The Bell Jar

So, I really need to stop reading other people's reviews because it only furthers my hate for ignorant people.

This book to me has nothing to do with a “privileged girl afraid to lose her status” or young twenty-something female angst or anything with feminism nor does it cause me to hate Ted Hughes with the fury and passion of a thousand suns. It's a story of a woman who has worked so hard and studied intensely for so many years and kept herself as pure as society wanted her - but for what? I can relate in that I thought I knew for the first 23 years of my life exactly what I wanted to do and then realized I had no clue. And to be caught in this deep depression that can't be cured by a man taking care of you or some group therapy sittings.

It's the same people who don't see how depression can consume you that won't appreciate this novel for what it is. Semi-autobiographical or not, it hits close to home. Scary.