'Entrapment In Sylvia Plath's Initiation'

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In the short story “Initiation” author Sylvia Plath uses the internal conflict of Millicent to explore how societal labels are a form of entrapment. A high school girl named Millicent is given the chance to be in a sorority and jumps at the opportunity, but then is faced with some difficult choices. At first she is ecstatic but after joining she realizes the sorority has a strange initiation process and everyone at the sorority seems plastic. The secretary of the sorority explains to Millicent “first of all, each of you has a big sister. She’s the one who bosses you around, and you just do what she tells you” (Plath 1). It is ironic because a big sister is usually thought of as someone who cares about you and helps guide you through a positive way, while in the sorority the big sister …show more content…

She believes she is where every girl aspires to be, one of the elect brought into the amazing world of sisterhood. During the initiation process, Millicent realizes that being part of the sorority might not be true to herself. She notices that everyone seems fake, and she even notices herself talking “mechanically, her voice sounding strange” (Plath 2). Her mechanicalness is a reflection of the fakeness of the girls in the story and how they all are expected act the same similar to robots to keep up with the social expectations. Millicent is still doubting whether or not the sorority is worth it because she doesn’t want to be so fake, yet she really wants to be a part of the elite society. While on a trip for part of her initiation process Millicent talks to an old man and realizes that the sorority is not where she belongs. She realizes that “So many people were shut up tight inside themselves like boxes, yet they would up, unfolding quite wonderfully, if only you were interested in them. And really, you didn’t have to belong to a club to feel related to other human beings” (Plath

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