The Bell Jar-

Vocabulary-

pg85-mulish-stubborn.

pg116-diaphanous-gossamer, lucid, gauzy.

Use of Figurative Language-

pg172-"I looked with love at the lineup of waiting trays- the white paper napkins, folded in their crisp, isosceles triangles, each under the anchor of its silver fork, the pale domes of soft boiled eggs in the blue egg cups, the scalloped glass shells of orange marmalade."

Pg96- "The black instrument on the hall table trilled its hysterical note over and over like a nervous bird."

The phone, that had awakened her out of a much needed, and ‘hard to get' sleep was annoying and not needed for her. Something that she was nervous of herself. Human interaction was waiting on the other side, and she couldn't deal with that, because any news was bad news to her at this point.

Tone-

Pg98-"I stuck the letter back in the envelope, Scotch-taped it together, and readdressed it to Buddy, without putting on a new stamp. I thought the letter was worth a good three cents.

Then I decided I would spend the summer writing a novel.

That would fix a lot of people."

Esther, beginning to slip into the throngs of clinical depression, tries to figure out ways to make the world think that she was still normal and was still the same as anyone else. Yet, to the reader, someone who could see into her thoughts, the thoughts that she had had after she went through her hellish ideal.

Pg76- "‘Well?' I rapped out, thinking, You can't coddle these sick people, it's the worst thing for them, it'll spoil them to bits."

Beginning to despise Buddy, and beginning to get annoyed with how he treated her as a neurotic, because she didn't wasn't to be treated as a neurotic. He didn't want her ideas and opinions to be treated any less than anyone elses ideas, and especially by Buddy, who wasn't exactly on her level.

Use of color-

pg61-"Constantin drove me to the UN in his old green convertible with cracked, comfortable brown leather seats and the top down."

Constantin's car represented freedom and happiness to Esther, because she was free to do what she wanted to do, and not what was planned and mapped out for her. She was with someone that may grow to care about her, and that excited her. She describes the car because she can remember it from her vivid, exciting memories of that day.

Pg165- "Out of the wastebasket poked the blood red buds of a dozen long-stemmed roses."

The roses that her mother had brought her, and the roses that she told her mother to save to put on her grave. The blood that had been spilled between herself and her mother, because the disease that she had had spilt them apart. Her mother wondered where she had gone wrong with raising her, because the doctors kept pestering her about it, and, in turn, Esther's mother kept pestering her about. Whereas Esther had no room in her life for more conflict, these roses show that, among other things, the doctors were not sensitive to Esther's, and her families plight.

Setting-

pg1-"New York was bad enough. By nine in the morning the fake, country-wet freshness that somehow seeped in overnight evaporated like the tail end of a sweet dream. Mirage-gray at the bottom of their granite canyons, the hot streets wavered in the sin, the car tops sizzled and glittered, and the dry, cindery dust blew into my eyes and down my throat."

A new place for Esther to be, New York was the land of endless possibilities, but many possibilities would have to be left behind if one was chose. She was in a foreign land that may just have well been in another country. So she was very unhappy where she was. New York was where all the trouble began, and it wouldn't end for a long time.

Pg15-"...I didn't feel like ending up in an empty barn of a ballroom strewn with confetti and cigarette butts and crumpled cocktail napkins."

The place where a party had once been. The ‘graveyard' of a once hopping party would have been dead and quiet. The remains of what once made the party great would remain. She didn't want to be left alone with the remains of something that the night could have been for her.

Characterization- pg2-"I felt very still and very empty, the way the eye of a tornado must feel, moving dully along in the midst of the surrounding hullabaloo."

In the middle, the eye of a tornado, it would be very peaceful and quiet. This is the way Ester felt, peaceful and quiet. But she knew that she shouldn't feel quiet and peaceful. That she should feel very turbulent, and excited, like all the other girls her age felt. She should be getting along with her life, and getting out of the everyday, familiar structure that she had had in the past. But she couldn't get along with her life, and she didn't want to get along with her life, because she would have to chose something, and that was the one thing that, above everything, was not appealing to her.

Pg 82- "I didn't want my picture taken because I was going to cry. I didn't know why I was going to cry, but I knew that if I anybody spoke to me, or looked at me too closely the tears would fly out of my eyes and the sobs would fly out of my throat and I'd cry for a week."

The beginning of her true sink into depression. She is sitting on a couch, waiting for her picture to be taken, and she is also being forced to choose a direction in life, and choose something before she left everything else behind.