Kevin McGrath's X084 Intro to Lit Sec 002

I have just finished reading Chapters One through Six of Sylvia Plath's "The Bell Jar", and though I enjoy the book, I feel underwhelmed by the story that unfolded in the first six chapters of the book- that is, the dissolution of Esther's relationship with Buddy Willard. As I was reading, I had a completely different prediction of what would come. The first misleading passage was on the first page of Chapter Three, when Plath wrote, "With one exception I've been the same weight for ten years.” Aside from the obvious surprise at her implication that she had the same weight at age 9 as she did at age 19, I immediately assumed that she had weighed differently because she had been pregnant, and Buddy was the father. This belief was confirmed throughout the chapters as Esther continued to think of Buddy as a hypocrite, and kept saying that her discovery of his hypocrisy came with a baby, and happened "the day we saw a baby born." After all this build up, I was somewhat disappointed to discover that I found her problems to be so less dramatic and more circumstantial.However, I still am very confident in my prediction that Esther is going to take her own life by the end of "The Bell Jar." But then again, I feel like anyone with even a casual familiarity with the life of Sylvia Plath would be able to make that observation. Furthermore, even without having ever read “The Bell Jar” before or heard anything of its plot, I am aware of its reputation as a tremendous downer of a book. Based of the information given in the first six chapters, my guess is that Esther will kill herself by either A) throwing herself out of a window (because of her fury at her hotel windows’ inability to open), or B) drowning herself in the bathtub (this seems like the more likely situation, firstly because of Esther’s proclamations of a hot bath’s “purifying” abilities, and secondly because the smothering aspect of drowning feels closer to Plath’s own death by oven asphyxiation).Plath is clearly familiar with the concept of feeling like an outsider. The way that she accurately captures even the most personal of ideas that one experiences in such a situation – such as Esther’s inability to fit in with the people she wants to fit in with and feels more similar to, while feeling dissatisfied and out of place with those that do accept her – are too realistic and believable to be made up or imagined.