The Bell Jar Part 1

Esther Esther is the main character in the book and the story is through her eyes and how she feels. She struggles with her identity who/what she wants to be whether  its conforming to societies view of 1950s women or rebelling by having ambitions and a career of writing.  

1950s Communist threat - Rosenberg's (Communist spies living in America) -Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were American communists convicted in March 1951 of espionage – specifically, of passing information about the atomic bomb to the Russians. They were sentenced to death on 5 April 1951.   Very limiting for women - women who had a job were considered ugly unfit for society e.g. Jay Cee Esther's boss 'ugly as sin'.

Esther doesn't know her own identity she is disassociated from her self 'I looked yellow as a Chinaman' Mirrors represent identity 'I noticed a big, smudgy-eyed Chinese women staring idiotically into my face' 'The face in the mirror looked like a sick Indian   Quotes  

Esther is disconnected from what is going on this is show through the structuring of the novel. She starts at the centre of what is going on - NY-  but gradually gets moved further away - the suburbs - and finally put where no one in society can see her  - the asylum.  

Very limited expectations To become wives and  mothers 'What a man wants is a mate and what a woman wants is infinite security' a man wants a woman suggesting  sexual while a woman needs someone to protect and look after them 'What a man is, is an arrow into the future and what a woman is, is the place the arrow shoots off from' meaning a man has goals and dreams but a woman's place is only to support the man  If they had ambitions to be something else then they were deemed ugly by society There was only two views of women sluts or homemakers no middle ground

Ester

Context

Indentity

Disconnection/Depression

Expections of women in the 1950s