The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath; narrated by Maggie Gyllenhaal | 2016; originally published 1963 | HarperAudio | Audiobook $ 17
The Bell Jar chronicles the crack-up of Esther Greenwood: brilliant, beautiful, enormously talented, and successful, but slowly going under — maybe for the last time. Sylvia Plath masterfully draws the reader into Esther’s breakdown with such intensity that Esther’s neurosis becomes completely real and even rational, as probable and accessible an experience as going to the movies.
The Bell Jar seems to be some kind of rite of passage reading for young women; I somehow missed it. Hence, putting it on my list for Classics Club.
The book does an astonishingly good job of portraying the main character’s spiral into a deep depressive episode. Millions of people will experience major depression in their lifetimes — including me and people I love. Each year, about 1 in 10 women and 1 in 15 men will experience depression; it is even more common among young adults in particular. It’s not an exaggeration to say that many, many people will find their own experience with this mental illness reflected in The Bell Jar.
I do wonder if perhaps it would have been even more meaningful if I’d read the story at roughly the same age as the protagonist — a college-age woman, newly adult and struggling to figure out what she wants out of life and what purpose, if any, or whether there is such a thing, is worth pursuing.
It’s true that at times the narrator gets pathetically myopic, and at other times is downright cruel in action or thought towards the other people in her orbit. This can make it a little difficult to sympathize with her. However, I think both of those problems are very much in line with real depression. Depressed people can have serious difficulty perceiving the world outside of their own heads; likewise, depressed people can be so caught up in self-hatred that they end up being unintentionally hateful to the people who care about them, too.
Although I think this book is a classic for a good reason, I will say that I would not recommend reading this book to anyone who is currently fighting a difficult mental health battle. Depression and some other mood disorders can be “contagious” — not precisely like a virus, of course, but for those of us who are vulnerable, a low mood can be spread from person to person and infect the psyche all the same. The book is incredibly well-written and worth reading, but it also has the potential to invite some truly damaging thoughts.
Links:
- Indiana University Lilly Library Sylvia Plath Collection
- Smith College Libraries Sylvia Plath Collection
- Biography from the Poetry Foundation
Publication information: Plath, Sylvia. The bell jar. New York City, NY: HarperAudio, 2016. Audiobook.
Source: Public library, via Hoopla..
Disclaimer: I am not compensated, monetarily or otherwise, for reviews of books or other products.
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