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Post by Dominique on Oct 21, 2006 18:06:32 GMT -5
That's ok. Yeah it's a little difficult to understand that part.
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Isa
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Post by Isa on Oct 21, 2006 20:56:20 GMT -5
poisonpen, I think you picked up something really great about the two cars, makes me want to go back to the beginning of the novel and see if it comes up at other times, like when she goes out on dates in cars... v. interesting! And I agree with your explanation for why she hates being reminded that it's her birthday. When she tells her mom "Save them for my funeral", I do think it means she'd rather be celebrating her death than her birth.
I'll work on Chapter 17 tomorrow!
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Kristie
Novel turned into BBC miniseries
"If a book is well written, I always find it too short."
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Post by Kristie on Oct 22, 2006 12:23:40 GMT -5
Well, Jefie, if you're gonna work on Chapter 17, I think I'll go ahead and start talking about it... This chapter is when Esther moves into the dormitory for the more stable people in the hospital. I found it sort of odd that Joan seemed worse than Esther, yet she moved into this dorm before she did. I think that this is a good place for Esther despite the fact that she doesn't like any of the women there. This dorm is really the final stepping stone before Esther is released into the real world again and I think that she must be somewhat thankful she's almost done with the psychiatric help. (The way Esther feels out of place in the dorm, feeling she's being judged by the other women, sort of made me think of Stepford Wives, although I've never read the book, just seen the 1960-something movie.)
Towards the end of the chapter, Esther has shock therapy for the second time. The only reason Esther let Dr. Nolan perform this on her willingly was probably because she feels safe with Dr. Nolan. There has been no reason thus far for Esther to not trust Dr. Nolan, and I think that made it easier for her. Half of the reason Esther didn't like Dr. Gordon was because he performed the therapy on her the wrong way, but Dr. Nolan, having done everything she promised she would to Esther, has earned her a place, not necessarily in Esther's heart, but at least her memory.
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Isa
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Post by Isa on Oct 22, 2006 12:56:04 GMT -5
You're right Kristie, it's interesting to contrast the evolution of mental illness between Joan and Esther. From the beginning, I felt like Joan was putting on a show, pretending everything was really not that bad, while Esther was really taking the time to deal with her illness, even if it almost consumed her - Esther could easily have said at anytime that she felt fine and her mom would have wisked her out of the hospital and who knows what would have happened then? But she took the time to deal with her emotions, no matter how dark they were, and I think that's what's cured her in the end.
What struck me in Chapter 17 was the range of emotions Esther goes through: she says she has come to love Dr. Nolan, then she feels betrayed when she doesn't tell her about the shock treatment, and finally she forgives her when Dr. Nolan explains why she acted that way. It really seems like Esther is getting back in touch with normal life and her normal self at that point. Do you think her admiration for Dr. Nolan might stem from the fact that she's a woman with a career?
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Kristie
Novel turned into BBC miniseries
"If a book is well written, I always find it too short."
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Post by Kristie on Oct 22, 2006 14:15:59 GMT -5
That is definitely what I was thinking, the way Joan and Esther contrast. Joan was partially putting on a show, but something really must have actually been off because of how she actually ended. She could've been faking things to make it appear she was improving and becoming normal again, but there was always that something in her mind that was unbalanced and it ended in her demise.
I do think that Esther seems to feel more comfortable around women than men. At the time women weren't in the kinds of jobs that Dr. Nolan was very often, but I think that Esther felt anyone that had Dr. Nolan's job should be a woman, or at the very least compassionate. (Have you ever seen Patch Adams, the movie with Robin Williams? This resembles the way doctors need to treat the patient, not just the disease like Dr. Gordon seemed to in Bell Jar.)
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Isa
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Post by Isa on Oct 25, 2006 8:40:39 GMT -5
I haven't seen the movie but I know about Patch Adams Is is alright if we move on to Chapter 18? Esther's reaction to Joan's potential homosexuality struck me as out of place. I mean, throughout the novel she seems to be so much ahead of her time, and then comes the episode with Joan and she has a very 1950s reaction. What did you guys make of it? The only thing I could see that disgusted her about it was that it was the total contrary of how she felt. Joan frees herself from male domination in her own way, by rejecting men altogether, whereas Esther feels like birth control is the best way to free herself from male domination - it affords her freedom because she can now be on the lookout for a sex partner instead of a husband. Yet I don't see how the possibility of having sex should result in freedom - sex is just sex, and even though it might have been a bigger deal in the 1950s, I think she makes too big of a deal of it and is bound to be disappointed when she realizes that losing her virginity won't change her life.
