Strong feelings abound concerning Faber's cover for the 50th anniversary edition of Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar. Against a background that acknowledges the frequent mismatch between a book's cover and its content, Plath aficionados have reached for their keyboards to express their outrage – and occasional support – for this particular choice.
Sorry, but I can't see what they're so het up about. I think the image of a young woman fixing her make-up
in a powder compact is entirely appropriate, perhaps the best cover yet. It doesn't signal chick lit to me -- that's all line drawings of long-limbed girl-women skipping
through autumn leaves -- but something far deeper:
The reflected image of the woman also demonstrates Esther's inability to unify her Self, and the splitting of her selves, which provide the main impetus for her admittance to the mental institution.
ThePlathDiaries
I'm also bemused that people consider the make-up image to be trivialising depression as, while I've succumbed to both on occasion, I've always found the former the more sinister in a way. Of course the current wave of feminism has moved beyond griping about the tyranny of looking pretty, so why the hostility, unless we don't like to admit there's still something to fight for in this arena?
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