The Bell Jar
Published November 21, 2003
It was intense.
I blame the book. I mean, my job sucks, but wow.
And that's why I think this is a great book. I didn't feel fabulous reading it, absolutely the opposite. But the fact that it could operate on me so powerfully takes my breath away.
Plath is good.
So that stuff I just wrote might have been the stuff I would have written if I hadn't finished the book. Now, after I've finished it I can say all kind of detached things.
Plath wrote a good story about suicidal urges. I have not been that kind of suicidal myself, but my frieds who have describe it in a very similar way. That suicide is a thing out there, a task to be done, something that needs to be done, and it's just a matter of finding the right time.
When Esther recieves the "good" shock treatment, she describes how she kind of forgot that she needed to kill herself. To paraphrase, she says she went to dinner and could not quite remember what she loved the knives for.
I don't know if other people would agree with me, but as I was reading the book, it seemed very easy to follow the logic Esther was using. It was hard to realize she was going crazy until she gave you the clues: she hadn't slept for a week. She hadn't bathed or changed her clothes.
The bathing part I felt was particularly significant, since she had earlier described how much she loved bathing. But then, she didn't want to bathe anymore.
It was definitely not pleasant to read this book, but it was very powerful.
- The Bell Jar
- Published: November 21, 2003
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- Section: Books
- Writer: Murphy
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a friend and i had been feeling just like she wrote in that book and it was almost eerie to see those words. to read all of those thoughts that had been circling around in my mind for some time. To see how similar a person from the past who was already dead and so unfamiliar was. It was strange. And after i was done i was not the same because the book opened my eyes to something i knew i wasn't sure about. wasn't sure if i wanted to give it life. but i had to. i wanted to. the book is bad for you. you can tell while you're reading. but i wanted it.
and i love sylvia plath.
if you can get your hands on her poems you should. I have only read pieces of Ariel. and i was reading her short stories and journal excerpts and essays, Johnny Panic and the Bible of Dreams, but i didn't finish.
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I read this book years ago and I still feel a tinge of dread just thinking about it. I liked your point about writing a review at different points in your progress through a book. I had a similar experience but with a twist. I'm reading Wind, Sand and Stars by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, the author of the Little Prince. I read the first chapter and thought "Uh oh, this really isn't for me." I just kept kind of losing focus on where he was headed, sort of like what happens if I try watching NASCAR. It got to the point where I was going to just put it down and not pick it back up when I got to a passage that opened it up for me. It was suddenly clear where he had been headed and I found myself literally nodding in agreement as I read. I love when that happens.