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Kristie
Novel turned into BBC miniseries
"If a book is well written, I always find it too short."
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Post by Kristie on Oct 25, 2006 10:21:46 GMT -5
I also thought that Esther approached homosexuality in a 1950s way. I mean, I can't see the pleasure in gay sex, but that's just me. People can do what they want. I admit I may be a little weirded out at first if I was being hit on by a girl, but I don't think I would quite find the girl to be disgusting, just because her sexual orientation is different from mine. I can understand why Esther wants birth control, because she doesn't want to get pregnant but she feels she needs to have sex to fit in with other women her age. Peer pressure! But I found it a little odd to just go around looking for someone to have sex with. Usually women get birth control when they're in a relationship already, like myself. But she's completely single...not even dating! I know at this time period birth control was illegal to women who weren't married. It was just a little weird how she seemed to do things out of order to me. O well...that's Esther though.
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Post by Dominique on Oct 26, 2006 17:45:34 GMT -5
sorry I'm still up to 17 so I'll recap what I thought about that quickly and later today I'll post 18. I found it weird that Joan wasn't so into Esther anymore in this Chapter, she seemed like a big fan earlier and now she's quite cold. I guess that's to show that she's getting better but I still found it a little odd. Might be a part of what one of you said about Joan putting on a show, she's being cold to Esther on purpose so she looks well and can get out quicker maybe? I didn't really find this Chapter that interesting in terms of stuff to analyse. In my Chapter 17 it ends with her having her first shock treatment. Did you say in yours it ends with her second Kristie? Maybe we have different editions? I also agree she seems much more comfortable around women than around men, she seems to be more likely to trust them and more willing to build a dr-patient relationship.
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Kristie
Novel turned into BBC miniseries
"If a book is well written, I always find it too short."
Posts: 7,214
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Post by Kristie on Oct 26, 2006 18:02:06 GMT -5
I meant her second in the book, after Dr. Gordon's. But yeah, it was the first with Dr. Nolan at the hospital she actually felt comfortable in. Sorry bout the confusion.
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Post by Dominique on Oct 26, 2006 18:29:04 GMT -5
ohhh i get it now. lol
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Post by Dominique on Oct 26, 2006 21:13:22 GMT -5
Ok Chapter 18, sorry I've been a bit slow this week ladies I think Esther's reaction to homosexuality was interesting. She saw it as a bit repulsive it seemed, but often young people who haven't really had any of their own sexual experiences and have a kind of christian-guilt, wrong complex attached to it are. I think she may have been so repulsed because she is still quite immature and doesn't really understand it (like she couldn't imagine what gay people do together), rather than because of any kind of real prejudice. It was interesting that while she thought it was gross she was fascinated by it. I think this is because she is so frustrated by all the roles that tend to attach themselves to being a woman, and perhaps sees lesbians as people who have rejected those roles? But it seemed like she didn't want to reject them to that extent, like fully reject any kind of strong relationship with a male and their resulting influence. She just doesn't want to be so attached and doesn't want children, she doesn't want to be defined by them. But she's still interested in them and something more with the right person. I think this is another example of her wanting to pick every fig from the tree, like she talks about all these "weird" old women who attach themselves to her and want to mould her into them. I think they do that because they sense this turmoil within her about her position in society, but it doesn't work because she wants it both ways, she doesn't want to totally reject masculinity and all it entails, but she doesn't want to succumb to it like Dodo Conway either. She wants to have her cake and eat it too. The overall impression I've gotten from this book so far by analysing it is that it's a novel about a girl who is at odds with what she is expected to be in the world, what she wants to be and whether she can be more than one role at once. It's like her mental illness was triggered by a where am I going, what am I doing, who am I, what do I want? crisis. I felt that the reason she got the birth control was because she didn't want to have that permanent connection to someone in case she made a mistake, she didn't want to be forced into the mother role by creating a life and giving up all her hopes and dreams. That's what I got from her "buying her freedom", by getting contraception she claims her right to choose who she will marry, when she will marry and whether or not she will become a mother even if she has sex. I felt this was an important step to her actually figuring out what she wants and taking control of her life, in a round about way. In her time period people who got pregant got married, and she's taking care to avoid that. Advances in medicine have allowed her to be everything she wants to be, she can fall in love, have sex as much as she wants, have a career, but she doesn't need to get married or have a baby until/if she decides she wants to.
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Post by Dominique on Oct 26, 2006 22:16:32 GMT -5
ok I'm gonna move on to Chapter 19, just because I won't have much time for the next few days so it's prob a good idea I do it now. I found the way Esther lost her viginity a very stupid thing to do. I think it would be horrible to do it with some stranger for the first time, and very embarassing with all the pain and the bleeding. The guy she did it with was really very tacky too, with his "ladies".
