Buddy is known for taking Esther on less-than-excellent dates, but the one that stuck with me most is the hospital tour. Esther is interested by the surgery lesson, the pickled babies, and the lectures, but watching a live birth really freaks her out because she is so attuned to the mother's pain.
All the male doctors are very businesslike, and they seem more concerned about how Will the third-year-man is handling the situation than how Mrs. Tomolillo is feeling. Instead, Esther is completely focused on the mother's experience. Even though the male doctors try to explain that the drug makes you forget pain, Esther knows that Mrs. Tomolillo is in agony.
From Esther's perspective, the birthing process seems like a dehumanizing, dystopian nightmare. Esther knows that she's expected to have children of her own, so the live birth shakes her in a deeply personal way. While watching the birth, Esther realizes that the romanticized stories she's been told about birthing are completely false. Giving birth seems to be more about extracting the baby from the woman and less about the woman's own wellbeing. Esther is terrified because she can see herself as another Mrs. Tomolillo in a few short years, and that's not a future she wants for herself.
Watching the live birth doesn't exactly set a romantic tone for Esther and Buddy's date. Esther says that her mother always talks about how "fine and clean" Buddy is, and she knows that "fine and clean" means "you should marry Buddy, have sex with him, and make many babies". She also knows that giving birth is a horrific experience for the mother, even though she would be too drugged to remember anything afterwards. Esther realizes that Buddy wants to go ahead with the standard progression from marriage to babies, and she doesn't want to be a part of that.
In a way, Will the third-year-man is right when he tells Esther that she'll never want to have a baby after watching a live birth. But isn't it better for a woman to know what's going to happen to her body so that she can decide for herself?
The point you make at the end is totally true, that it's exactly important that Esther sees this and knows what birth really means. Sometimes thinking about birth really freaks me out and just like the idea of marriage, and I think its especially weird when you're younger and your whole life is dedicated to school. Like imagine just one day "giving that up" but your whole life is so dedicated to it right now; the notion of settling down over pursuing a career seems like suicide basically after working day and night to excel academically.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading Esther's account of the live birth, it's really brought to my attention just how horrifying it seems. However, I really like your concluding point. I think it's kind of unfair to be left in the dark about something so possibly traumatizing. Even now, people are expected to have families and progress to the next generation. There's nothing wrong with that, but it's important that a woman wanting to have children knows the risks. I mean, that's why there are always consent forms for surgery -- it's never a good idea to just walk into something with no clue and regret not knowing beforehand.
ReplyDeleteI want to add on to your last point, pointing out that Will follows that with "It'll be the end of the human race", as if if women see what the birthing process is really like, they'll never want to have kids again (fair) and it will be all the women's fault that the human race. He never considers that not only does it look painful, but he could also do something about it to make it less horrifically dehumanizing, but instead he chalks it up to oh that's the way it is and it just be like that.
ReplyDeleteI love the point you made about the birthing process being more about the extraction of the baby than the wellbeing of the woman. While, in essence, this is absolutely true and rightfully so, the way you phrased it made it sound so robotic and dehumanizing. The woman serves the sole purpose of creating the baby, and the birth is to extract the baby she made. Like you pointed out, Esther does not want to be valued for her ability to procreate. Therefore, she wants nothing to do with the idea of marriage or birth.
ReplyDeleteI think there's something really powerful in the image of Esther just standing there, horrified, while Buddy and his doctor friends openly laugh about this genuinely awful thing they're doing. I don't think Buddy and his friends are evil, but their disregard for Mrs. Tomolillo is indicative of their society's disregard for women. It's no wonder that Esther feels lonely when she's the only one who realizes how genuinely terrible this is, and everyone around her is so quick to dismiss it.
ReplyDeleteIt made me so mad how Will and the other doctors were joking about how Esther shouldn't see the birth because "it will end the human race". Like, what kind of joke?? They were just kind of like yes, birth is painful and there are many risks that come with it, like dying, but don't worry, you won't even know what's going on because if you did, that will be the end of the human race and it'll all be your fault. The only reason they're telling her that is because they know that what they are doing is wrong.
ReplyDeleteThe live birth and Esther's narration of it unnerved me too. All the doctors were men and they were more focused on Will the student than Mrs. Tomolillo. I disliked how robotic the live birth scene felt and how little emphasis there was on Mrs. Tomolillo as a person during the whole procedure.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading Lady Lazarus, I immediately thought again of this scene, and I think that adds another interesting perspective to it. I also wonder how Plath's changed situation (she had two children and a miscarriage, I believe) affected how Esther describes the hospital scene and then how Plath writes about male doctors in Lady Lazarus.
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