A look at personality as displayed in the bells

The Bell Container

She wantsto be everything

A sense of personality is essential pertaining to surviving the numerous emotional and physical obstacles encountered in everyday life. A unique id is perhaps one of the only accurate characteristics that defines a person and is certainly a key basic principle for understanding and addressing ones atmosphere. In the Bell Jar, Esther battles not just a deteriorating mental stability, although also a lack of a sense of identity. Esther is known as a young, hypersensitive and intelligent woman whom feels oppressed by the evident social constraints placed upon women, and the pressure she feels regarding her future. Unquestionably these emotional burdens result not only in Esthers social and intellectual remoteness, but as well her approaching mental break down. Clearly, Esther is deeply troubled by hypocritical and frequently vicious universe encompassing her, and seems overwhelmed and powerless to break free of her inner associated with alienation. Instead of firmly building a genuine sense of home, Esther retreats into and scrutinizes the images and personalities in the women in her your life, which neither fit neither reflect her legitimate figure.

Through the entire novel Esther is confronted with numerous choices regarding her future aspirations. Although she is an extremely perceptive and glowing woman, Esther has no impression of upcoming direction, and instead imagines herself becoming and having an abundance of successes simultaneously. Upon meeting her boss, The writer Cee, Esther is immediately impressed with her prospering balance of a career and marriage, and begins to think about herself attaining similar achievements:

We tried to think about what it would be like if I actually were CeeCee, the famous manager, in an office full of plants in pots rubber vegetation and Africa violets my own secretary was required to water each morning. (pg 36)

Esther idolizes Jay Cee for her intelligence and wealth, however , she is indecisive and paranoid regarding choosing h single way to follow is obviously. Esther anticipate her life as a fig tree through which she are unable to choose a sole branch:

I saw my entire life branching out before me like the green fig treeI saw personally sitting in the crotch of this fig-tree, depriving to death, just because We couldnt makeup my mind which will of the figs I would select. I wanted every single one of them, nevertheless choosing one particular meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat generally there, unable to determine, the figs began to -wrinkle and move black, and, one by one, that they plopped towards the ground at my feet. (pg 73)

The writer Cee signifies the urbane and finished accomplishments which usually Esther anxiously wishes to embody, irrespective of her incapability to resolve in striving for a specific aim, your woman eventually understands of Esthers incompetent decisiveness as the girl states: The lady wantsto be everything (pg 97). Being a scholarship recipient, Esther feels obligated to impress everyone, and live up to the standards which the outside the house world provides placed upon her. Therefore, Esther hard disks herself to a state of utter depressive disorder and disillusionment, feeling that she could hardly possibly measure to the criteria expected of her. While institutionaized Esther cannot break free from the intense pressure of her visitors: I held feeling the visitors testing my excess fat and stringy hair against what I had been and the actual wanted myself to be. Detached and separated from her inner personal, Esther concentrates her chances of a job on the anticipations of others.

Esther exists in a perceptive and cerebral world which will consequently segregates her via many sociable aspects in her life. Essentially an outcast, Esthers numerous endeavors at interpersonal conformity are unsuccessful, as her image of very little is unfinished and contrary. Esther views herself as being a pure and naive very good girl, and feels exhilarated while experimenting with Doreens lifestyle. She views Doreen like a worldly, advanced, clever and experienced poor girl, and it is enchanted in the prospect of constant emotional and sexual freedom. As Esther declares: being with Doreen made me neglect my problems. I sensed wise and cynical because hell (pg 7). Doreen symbolizes Esthers need to mutiny against her obsession with sexual chastity and obeying the rules, and for a short time she enjoys her adaptation to this way of life. Though Esther shows up captivated with Doreens lifestyle, the lady quickly can determine that she cannot balance with Doreens flirtatious characteristics and wild escapades, and instead aspires to participate in the natural and simple natured Betsy.

