Framing Statement:
My project is based on my Annotated Digital Edition of The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath. I’m focusing on the difference between the two doctors in the novel: Doctor Gordon and Doctor Nolan. Specifically, I’m analyzing the relevance of gender in psychiatric patient provider relationships. My thesis is: “Through the strategic juxtaposition of two providers and the explication of their differing genders, The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath examines how psychiatric healthcare and gender interpolate. Additionally, The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath utilizes narrative and linguistic differences to indicate the impact of gender on psychiatric patient-provider relationships.”.
On Newstok:
“The etymology of “craft” reveals that centuries before it becomes trade or profession (defended by associated guilds, companies, and unions), it was first a strength, a power, a force. That is, craft meant a physical transformation of some material, as in the earliest instances of resourceful toolmaking. Soon this capacity to transform becomes isolated as a skill or art, a dextrous ingenuity… The crafter transforms a common object into her own artifact. She has made something that was public into something private, her own— the way a block of stone ceases to belong to nature and becomes the sculptor’s as she works on it… In this sense craft becomes both empirical and cumulative.”
(Newstok 29,31)
Newstok’s ideas in his chapter “Of Craft” in his book How to think Like Shakespeare encourages the use of found object and materials as one’s own to create something that is ingenious. In a sense, his explanation refer to the craft of making something as turning a raw material into something stronger by making it personal or changing its context. I think that this helped guide my revision of my original ADE immensely. Originally, I had very little to personally analyze or add to Sylvia Plath’s text. Instead I found myself pacing in circles around what other people had said and how I could synthesize these thoughts. It was only once I decided to change the topic to one more personal, one I had more knowledge on, and one I could shape to make my representation of the text stronger, was I able to write. It was only once I focused on craft, that I was able to wholly approach my capstone.
On the Revision Process:
My initial project about Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar focused on the use of ECT as a method of psychiatric treatment and concomitant oppression. I decided to move away from this topic, as I was uninspired by it and found myself unable to delve deeper into the matter than what other literary critiques has been able to do. Now, I’m focusing on gender in patient provider relationships. I think that this is a much better fit, because it allows me to draw on texts that have been integral in my development as an english major: such as “The Yellow Wallpaper” and Dr. Zay. I think that the ability to reference these texts in the forward of my capstone allows me to approach the reader less delicately, because they, too, now understand the context that The Bell Jar was written in. And, beyond the text being a scintillating view into Plath’s psyche, it is an important novel documenting the detrimental effects of improper psychiatric care, and moreover, the ways in which gender overtly and covertly affects psychiatric patient-provider relationships.
Moreoever, through embracing Harris’ idea of forwarding throughout my capstone, I’m able to more fully reconcile the depth of societal integration and stratification that impacts bioethics and gender. as I begin with a forward that forwards Carrie Bradshaw from Sex and the City. In fact, this forward has dictated my general structure and commentary on the text. I am using the forward, and the concomitant association of gender and sex to frame my analysis of the texts, citing each phase of Esther’s treatment as a commonly referred to aspect of sex (ie. consent, pillow talk etc.). I’ll be covering the implied intimacy of psychiatric treatments and the relevance of gender and sexuality in these treatments through the lens of Plath’s The Bell Jar. Throughout the forward I also use other texts to support my question of gender’s place in patient-provider relationships, including anecdotal experiences, primary, and secondary texts. Overall, this forward functions as the foundation for contextual knowledge for the read to use as the read my analysis of the Digital Edition of The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath.
Examples of Revision:
Old intro 1st Paragraph (final draft): In Sylvia Plath’s novel The Bell Jar, the main character Esther Greenwood receives electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) as treatment for her mental illness. ECT is explicitly mentioned twice in the novel, and the context of these appointments implies numerous observations about the treatment of mental illness in the urban U.S. and, specifically, in women. Furthermore, Plath’s decision to make the main character a woman helps to segue the novel into the politics of mental healthcare, which is especially prevalent in the scenes involving ECT. The previous state of ECT and psychiatric treatment lead to the traumatization of Esther and exacerbated her symptomatology acting as a positive feedback mechanism and inciting her suicide attempts. This effect was conflated by the oppression of womanhood that transgressed any of the various societal expectations associated with femininity and further promoted by the institutionalization of Esther when she did not respond positively to the traumatizing ECT treatments. Ultimately, the novel The Bell Jar depicts electroconvulsive treatment as a method of gender oppression and cites the identification and treatment of mental illness as a form of further subjugation.
New Intro 1st Paragraph (rough draft): The Bell Jar, by Sylvia Plath is often referred to by literary critics as a “roman à clef”, meaning that the story acts as a key to the door of Plath’s existence (Fernandez 163; Taylor Kober and Ross e23 ). Many believe the novel helps readers to understand the many years of suffering leading up to Plath’s taking her own life— despite the relatively positive ending assumed by the ending of The Bell Jar where the main character, Esther is ultimately discharged from the hospital, and she finally feels “…perfectly free” (Plath 242). The difference between the end of the novel and the end of Plath’s life provides both important information about the limit of reasonable literary extrapolation from a roman à clef as well as the potential idealization of Esther’s experience with psychiatric treatment. Therefore, there can be substantial literary analysis done on the novel’s ability to reflect on human experience as well as on Plath’s existence as a woman writer at the time. The Bell Jar comments on the perpetration of gender oppression through mental illness experienced by women. Plath depicts and characterizes the systematic enmeshing of both societal gender ideals and mentally un-wellness through the main character of Esther Greenwood (Fernandez 164-165). Moreover, Esther’s mental health treatment is received from two healthcare providers: one is a woman (Doctor Nolan) and one is a man (Doctor Gordon). The difference in care and treatment between the two providers illuminates a more clear representation of how gender infiltrates mental illness through both patient and patient-provider experiences.
Intro 1st Paragraph (Final Draft): The Bell Jar, by Sylvia Plath is often referred to by literary critics as a “roman à clef”, meaning that the story acts as a key to the door of Plath’s existence (Fernandez 163; Taylor Kober and Ross e23 ). The story documents the ‘unbecoming’ of the main character, Esther Greenwood (Fernandez 164). Esther is a college-aged young woman who experiences a severe depressive episodes and suicidal ideation after an extensive internship in New York City. She seeks outpatient psychiatric treatment for her mental illness which is unsuccessful and then receives mandated inpatient psychiatric treatment after a suicide attempt. Many believe the novel helps readers to understand the many years of suffering leading up to Plath’s taking her own life despite the juxtaposition between the relatively positive ending assumed by The Bell Jar— where the main character, Esther, is ultimately discharged from the hospital, and she finally feels “…perfectly free”— and Plath’s own ending— where she tragically took her own life (Plath 242; Taylor Kober and Ross e23). The difference between the end of the novel and the end of Plath’s life provides both important information about the limit of reasonable literary extrapolation from a roman à clef as well as the potential idealization of Esther’s experience with psychiatric treatment.
