Bell Jar, The, is an autobiographical novel by the American poet Sylvia Plath. The novel was published in January 1963 in London under the name of Victoria Lucas. The characters in the novel closely resemble people Plath knew. She used the pseudonym Victoria Lucas in part to protect those people. The Bell Jar was Plath’s only novel. She took her own life one month after its publication. The book was finally published under Plath’s name in England in 1966 and in the United States in 1971.
The Bell Jar is narrated by Esther Greenwood, an attractive and intelligent 19-year-old college student. Part of the story is set during a summer month in New York City, where Esther is working as a guest editor for a women’s fashion magazine. After returning to her home in the Boston suburbs, Esther becomes deeply depressed. Her mother takes her to a psychiatrist who administers terrifying electric shock therapy as a means of treating Esther’s mental illness. Such therapy involves passing an electric current through a patient’s brain for a fraction of a second (see Shock treatment). Esther’s condition worsens after the treatment, and she attempts suicide by an overdose of sleeping pills.
After her unsuccessful suicide attempt, Esther is admitted to the psychiatric ward in a city hospital. There, her mental condition deteriorates even more. However, a famous woman novelist who had sponsored Esther’s college scholarship pays to move her to a private hospital. Esther’s condition improves. At the end of the novel, Esther believes that she has regained some grasp on her sanity but realizes that madness could take over her mind at any time.
The Bell Jar has been called an important feminist novel because Esther suffers under the limitations of roles available to women during her time. In the novel, Plath protests against the expectations that women must meet before society considers them normal and successful.
The novel is also a dramatic study of mental illness and its treatment during the 1950’s in the United States. The novel’s title refers to a bell-shaped glass container used in laboratories in which air has been pumped out to create a vacuum. In the story, Esther describes her mental condition as resembling being trapped beneath a bell jar.
See also Plath, Sylvia.
