Open Prompt # 1984

1984. Select a line or so of poetry, or a moment or scene in a novel, epic poem, or play that you find especially memorable. Write an essay in which you identify the line or the passage, explain its relationship to the work in which it is found, and analyze the reasons for its effectiveness.

        In the novel The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath, the protagonist and narrator, Esther Greenwood, is a young girl who travels to New York City after winning an assignment on a fashion magazine. The story follows Esther as her life falls apart and she is eventually institutionalized. One line from The Bell Jar stands out to the reader at the beginning of the novel:

        "Look what can happen in this country, they’d say. A girl lives in some out-of-the-way town for nineteen years, so poor she can’t afford a magazine, and then she gets a scholarship to college and wins a prize here and a prize there and ends up steering New York like her own private car. Only I wasn’t steering anything, not even myself. I just bumped from my hotel to work and to parties and from parties to my hotel and back to work like a numb trolleybus. I guess I should have been excited the way most of the other girls were, but I couldn’t get myself to react. I felt very still and very empty, the way the eye of a tornado must feel, moving dully along in the middle of the surrounding hullabaloo "(Plath 2). This thought from Esther tells the reader more about her character than Plath could have told us from a simple description.

        Plath provides the metaphor of the eye of the tornado to explain Esther's inability to connect with her new environment. She herself cannot understand why she is unhappy, and why her dream is not what she had expected it to be. The metaphor between Esther's emotional state and the eye of a tornado is just the beginning of her loss of sanity. Esther also compares herself to a numb trolleybus as she goes through the motions of her day. This passage is a signal to a reader that something isn't write with Esther, and by using figurative language, Plath makes a comparison that is clear and easily understood. 

        The choice of diction in the passage is also significant to its effectiveness. "still, empty, and dully" all effect this somber, gloomy tone Plath is beginning to develop. Esther comes off as helpless and even confused as to her own feelings. This feeling of numbness is the first stage of the madness she is eventually driven to.

        Plath's use of figurative language and diction make this a significant, effective, and memorable moment in the novel for the reader.