Paraliterary Labors in Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar: Typists, Teachers, and the Pink-Collar Subtext

Unlike some postwar authors, Sylvia Plath resisted the temptation to bolster her reputation as a writer by exploiting the image of the secretary. Instead, Plath deployed the opposition between "writing" and "typewriting" to shine a critical light on the sexual division of textual labor. Plath used The Bell Jar to foreground the plight of young women who possessed the talent to become writers and editors but were discouraged from doing so by discriminatory hiring practices and a restrictive social imaginary.