The Bell Jar
by Sylvia Plath · first published 1948
47% recommend47% neutral5% critical
Why HN recommends it
Semi-autobiographical novel offering a vivid, precise portrayal of depression, the psychiatric treatment it describes, and the sense of stakes in ordinary life. It is widely regarded as a strong American novel.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
The Bell Jar is the only novel written by American poet Sylvia Plath. It is an intensely realistic and emotional record of a successful and talented young woman's descent into madness.
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…include them in the text? Was on maternity leave this year so there are quite a few. Those marked * are also recommended. Guns Germs and Steel - Jared Diamond * The Vital Question - Nick Lane * The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath * Convergent Series - Larry Niven * Cosmos - Carl Sagan * World of Ptaavs - Larry Niven The Integral Trees - Larry Niven The Girl on the Train - Paula Hawkins The Girl with Seven…
on “Ask HN: Books you read in 2016?” ↗…distinctly different from before the ECT. I haven't found much reason to think about it more than that—I'm not in the business in prescribing treatment, but I'm grateful for what I did find. Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar has an excellent description of the aftermath of the treatment that roughly aligned with my own, albeit I experienced it much slower than how it was depicted in the novel.
on “Deep-Brain-Stimulation Treatment for Depression Fails Another Trial” ↗Ask the Dust - John Fante Journey to the End of the Night - Louis-Ferdinand Celine Delta of Venus - Anais Nin The Star Diaries - Stanislaw Lem Maus - Art Spiegelman The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath Japanese Destroyer Captain - Tameichi Hara Elementary Go Series #1: In the Beginning - Ikuro Ishigure Dune - Frank Herbert Biohacking Manifesto - James Lee The Trumpets of Jericho…
on “Ask HN: Books you read in 2018?” ↗…Losing Ground: American Social Policy, 1950–1980 * Real Education: Four Simple Truths for Bringing American Schools Back to Reality * Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960–2010 Oh, and The Bell Jar, although that doesn't somehow imply that 1950 was the peak of White Culture.
on “Taleb is wrong about IQ” ↗…situation to universal themes, although not always successfully. More interestingly, many good novels make relevant and fairly ordinary stakes feel like high stakes. Kurt Vonnegut's short stories[0] and The Bell Jar are great examples. I don't want to pile on or try to convince you that novels are actually for you (sounds like they aren't), but I think this is an interesting distinction to make about "high stakes."…
on “novelWriter – open-source plain text editor designed for writing novels” ↗…adaptation to the novel. Something like C. S. Forester's book The African Queen and the 1951 film directed by John Huston. Pick a novel that riffs on subjects you're already into. Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar involves psychology as a major plot element, as do One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and Requiem for a Dream. All three have been adapted into excellent films.
on “Ask HN: How to transition from non-fiction to fiction reading?” ↗…that we would have liked to have walked through some of those doors... to me, that's just fear of facing the weight of our choices. Makes me think of the famous Fig Tree section of Sylvia Plath's "The Bell Jar": https://www.favoritepoem.org/poems/plath-the-fig-tree/ Jacob, if you see this: it spoke to me, and gave me some peace as I've been ruminating over similar things. Thanks for writing :) --- edit:…
on “Felix and I” ↗…a novel. Off the top of my head I could come up with a list of at least 10 American novels that I have read that I think are significantly superior. In no order here goes 1. Blood meridian 2. The Bell Jar 3. Of Mice and Men 4. Mason and Dixon (everyone’s gonna say “Gravity’s Rainbow” but I think since this is an explicitly American list, the themes of Mason and Dixon of the North/South divide etc put…
on “The Great Gatsby is the most misunderstood novel” ↗…argue more plain prose would be better every and which way. Obscure language a good writer does not make. Hoe often you need dictionary when reading The Sun Also Rises? Or Homage to Catalonia? Or The Bell Jar? In short, having have to read extremely jargony and difficult to understand academic or professional text more or less daily - text that by nature sorta have to be difficult and abstract, since the…
on “Who Killed Paulina Borsook's Career?” ↗This reminds me of “The Bell Jar” by Sylvia Plath, which has a quote Aziz Ansari used in his series “Master of None”: > "I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story. From the tip of every branch, like…
on “What If You Could Do It All Over?” ↗…Heller’s chart outline for Catch-22 * Henry Miller’s manuscript plan for Tropic of Capricorn * William Faulkner’s outline for A Fable — written on his office walls. * Sylvia Plath’s outline for The Bell Jar * Norman Mailer’s character timeline for Harlot’s Ghost. * Part of Jennifer Egan’s plan for her short story “Black Box.” * Gay Talese’s outline for his classic profile “Frank Sinatra Has a Cold” http://flavorwire.com/391173/famous-authors-handwritten-outl...…
on “How J.K. Rowling Plotted Harry Potter with a Hand-Drawn Spreadsheet” ↗…all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.” One of my favorite quotes by Sylvia Plath from the Bell Jar.
on “Making Peace with Your Unlived Dreams” ↗…there's significant literature available for the efficacy of ECTs in relieving over-active and/or over-connected brains. Hell, one of the horror stories is in itself a success case—Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar.
on “Electrical brain stimulation beats caffeine and the effect lasts longer” ↗…However, it's a legitimate technique that's been proven in clinical trials repeatedly. In popular lit, you can read about the experience of going through (and receiving help from) ECT in Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar; I've personally experienced a thorough ECT treatment, and her depiction of the relief (the titular bell jar imprisoning her/suffocating her is lifted to sweet relief). Medically, it's introducing small…
on “Electrical brain stimulation beats caffeine and the effect lasts longer” ↗This is interest: https://www.amazon.com/Bell-Jar-Harry-Hill/dp/0571245641/ref... https://www.amazon.com/Bell-Jar-Modern-Classics/dp/006083702... Two versions of the same book with different authors and covers. Makes me wonder if someone screwed up…
on “Has Amazon been hacked (wrong author attributions)” ↗