Analysis Of Esther By Sylvia Plath

Esther wanted to get away from the real world because she considers herself a failure. She reminds herself while in a negative phase that “[she]’ll never get anywhere like that” (Plath 146). Her inward personality creates this negative view of herself, which is another sign of suicidal tendencies (Lester). She does not feel worthy. Once, she calls herself “a dull cart horse” (Plath 32). She criticized her writing by reminding herself that her professor called it “factitious” (Plath 147) even though she won a scholarship to a college and won a writing contest that a magazine held (COSPL). When in a rough time while living with her mother, she thinks to herself that “the stupidest person at [her] mother’s college knew more than [she] did” (Plath 125). She constantly thought of herself as a “dreadfully inadequate” (Plath 77). Esther’s solitary personality was the most evident when she stayed in the hospital. When her doctor announced that she’d be having no more visitors, instead of …show more content…
Sylvia Plath took her own life in 1963 when she turned on the gas jets of her home’s oven and suffocated herself. Plath’s novel is a piece of lost history; many women never got to share their stories because their mental illnesses were taboo. Even though in Plath’s writing “her subject is never really more than her own illness” (Whittington-Egan), this novel helped women everywhere by allowing others “to learn about suicidality (sic) from a study of the writings and lives of women such as Plath” (Gerisch). Thanks to Sylvia Plath and others like her, representation of women is less of a problem in today’s society. The Bell Jar, whether Plath realized it would or not, crossed many social boundaries that would continue to affect the greater good in the future. Plath’s personal testimony within the novel and her representation as a woman with mental illnesses had a much larger reach than what anyone could have ever