In many ways the lives of Esther and Betsy are incredibly similar. Both are young, scholarship or grant winning ladies who, to a certain degree, exist within a world of purity and innocence. However , contrary to Betsy, Esther does not enjoy her femininity as your woman refuses to marry or have a family group. Just as Esther cannot adapt to Doreens regarding seduction and rebellion the girl cannot adapt to the female role of mother and wife which Betsy welcomes. Betsy is known as a sweet and innocent female who joyfully accepts the role of women in culture, which Esther periodically desires she can also embrace. Rather she bitterly rejects Betsys beliefs and sarcastically refers to her since Pollyanna Cowgirl (pg 108). Esthers low self-esteem is finally the cause of her division in the environment of both Betsy and Doreen.

Through the novel Esther is distraught over the sanctimony of culture, and the role in which females have been chosen to follow. Esther despises the prevalence that males retain more than women and the maternal function which women are expected to fulfill. Although Esther does not endeavor to imitate the attitudes of her mom and Mrs. Willard, Esther is nevertheless affected by their particular ideology which usually she is regularly subjected to. In addition, Mrs. Willard and Esthers mother merely suggest tasks that Esther should play. Esthers idea revolves around feminism, where ladies should be presented the same opportunities and privileges as males. Unfortunately, Esther ascertains the realities of the deceitful world in which her opinion and naive values are broken. Mrs. Willard is a sensible and practical woman which has devoted her existence to being a dutiful wife and mother. Your woman preaches to Esther that:

What a guy is is usually an arrow into the future and what a girl is may be the place the arrow shoots off from (pg 67)

Disgusted and enraged with this concept Esther is astounded that the demands and interests of a girl in society are constantly neglected. Mrs. Willard also injects the concept into Esther that both males and females should remain pure for just one another until they are married. Tragically, Esther is devastated when the girl learns of Buddys romance with an old woman, and feels tricked by the notion of a dual standard for a man and not for girls. Mrs. Willard personifies the actual sentiment which in turn Esther rejects. Not only does Mrs. Willard spend her lifestyle to a hubby and kids, her specific emotions and actions are disregarded, while Esther states:

And I knew that despite all the tulips and smooches and cafe dinners a male showered over a woman before he married her, what he secretly wanted if the wedding assistance ended was for her to flatten out underneath his feet just like Mrs. Willards kitchen mat. (pg 80)

Coherently, Esther repels the comparable values of her mother. Esthers mother is likewise a capable better half and mom and in addition instructs shorthand classes to young women. Instead of following the advice of learning shorthand, Esther cannot know why she’d type for any man rather than for her personal assignments or perhaps ideas. Furthermore Esther can be agitated by simply her mom as the girl approves of Buddy Willard, who in Esthers mind is a self-centered and insensitive fraud. Both Esthers mother and Mrs. Willard stand for the type of woman Esther will not become. Your woman rebukes their particular advice and philosophies, although later locates them relevant in the real life as the girl discovers with Marco. Frustrated and overwrought with Marcos treatment of girls, Esther begins to fall in a downward spiral leading her for the edge of her sanity.

Obviously, it is Esthers insecurity over her personality that causes her to abide by the personas of others, although is also maintains a more deeply meaningfulness. Her rejection and failure by conformity shows the harsh, the bitter, the unforgiving, as well as the sanctimonious community that torments her extremely existence. Not only does Esther truly feel rejected by social atmospheres, but likewise her perceptive atmosphere. It really is Esthers inventive mind that first illuminates part of her true identity and isolates her by those about her. Not necessarily until she actually is rejected by both the sociable and intellectual worlds that Esthers world completely disappears. Perhaps Esthers many tries to fit in to the inner group of world depict the costly consequence of mental and interpersonal detachment, yet Esther does not begin to recover until she realizes right after between her creative globe and the exterior society. Furthermore, it is Esthers lack of identity that dramatizes the irony and symbolism inside the novel. Only when Esther begins to stand exterior her individual world of the bell container, does your woman truly start to see inside herself.