Sylvia Plath's only novel, The Bell Jar, was published over fifty years ago, and over that time, it has ascended into the ranks of must-read American classics. The issues it deals with—mental illness, depression, and identity crisis—remain as relevant and urgent today as they were when the book was first published. At the same time, Plath's own life and death were factors in propelling the book to the status it holds today.
In writing The Bell Jar, a part of Plath's intention was to utilize her own experiences in a mental hospital to produce a work that she hoped would be a commercial success. She intended to capitalize on the newly awakened public interest in the treatment of patients at mental health institutions. Plath’s interest was the result of another book that had been released around the same time, The Snakepit, by Mary Jane Ward, which, too, was semi-autobiographical. However, Plath's book has far outdone its predecessor in public memory.
Plath’s Depression and Legacy
Sylvia Plath is today regarded as an icon, with a following that could almost be described as “cult.” Her life and works have become a subject of study that fascinate and absorb not just academics, but regular readers as well. And her marriage with fellow (and equally celebrated and acclaimed) poet Ted Hughes has become grounds for heated debate, with fans adopting strongly anti-Hughes stands, or more conciliatory approaches.
Born on October 27th, 1932, Plath lost her father eight years later. This loss was a very significant one, and shaped much of her life, and surfaced frequently in her writings (her poem Daddy, for instance). Her widowed mother had to work hard to keep the family financially afloat in an environment that was far more well off and prosperous. These circumstances influenced her own political thoughts and opinions later in life.
Plath's ability and genius for writing were evident at an early age. She wrote poems as a child, some of which were composed when her father was still alive. It later won her a guest editorship at a women's magazine while she was in college, and after graduation led to a Fulbright scholarship.
However, the depression with which she would struggle for the rest of her life also surfaced during her college years. The summer she spent in New York, guest editing for the magazine Mademoiselle turned out to be an unsatisfactory one, and it culminated in a rejection from a writing class she had hoped to attend in college. She made her first suicide attempt shortly after receiving the letter, overdosing on her mother's sleeping pills as she hid in the family's basement. This attempt and the subsequent electroshock therapy (ECT) she received at state institutions and McLean Hospital form the narrative of The Bell Jar, which is a very thinly veiled autobiographical account.
She left behind descriptions of her later life as well, in the form of journals and letters. However, these have not always been as easily accessible to the public, since they were held by an estate that was protective to the extent of being secretive. For several years after her suicide, biographers and academics studying and writing about Plath either clashed or cooperated with this tight-fisted estate. It is only recently that more documents regarding her life have been opened up for the public. A 2020 biography of Plath by writer Heather Clark, titled Red Comet: The Short Life and Blazing Art of Sylvia Plath, is the first to include all of her surviving letters.
Previously published collections were edited by her estate, which included Hughes and his sister Olwyn. Their involvement led many to believe and claim that the publications were biased, and concealed much. Some of Plath's journals had indeed been either lost, or destroyed by Hughes who admitted to doing so, explaining his actions as being done for the purposes of protecting their children. Accusations of bias and censorship also accompanied the collections of Plath's poems that were edited and published posthumously by Hughes, including Ariel, her most acclaimed work.
Her Death
Sylvia Plath committed suicide during the early hours of the 11th of February, 1963 in her London apartment. This was exactly a month after The Bell Jar had been published in the UK, under the pseudonym of Victoria Lucas. It would be years before it would be published there under her own name, and even more time would pass before it arrived in stores in the US (The US publication of the book was delayed till 1971 at the insistence of Plath’s mother to spare the feelings of relatives and friends who made appearances in the book. Even though names were changed, the disguise was too thin to keep them from recognizing themselves).
Her death came after a period of intense emotional upheaval that resulted from the discovery of her husband's affair with another woman, Assia Weevil, and their separation. Her move to London from their country house brought up economic tensions as well.
Prior to this, she'd already spent over a year reliving and writing about another fraught period of her life, only to have her book rejected by several publishers in America. And when it was finally published, it was met with lukewarm response from critics, which dashed her expectations. Ted Hughes blamed the book for her death (even as others held him responsible).
The Enduring Relevance of The Bell Jar
Esther Greenwood, the narrator and protagonist of The Bell Jar, and a stand-in for Plath herself, is a young woman, experiencing severe depression. The missing presence of her father still weighs on her heavily, and she feels that the last time she was truly happy was only when he'd been alive. At the same time, she also feels lost and confused in a world where everyone else, particularly the women around her, appear to fit into defined roles and molds, defined by their relationships with men.
At the time, The Bell Jar was an eye-opener for the public on the subject of mental illness and the callous manner in which their treatments were administered. Since then, the field has advanced tremendously, with a better understanding of causes which has also resulted in more humane treatment methods.
However, Esther is a character that continues to resonate with the modern reader, in particular the young reader. Like Salinger's Holden Caulfield before her, Esther was a character who felt and described the isolating experience of not fitting in, but this time, from a female perspective. She didn't share the ambitions and aspirations of other women, but felt pressured to choose a “fig,” a predefined role. These “figs” are not yet a thing of the past. Society has, of course, progressed much since the 1950's, the period in which the book is set. But the pressures to fit in, to pick roles remain, especially for women.
Her troubled relationship with Ted Hughes and her death have undoubtedly played a role in mythologizing Plath as a major depressive figure, to the extent that sometimes Plath’s name is used as a metonym for literary explorations of depression and mental health. However, her work strongly evokes her individuality. Her poems may be more critically acclaimed than The Bell Jar, but is it this novel that has become the most effective vessel to carry her voice, even as it became one of the most powerful and raw descriptions of the female experience.
Author Bio: I’m Dennis Wesley, an independent researcher and blogger. I’m mainly interested in interdisciplinary practices and methods. I mostly write about mental health, education, and sustainability. Follow my personal blog here.