she would get sicker after they discovered she was sleepwalking. Lucy was sleep walking because she had gotten bite by Dracula and every night he called to her so he could feed off her again. He also made sure she was alone and waited a few days before attempting to suck her blood again. Although, Dracula was a smart man in his cunning actions he could not hide the fact that something evil was
One’s identity is the most important lesson to be learned. It is vital part of life knowing who you are in order to live a fulfilled life. Without knowing your identity, and the way you perceive life, it is difficult for others to understand you, along with a struggle to live a happy life. In Sylvia Plath’s “The Bell Jar,” Esther Greenwood struggles to find her own identity, and in the process, she develops a mental illness which helps her discover the person she is on the inside.
The late nineteenth century Irish novelist, Bram Stoker is most famous for creating Dracula, one of the most popular and well-known vampire stories ever written. Dracula is a gothic, “horror novel about a vampire named Count Dracula who is looking to move from his native country of Transylvania to England” (Shmoop Editorial Team). Unbeknownst of Dracula’s plans, Jonathan Harker, a young English lawyer, traveled to Castle Dracula to help the count with his plans and talk to him about all his options. At first Jonathan was surprised by the Count’s knowledge, politeness, and overall hospitality. However, the longer Jonathan remained in the castle the more uneasy and suspicious he became as he began to realize just how strange and different Dracula was. As the story unfolded, Jonathan realized he is not just a guest, but a prisoner as well. The horror in the novel not only focuses on the “vampiric nature” (Soyokaze), but also on the fear and threat of female sexual expression and aggression in such a conservative Victorian society.
In Bram Stoker’s novel Dracula, Stoker’s use of inverted gender roles allows readers to grasp the sense of obscureness throughout, eventually leading to the reader’s realization that these characters are rather similar to the “monster” which they call Dracula. Despite being in the Victorian era, Stoker’s use of sexuality in the novel contributes to the reasoning of obscureness going against the Victorian morals and values. Throughout the novel the stereotypical roles of the Victorian man and woman are inverted to draw attention to the similarities between Dracula and the characters. Vague to a majority of readers, Bram Stoker uses Dracula as a negative connotation on society being that the values of the Victorian culture are inverted amongst the sexes of characters, thus pointing out the similarities of the characters and the so called “monster” which they call Dracula.
The narrator states, “To his surprise, his father began very carefully to direct the needle into the top of the new child's forehead, puncturing the place where the fragile skin pulsed”(149). The narrator also quotes, “As he continued to watch, the new child, no longer crying, moved his arms and legs in a jerking motion. Then he went limp. His head fell to the side, his eyes half open. Then he was still”(149). This innocent baby is murdered because he is a twin and he weighs less than the other twin. The society is brainwashed into believing that they release babies, but this really means that they kill them. In addition to killing babies, they also beat the
The fact that Esther couldn't really accept her father's death contributed to career problems: she had no idea of what to do with her life, she `thought that if my father hadn't died he would have taught me....`
Esther envisions her life as a fig tree in which she cannot choose a single branch. At one point in the novel, Esther reads a story about a fig tree which turns into a symbol of the choices she is given available to her. She states, “I saw my life branching out before me like a green fig tree…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...
In the novel, Esther Greenwood, the main character, is a young woman, from a small town, who wins a writing competition, and is sent to New York for a month to work for a magazine. Esther struggles throughout the story to discover who she truly is. She is very pessimistic about life and has many insecurities about how people perceive her. Esther is never genuinely happy about anything that goes on through the course of the novel. When she first arrives at her hotel in New York, the first thing she thinks people will assume about her is, “Look what can happen in this country, they’d say. A girl lives in some out-of-the-way town for nineteen years, so poor she can’t afford a