A Study of the Representation of Depression in Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar_英语论文

摘要

抑郁症是当今社会最主要的健康问题之一。抑郁症患者对自我的主观看法和客观世界对他们的评价与看法通常会形成很大的反差，这种反差亦是抑郁症这种疾病的特点之一。因此, 让一个精神状态健康的人了解罹患抑郁症的感受是很困难的。但在西尔维娅·普拉斯的自传体小说《钟形罩》中，作者成功地将抑郁症的发展和故事的发展结合起来,并借她的写作向读者介绍了抑郁症对患病者惊人的影响和摧毁力。

在本篇论文中，我将抑郁症的科学描写和抑郁症在《钟形罩》中的文学表达做了比较。具体来说， 这篇论文分为三个部分：抑郁症的成因，抑郁症的发展和抑郁症的结果。首先是抑郁症的成因，本文通过分析当代抑郁症主要的几种成因并和文中艾斯特的经历作比较，寻找二者的共性相似的部分；其次是分析艾斯特抑郁症的前期表现，主要为生理上的一些变化例如睡眠和饮食的问题，追踪她逐渐丧失基本生活能力的过程；然后是分析艾斯特抑郁症的后期表现，主要为精神上的变化例如她出现的幻听和幻视等现象。本篇论文还分析抑了郁症对她造成的潜性影响。这些肉眼不可见的影响却是导致她深陷抑郁泥沼的重要原因，例如她的“无法看见事物积极一面”的心理，还有患病带来的与他人的隔绝感等等。通过这种比较，本篇论文揭示了西尔维娅·普拉斯如何将抑郁症的科学症状融入她自己对于抑郁症的文学描写的全过程。

关键词:  《钟形罩》  西尔维娅普拉斯  科学症状 文学描写

Abstract

Depression ranks as one of the major health problem in modern society. One characteristic of depression is the strong contrast between the images depressed people create for themselves and the images the objective world fixes on them. Thus, to explain the feeling of depression to mentally healthy people is relatively hard. However, in her biographical novel The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath successfully integrates the specific symptoms into her story, impresses the readers with the astonishing impacts of depression.

For my thesis, I compare the actual medical condition of depression and the literal expression of depression in The Bell Jar. Specifically, the discussion includes three parts: the formation, the development, and the aftermath of depression. Firstly for the formation, this paper attempts to make a contrast between some major triggers of depression and Esther the main character’s related life experiences, in order to find out the possible triggers of depression from her background; secondly, this paper analyzes Esther’s performance on the first phase of depression, including some physical changes like insomnia and eating disorder, tracks the entire process of how she loses her basic life skills due to the depression; then this paper analyzes Esther’s performance on the second phase of depression, mainly focusing on her mental changes like hallucinations and delusions. The paper also examines some invisible effects of depression, for example the cognitive mode of “being unable to see any positive side of anything” and the isolation feeling of being distant from other people. Those effects actually constitute her sufferings in the depression. Through this examination, this paper reveals the process of how Sylvia Plath fluently blends the actual symptoms of depression into her depiction of depression in a fictional world. 

Keywords;  The Bell Jar  Sylvia Plath  Depression  Medical Symptoms  Literal Expression

Contents

1.  Introduction1

1.1 Sylvia Plath and Her Depression.1

1.2 Literature Review4

1.3 Theoretical Framework.4

1.4 Thesis Structure.6

2.  Formation of Depression in The Bell Jar.9

2.1 Family Triggers of Depression9

2.2 Individual Triggers of Depression.11

3.  Development of Depression in The Bell Jar15

3.1 Triggering Event of Her First Phase Depression15

3.2 First Phase of Depression: Physical Symptoms Manifested.16

3.3 Triggers of Second Phase of Depression: Attempted Suicides. .18

3.4 Second Phase of Depression: Mental Symptoms Manifested20

4.  Examples of Specific Writing of Depression in The Bell Jar23

4.1 The Feeling of Loss23

4.2 The Creation of an Isolated World24

Conclusion28

Acknowledgement29

Reference30