1-17-23
When they tell you you are made of stars, do not let them forget what stars are made of. Stars are not glitter, not stickers on the ceiling, not there for decoration. Stars are chunks of collapsing galaxy. They are hundred-thousand mile wide nuclear furnaces that consume their surroundings into death. They are not friendly; they do not exist to write poems about. Stars are not made of metaphors. You are not made of other people’s words. When they tell you you are made of stars. look them in the eye and remind them that so are they, and so is the earth, and so is the gum on the bottom of your shoes, and so is the fist you will hit them with the next time they try to placate you with their condescending bullshit – When they tell you you are different from other girls, ask them why you should want to be. Do not let them call you dream girl. Do not let them trap you up on a pedestal, surrounded by books that cannot hurt them. Read things that can hurt them. Your mind is a forest richer than folklore; do not let your curiosity be reduced to an accessory. Your intelligence is not a fashion statement. Your existence is not a novelty. You are not a metaphor for someone else’s problems. When they tell you you are made of stars, tell them you have always known this. Tell them you have fire in your bone marrow, that you are burning with the deaths of the entire universe before you. When they tell you you are made of stars, tell them you know. Tell them they should keep their distance.
When They Tell You You Are Made of Stars - Melissa Victoria
TANGLED 2010 • dir. Nathan Greno & Byron Howard
“Woody Allen is holding a copy of The Bell Jar as he is perusing his girlfriend’s bookshelf: “Sylvia Plath: interesting poetess whose tragic suicide was misinterpreted as romantic by the college-girl mentality.” Here, Allen seems to be implying that young female readers of The Bell Jar just don’t get it; they misconstrue the actual content behind the novel, and instead come out seeing the book as romantic. The reality, of course, is in fact the opposite. Yes, many young women relate to The Bell Jar and see themselves in the character of Esther Greenwood. Stories about young women within this particular context (that analyze the abusive and sexist ways society treats them, as well as looks into women with mental illnesses) are rare and, as such, it is hardly surprising that women relate to it. Additionally, as I have discussed here, many women also enjoy the novel because they see the level of skill and intellect that was put into it, oftentimes more so than many critics have. Plath herself said that she had no patience for “cries from the heart that are informed by nothing except a needle or a knife,” and yet more often than not the actual critics seem to forget this. Instead, they say that because the novel was the autobiographical story of someone with a mental illness, it is allowed to be brushed off and doesn’t merit grand literary analysis. Then, when the novel is popular with the very demographic it is focused on, critics then tell
the fans they are romanticizing a tragic story because they relate to it, and then label the novel itself as inferior because of the way it resonates with young women, a group of people that society loves to mock and ridicule. The reality, of course, is simply that in The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath is saying things that are true. She is telling an honest story about her experiences being a woman with a mental illness, and also just a woman in general. And her story isn’t pleasant, or sweet, or any of the things young girls are “supposed” to believe. It’s incredibly unflattering to men at large, as it calls out the multitude of sexist and truly horrible things they do to women on a regular basis. The fact that the novel is autobiographical just makes it that much worse in the eyes of men: she’s not even fabricating these incidents, because they are essentially her real life.“