When my summers get to be too much, I’ll jump headlong into a book for the experiences I’ve been lacking. This summer was a bit different though—instead of finding a new book to get lost in, I rediscovered the book that got me through my junior year of high school.
For those of you who know me, you can possibly guess the book. For those who don’t, I’ll tell you simply: I rediscovered “The Bell Jar,” by Sylvia Plath. Plath has kept my bookcase full and my life busy, considering the amount of time I’ve put into researching her work and life.
My interest (or obsession, depending on who you ask) started sophomore year of high school, when I was trying to determine the place of a girl who was supposedly “intelligent” and “gifted” at school, but was told otherwise at home by someone who should have been a role model. When I was introduced to “The Bell Jar,” I remember my world being rocked and my identity clarified, finding someone kind of like me in those neat little black letters and starkly honest quotes.
So you would think that I would have the book on my shelf before now, right? Not necessarily. I found myself more drawn to Plath’s diaries, to her poetry, and her prose went forgotten for a while, despite it being the first thing to draw me to this author. Honestly, I didn’t realize that I was missing the book from my collection until a friend of mine asked.
I didn’t have a good reason why I didn’t have it, so on a whim, I bought the book. I didn’t think that I needed it again, not like the first time, that it would just complete the catalog of Plath’s work that I have. But the thing is, with books, with stories, your need for them never really changes.
Mine didn’t—because sure, I am in a new stage of my life, but I am still looking for my identity. I am still looking at how I fit into the world even though there are days that my depression wants me out of it. I still wonder what my writing is meant for—poetry or journalism, prose or nonfiction?
Did “The Bell Jar” have answers for me the second time around? Yes and no. Yes, because it calmed me and gave me insight to how another creative mind saw a similar situation, and no, because I wasn’t looking for answers. I was looking for a story that was relevant and had not changed in the four long years since I first found it on that dusty library shelf.
Yes, I am afraid that I will succumb to my own bell jar, that I will slip into a depression that may not let me out, and that may stifle my voice. Yes, I am afraid that society will keep telling me that since I am a woman, I am only good for one thing and not anything else. But at least, for now, I can find comfort in knowing that there was another woman—both real and fictional—who worried about the same things, yet still made an indelible mark on literature and the world.
And really, what more could I want from a book?
