Plath's "Bell Jar"
Themes, Metaphors, Motifs
Who said it?
Plot Questions
Random
100

The year the book was first published

What is: 1963
100
At one point, Buddy metaphorically compares a poem to "a piece of _______"?
What is dust
100
"Children make me sick."
Who is Esther
100

The name of the male doctor (psychiatrist) who Esther first meets with (and who costs her mother 25$ an hour)

Who is Dr. Gordon

100

Esther adopts this pseudonym when she goes out with Doreen in the beginning of the novel

What is Elly Higginbottom

200
The pseudonym Plath published the novel under

What is: Victoria Lucas

200
Explain what the fig tree symbolizes to Esther
What is life's many choices and Esther's inability to commit
200
“What a man is is an arrow into the future, and what a woman is is the place the arrow shoots off from.”
Who is Mrs. Willard
200

After her night with Marco, Esther does this to her wardrobe

What is throws it off the roof of her hotel piece by piece

200
Who is Jay Cee?
Who is Esther's boss at the magazine
300

The number of pages in your copies of The Bell Jar

what is: 234 (guesses within -10 to +10 of this accepted)

300
Esther hears the repetitive "brag" of her heart beating "I am I am I am" on two separate occasions. What are those occasions?
What is when she tries to drown herself in the ocean but fails and when she attends Joan's funeral
300

“Do you think there's something in me that drives women crazy?” 

Who is Buddy Willard

300

In New York Esther get food poisoning after eating huge amounts of this food

What is: caviar
300
Whose blood does Esther wear on her face?
Who is Marco
400

The novel opens with this sentence: "It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the ............." fill in the missing name

What is: Rosenbergs

400

A key symbol of Esther's clinical depression, mental isolation, and distorted perception of the world, that is lifted towards the end of the book. 

What is: The Bell Jar

400

“I knew my baby wasn't like that… Like those awful people. Those awful dead people at that hospital…I knew you'd decide to be all right again.”

Who is: Esther's mother

400

Doctors experiment with mental health treatments in the book and one treatment involves injections of insulin. They affect Esther physically in this way:

What is: weight gain

400
When Esther sees Buddy naked, all she can think about is _________________?
What is turkey neck and gizzards
500

The city Plath was living in when The Bell Jar was published

What is: London

500

Esther says she's numb like a ___________ in the beginning of the story. 

What is a trolleybus (showing her lack of feeling even though she is supposed to be having the time of her life)

500

"I read about you. Not how they found you, but everything up to that, and I put all my money together and took the first plane to New York."

Who is Joan

500

The name of Buddy Willard's college

What is Yale

500

The name of the radio DJ that Esther and Doreen meet and go home with in New York

Who is: Lenny Shepherd
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