The Bell Jar

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The Bell Jar (Magill’s Survey of American Literature, Revised Edition)

In The Bell Jar, the veil of fiction over the story of Plath's own life is so thin that her mother fought its publication in the United States, writing to Harper & Row that “practically every character represents someone—often in caricature—whom Sylvia loved; each person had given freely of time, thought, affection, and, in one case, financial help during those agonizing six months of breakdown in 1953.” Nevertheless, the story has the appeal of the novel, and it uses the conventions of fiction in the structuring of the experience it narrates.

The heroine,...

[The entire page is 1873 words long]

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• The Bell Jar (Cyclopedia of Literary Characters)
• The Bell Jar (Identities and Issues in Literature)
• The Bell Jar (Magill Book Reviews)
• The Bell Jar (Masterplots, Revised Second Edition)
• The Bell Jar (Masterplots II: Women’s Literature Series)
• The Bell Jar (Cyclopedia of Literary Places)
• The Bell Jar (Magill’s Survey of American Literature, Revised Edition)

See Also:

• Sylvia Plath (Cyclopedia of World Authors)
• Sylvia Plath (Poetry)
• Sylvia Plath (Short Fiction)
• Sylvia Plath (Dictionary of World Biography)
• Sylvia Plath (Identities and Issues)
• Sylvia Plath (Women’s Issues)

See Also:

• - The Bell Jar summary and study guide in the eNotes.