I got the feeling that she picked him not only for being intellegent, but also for being unattractive, like that way he might have less of a residual power over her or something? That's what I felt her whole virginity plan was about, having the sexual experience while retaining her own power and avoiding any on going influence from the man.
I didn't really understand her wanting to do it with someone experienced, that's another thing about the way she did it I think would be horrible. It would be much preferable with someone you care about, trust and could learn along the way with eachother, I think anyway. But of course that sort of thing isn't really Esther is it?
Joan's death was very sudden, I have read the book before but I forget how they explain it in the next chapter. In this chapter it's written as though her relapse and suicide are somehow connected to Esther's first time, it seems to be suggesting that Joan's sexual orientation and seemingly fixation on Esther caused her to take her own life.
Has anyone noticed that Joan chooses very violent ways to go: punching her hands through a window, hanging herself. Esther however chooses overdosing on medication.
Statistically men are more successful at commiting suicide and go through with it more than women because they are more violent and brutal in their techniques. Could Plath be linking the way Joan kills her self to her sexuality? Or maybe she's suggesting that it shows Joan was worse than Esther all along because Esther never behaved violently? Not sure just a suggestion.
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Isa
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Post by Isa on Oct 28, 2006 9:38:40 GMT -5
whoa, you're on fire, Poisonpen! Excellent analysis of Chapter 18.
I agree with you that the way Esther lost her virginity was very, hum, sterile. There were no feelings involved, and like you said, it totally fits the character of Esther. Most girls would want their first time to be with someone really special, but she wants it to be with someone she'll easily forget. I think you're right, it's her way of keeping in control. She talks about how she wants her first time to be like a tribal rite, during which young virgins are sacrificed, and I guess with all her bleeding that's pretty much what happens.
At first I didn't connect Joan's death with Esther - I just thought Joan was on the brink of disaster all along - but after reading your analysis I went back to the book and you're right, there does seem to be a connection. Joan gets pretty upset when she finds out Esther has had sex and the next thing we know she's back at the hospital. I guess at first I just thought it was the trauma of taking her friend to the hospital, but it could be more than that.
I think I wrote something before on how Joan's first suicide attempt was much more violent than Esther's. Once again, I just saw it as a sign that her illness was more serious than Esther's, but your suggestion that it could be linked to her sexuality is very interesting. Wow, you got a lot from that chapter and really changed my perception of it!
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Post by Dominique on Oct 29, 2006 3:13:08 GMT -5
hey Jefie, glad you liked my analysis I'm not entirely sure if it's all correct or not, but Plath seems interested in exploring female sexuality to me as she wrote that "Daddy" poem about a girl with that syndrome where you're sexually attracted to your father or something apparently. I do think Joan's suicide was connected to Esthers behaviour though as throughout the book Joan seems very attached to Esther, an attachment which isn't reciprocated. Descriptions of Joan also seem to be somewhat linked to her sexuality, Esther calls her horsey, lanky and awkward; none of which are very feminine characteristics. Joan's sexuality struck me as maybe a different reaction to the same crisis Esther had about her identity and her role in the world. I'm not entirely sure why. Maybe because often Joan seems like Esther's alter ego or something, can't think of the right word. Esther said once sometimes she wonders if she though Joan up which I think is interesting.
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Kristie
Novel turned into BBC miniseries
"If a book is well written, I always find it too short."
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Post by Kristie on Oct 31, 2006 17:26:10 GMT -5
I agree with you ladies about how Esther completely went about having sex the wrong way. I personally couldn't have done what she did, but she seems to be self-absorbed throughout most of the book. She really only seems to care about what happens to herself. Obviously she doesn't care about her family (and I would say friends if she managed to keep any) or she wouldn't attempt suicide. The birth control is something good to have, especially in her case because she doesn't want a child and I wouldn't want her to have one even if she wanted it.
I really hadn't read so much into Joan's sexuality as much as you girls. But thinking back, Joan does seem to have problems when Esther does something that shows her she has no sexual desire for her. I too had thought that Joan had had more problems after Esther's hemorrhaging problem because of that, but I hadn't really thought Joan would be upset about Esther's sex life and not the near fatal wound she managed to obtain. I can understand what you mean, Poisonpen, about the way Joan was attempting suicide and how it was masculine. In my community there have been 4 suicides, all boys, all hanging, in the past few years. It does appear to be their favourite way to depart.
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