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The Bell Jar

DIANE S. BONDS (ESSAY DATE 1990)

SOURCE: Bonds, Diane S. "The Separative Self in Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar." Women's Studies 18, no. 1 (1990): 49-64.

In the following essay, Bonds examines how Esther Greenwood, the protagonist of The Bell Jar, represents the concept of a separative model of selfhood and contends that because Esther fails to cultivate a network of positive, non-hierarchical relations, especially with the other women, she is likely to re-experience the alienation that led to her suicide attempt.

As Paula Bennett has written, Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar offers a brilliant evocation of "the oppressive atmosphere of the 1950s and the soul-destroying effect this atmosphere could have on ambitious, high-minded young women like Plath."¹ It has not been widely recognized,...

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1. Introduction
2. Principal Works
3. Primary Sources
   1. Sylvia Plath (Novel Date 1963)
4. General Commentary
   1. Christina Britzolakis (Essay Date 1999)
   2. Linda Wagner-Martin (Essay Date 1999)
5. Title Commentary
   1. "Ariel"
   2. The Bell Jar
6. Further Reading
7. Copyright

1. Feminism