The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath: A review
The Bell Jar is Sylvia Plath's only published novel. It was originally published under a pseudonym in 1963 and only under the author's real name in Britain in 1967. She committed suicide about a month after that. Publication in the United States was delayed until 1971, at the request of her family. Since that time, it has attained the status of a classic and is often cited as one of the most influential feminist works of that period. But I had never read it. Time to remedy that oversight. As all the reading world is most likely aware, the book is written in the form of a memoir of a young woman's descent into madness and is apparently based on Plath's own experience. I was mesmerized by it almost from the first page. It is unlike any other book I have ever read. The story is told in simple, declarative sentences. The prose is both precise, crisp, and seems utterly dispassionate in its descriptions of the most harrowing personal experiences, including her traumatic los...