This book is an exploration of depression, mental health, and the restrictive expectations placed on women in society. The main character, Esther, is a semi-autobiographical stand in for the author and you can definitely see the parallels if you know about Sylvia Plath's life. The narrative is an exploration of a  privileged woman's deteriorating mental health. I emphasize Esther's privilege because a lot of Esther's experience is informed by her privilege as a white woman. I will elaborate.

Esther does suffer various forms of oppression such as the expectations of marriage and having children that society imposes on her. Furthermore, Esther often ruminates about having sex and relationships. She is aware of the double standard there is for women and men when engaging in sexual activity. All of these issues are part of much of the female experience. However, in the context of women of color and queer women Esther's struggles are very narrow in scope. Esther is very depressed and it's clear from the way she often feels dissapointed by the relationships around her as well as her cirumstances. As the book progresses, her mental health deteriorates and she ends up staying in a psychiatric hospital. Her stay ends up being completely funded by by an anonoymous sponsor. The fact that she has access to pschiatric care at all and on top of it has it fully funded is very privileged. Most people, either due to race or socioeceonomic reasons, would not have access to that level of care. I think there is definitely space to explore the stories of white women like Esther. However, I think the limited scope of this experience must also be acknowledged. 

I can't help but feel that Esther is also heavily informed by Sylvia Plath's internalized racism. There is an instant in the book where she is in the psychiatric hospital and there is a black janitor that Esther describes very negatively. It falls into many racist stereotypes pertaining to the lack of intelligence of black people as well as their likeness to animals. It's jarringly racist and even the dialogue Plath uses for the black janitor feels like something pulled out of a minstrel show from the 1800s. There is another instance in the book when she is looking at herself in the mirror and is not happy with what she sees. The description she uses for the image she sees in the mirror is "smudgy eyed Chinese woman". I don't think I need to explain the prejudice there. She just uses these negative comparisons often enough that it's hard not to notice.

Despite the shortcomings of the book, I still found the story interesting and worth a read. I think it is a good representation of the state of mental healthcare during the 1960s. The outdated treatments are hard to read about at times. A lot of people suffered through treatments like electroshock therapy with no benefit. It offers insight into the neglect that a lot of women with mental illness probably felt at the time. To this day, as far as we have come there is still a lot of stigma related to mental health for both men and women. I wish Sylvia Plath had lived long enough to write more than one novel, but I'm happy that we at least have this novel as well as many of her poems and essays to remember her by.