“Thanks for the bell, Sylvia,” Esther said. “It’s just lovely. And it goes so well with the jar that Beth just got me.”
“Oh, it was nothing,” Sylvia said. “It’s been a lovely evening.”
It really had been a lovely evening.
– The Bell Jar, I assume
*
“I love you, Dad,” she said.
“I love you too,” he said.
“By the way,” she said. “I like your black shoes.”
“Thanks,” he said. “They’re from Germany.”
“Which way do you think it looks nicer,” she asked, “with the bell arranged inside of the jar, or with the jar turned over and covering the bell?”
“I think it looks nice both ways,” he said.
It really did.
*
“I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story,” she said. “From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked.”
“I love figs,” he said. “This sounds like a wonderful story.”
It really was.
“Let’s have some figs, everybody,” said Norma, who came in carrying a tray of figs.
“Figs!” everyone exclaimed. The surprise was figs. (Norma had said before there was going to be a surprise.) Everyone had a wonderful time eating figs, even though the figs were a little sticky. That’s part of the fun of figs.
*
“Gosh, has anybody seen my bell?” Esther asked.
“Last I saw it, it was by that jar Beth got you,” Samuel said. “Check to see if it’s still there.”
It was.
– The Bell Jar, probably
Tags: books, i think i just invented normcore poetry, quotes, some of these are made up by me, sylvia plath, the bell jar
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“Thanks for the bell, Sylvia,” Esther said. “It’s just lovely. And it goes so well with the jar that Beth just got me.”
Like the Useful Pot and the balloon that was just the right size.
Eeyore is a problematic Halloween costume when you have an office job.
My exact thought while reading. A good day for Eeyore.
Jane Horrocks as Piglet. My heart is meltingggggg.
I mean, I read the Bell Jar before I really had the appropriate comprehension skills for it, so this all seems about right to me.
Me too. All I remember is spending a whole road trip reading the book and being really grouchy to my family after I finished it.
Much improved, actually.
I feel like this is pretty spot on, much like how the Infinite Jest was a book about a guy who told a really really long joke that just went on like, for-ever. As I recall to the best of my recollection, anyway. *strokes beard* *someone’s beard*
I’m sure there’s one in close proximity to that book at all times.
“Esther cooked the hamburger meat before she ate it. It was delicious, and normal.”
My Dad’s dog
Bit Sylvia Plath
When they were both children
In Winthrop, Mass.
It’s true! He had about the same understanding of her work as this person does. He said, “She was a fat kid,” as if that explained everything..
I did a paper/biography book report on her in 11th grade. Apparently my paper showed that I thought she was a jerk. I later told a friend Virginia Woolf would be a better girlfriend.
Good Bangles song though.
Well, Virginia Woolf WOULD be a better girlfriend, so.
Yessss, more normcore poetry.
I reread The Bell Jar recently and was surprised by the intensity of my dislike of it. Esther was just so insufferable to me.
I really like figs
I joined this “challenge” a couple years ago where people signed to cook every recipe in an issue of Bon Appetit and then report on the results. I followed the recipe but also used some cheese on the “non-control” crepes. I can’t remember the name of the cheese, someone here probably knows, but a friend said it was Very Necessary for crepes. http://www.bonappetit.com/recipe/cornmeal-crepes-…
(the non-cheese ones were blander, certainly)
Tallegio (she was very correct)
These are so soothing.
OMG I am grading some student work about Plath and The Bell Jar RIGHT NOW Mallory how did you know? It’s like you wrote this just for me. And I am so grateful.
“I love figs,” he sad. DYING.
Also, I don’t think you’re supposed to *like* Esther.
This is basically exactly the book, only maybe with a bit of ptomaine poisoning.
did you know that if you Google ptomaine poisoning (the words just weren’t clicking for me) that you get a sidebox in your google results with a little definition and two (two!!) lovely full color illustrations of a woman to describe ptomaine poisoning.
Under the “about” tab she eats at a picnic table, bowl of egg salad looming ominously in the foreground.
Under the “symptoms” tab that same woman has a bad time, contextually near a bathroom.
I need to know how many illnesses Google has illustrated, this is very exciting (to me).
That illustration is amazing. I especially like the empty toilet paper roll carelessly thrown on the ground – obviously she’s been feeling bad for a while now…
This is basically exactly the book, only maybe with a bit of ptomaine poisoning.
My exact thought while reading. A good day for Eeyore.
Jane Horrocks as Piglet. My heart is meltingggggg.
Tallegio (she was very correct)
My book club talked about The Bell Jar, and they make anything sound good. I hadn’t read it because of a vague prejudice against Sylvia Plath for using Jewishness as a metaphor for suffering (when, as far as I know, she’s not Jewish), and a more specific, less fair prejudice against Gwyneth Paltrow’s acting persona. After the book club, I got the book out of the library, liked the beginning and loathed the rest of it. I found the main character to be insufferable (I know, you’re not supposed to like her) and I was skipping large swaths of text by the end.
I suffered through Anne Sexton for class and then opened some booth of Sylvia Plath’s and said OH MY GOD THIS IS WHO SHE WAS IMITATING and put the book down and ran and ran and ran.
I liked it, probably because I didn’t let the fact that I have no desire to sit down and have a beer and a nice chat with Esther, keep me from empathizing with her and her suffering. Being suicidal sucks, and no one deserves to have to be. Not even people I don’t personally like. What a concept.