In the end we start thinking about the beginning

    One thing I found myself thinking about as I read The Bell Jar was, when did this all start? In the beginning, I was feeling the same confusion and disappointment. Ester was feeling her lack of enthusiasm and joy during her internship. It was obvious from the beginning that something had already gone really, really wrong. Ester didn’t know about chemical imbalances or any of the other “modern-day" scientific analyses of what causes shifts in mental health. Now, most readers can identify her depression as a pathological physical state of her body—something akin to POTS or Crohn's disease. Yet, there is a profound shift in her illness from the beginning to the end of the book that I don’t think can just be attributed to the momentum that poor physiology (especially mental illnesses, because those often make it extra hard to engage in behaviors that would help you get better) has. 

It is certainly possible that there's no other reason for her descent into suicidality than the physical worsening of a condition, but a specific moment in the book makes me doubt that. First, I thought it might be her experience with Marco, the woman-hater who tried to assault her. Her throwing all of her clothes off the rooftop after the incident was as symbolic a gesture as any that her depression would take a sharp turn at that point in the novel. The parallels from that to suicide are so clear, and she literally said, "It was my last night.” (Plath, 111). She described them like “a loved one’s ashes" (111) as well, signifying that a piece of her died that night. Her “before” life, the life where she cared about looking pretty and enjoying luxuries and was excited about new prospects and success, was over. She no longer identified with the person who would wear those expensive clothes. 

In the next chapter, I found another specific event I thought triggered the deafening of her depression, more so than Marco. In the beginning of the novel, she clings to the validation she got from being a talented writer. She isn’t close to anyone, including her mother, at this point, and her hopes ride on a successful career and a new life in the city. She doesn’t know if she’s a Besty or a Doreen, as Mr. Mitchell likes to say, but she knows at the very least she's a good writer. As she starts to lose confidence, she clings more to her identity as a good writer to keep herself afloat. After she cries at the photoshoot due to not knowing what she wants to do in the future, she jumps to a small fantasy of Jay Cee being shocked by how awesome her writing is: “I decided I’d surprise Jay Cee and send in a couple of the stories I wrote… Then one day the Fiction Editor would come in to Jay Cee personally and plop the stories down on her desk and say, 'Here's something a cut above the usual'" (103). In her daydream, those stories were written at a summer course she applied to during her first month at the magazine. Even though the class was very small, she was so sure that she’d "find the letter of acceptance waiting on the mail table at home.” In a subtle way, Plath foreshadows how devastating a rejection from this class would be to Esther. It would be a shocker, first of all, but second, it would be a crucial step away from the path of success she was building in her mind. Without this class, there is no iconic manuscript for Jay Cee to marvel at. 

This is exactly what happens. When Esther finds out about the rejection, “the air punched out of [her] stomach." She also implied that this course would give her something to do, like a distraction from depression, perhaps, until school began again. Without it, she felt extremely empty and “had nothing to look forward to” (117). Instead of taking another summer course, such as German, which she mentioned interest in earlier in the novel, she calls the Admissions office to tell them she wouldn’t be coming at all (199). She tries to write but can barely bear it and stops quickly (121). Then she can’t stand her mother's shorthand lessons (122). She admits she couldn’t see herself a year beyond 19 years old, and expresses it (ironically) in a very poetic and artful way by picturing years as telephone poles along a road (123). She decided to junk the idea of writing a book at all over the summer, the idea of staying in the honors program, and even the idea of going back to college at all (124). Finally, she thinks of herself as “the stupidest person” at her mother’s college (125). I see this as the nail in the coffin for Esther, so to speak, because she lost the last touchstone of her identity—her biggest reason for existing and for liking herself—when she found out she was rejected. Seemingly, the very next day, she goes to get more sleeping pills and is referred to Doctor Gordon.

There are lots of things that push Esther towards the edge, but if I were to summarize the book and flatten the plot to a specific event I felt was most significant in that respect, I would definitely choose the summer writing class rejection. Unlike Buddy, or Marco, or Doreen, or even things her mother says, the rejection eliminates the telephone wire/line to which all the poles of her life are connected. Buddy, Marco, Doreen, and her mother certainly contributed to her depression by either not being there for her or deliberately threatening her or making her feel crazy, but none of them were tied to her identity. Without the confidence that she’s talented, she can’t see her own future and loses all hope for a life worth living. I do think lots of other events matter, but I enjoy the challenge of arguing for why one is especially significant.